In the Brew Room this Week

     This week has seen everything we have brewing either racked off or bottled. So quite a lot of washing up and sterilising, the less glamorous side of brewing but probably the most important. As we are encouraging the yeast to grow, giving them the ideal conditions to do so ie warmth, food and a medium we need to ensure that only those we want are there. Now ideally any work with the yeast or an open fermenter should be carried out in a clean dust / hair free environment to avoid contamination but that's just not possible outside a lab so we make sure that what we can control we do. All our tools are cleaned and sanitised before use, as are the fermenters and bottles to give our brews the best chance of being contamination free.

     First up this week the second batch of medium Mead has been acid balanced and bottled, a nice and easy job as it's only a 4.5L batch. This freed up the fermenter for the next step of the Blueberry Melomel, which involved 500gm of blueberries being soaked in 500ml of boiling water to sanitise them and adding a 1/4 teaspoon of pectinese. The Sweet Mead base was then racked off onto this.

     This then freed up the fermenter for the other Sweet Mead to be racked off, this will help it to clear more and probably be ready for bottling with in the next few weeks.

     The Hoptastic we had brewing in the fridge has been bottled, not without it's own dramas, with the end of the bottling wand deciding to come off in a bottle with the end result of sticky beer being squirted over half the brew room. ( the clean up for this took longer than the actual bottling ) This beer is back in the fridge for some more lagering.

     The Bilge Pump Saison has been tested and we are very happy with the results, very different to the last Saison this one has a reserved taste and even though the brewing temp got up to about 26 - 27*c it has a very reserved ester taste and packs an almighty punch, coming in at a sneaky 7% alcohol you don't notice it straight away, there's no nasty alcohol taste just a gentle warming of the mouth when your about half way through the bottle. This beer should just get better and better.

     We will also be brewing and APA ( American Pale Ale ) this week but it will get a post of it's own so watch out for it soon.

Cheers and Beers

The Australian Hotel and Brewery

     The Australian Hotel and Brewery is located in Rouse hill on the out skirts of Sydney just up the road from Parklea Markets. Situated in a brand new purpose built premises the hotel and brewery combine to give you a spacious layout centred around the bistro and massive dinning / lounge area complete with a viewing spot to watch the brewery in operation. On the other side is the TAB, gaming lounge and pool tables, these are around the corner and as such are not the main focus.

     While having our tasting panels and watching the brewery operate, we were approached by Head Brewer Neal Cameron ( formerly of Di Bortoli's craft brewery The William Bull brewery ) who was  more than happy to chat with us not only about the brewery but also all things beer related. The brewery has a 20 hectolitres ( 2000L ) capacity with some very nice double skinned temperature controlled fermenters ( yes I'm jealous ) and is kept fairly busy with their range of 6 Beers (1 seasonal ) and a Cider.

Now for the Beers:

Pale Ale - 4.8% - Cloudy and all about the Hops, with galaxy hops used in each part of the process  this beer is a showcase for the Galaxy variety and is left to stand alone with no real malt taste.

Cerveza ( Mexican Lager ) - 4.4% - Served with a slice of lime, taste it before you squeeze the lime and you will be rewarded with a clean fresh beer tasting of lemon. With little body to it this beer goes down very easy and is a match for it's better known cousin. Remember if you squeeze the lime into it all you will taste is the lime.

Pilsner - 4.8% - Tasting of nothing but hops, its hard to get past the big hop taste and the bitterness to what you know should be there somewhere, a clean malt.

Dark ( Dark Lager ) - 5.1% - Roasted malt and caramelly notes with a recognisable NZ Motueka hop finish this beer is is a genuine credit to dark beers. Take a bow.

Smoked IPA ( seasonal ) - 5.8% - Smoked beers seem to be coming back into favour these days and this one is up there with the best, it's smoky bacon flavoured with a good bitterness and will take you straight back to any smoke house you've ever visited.

Light - 2.9% - Dry with a full mouth taste, you start off tasting rye and then move to the hops.

Spider Cider - 4.5% -  Dry with a measure of sweetness this Cider has a big apple taste. My Cider loving wife rates it as one of the best craft Ciders we have found to date.

Tasting Paddles - 5 glasses for $10 with a free schooner of your favourite.

Steve's Pick  - Dark Lager          Wife's Pick - Spider Cider

     Now for the food, whoever thought of a steak sandwich on pide with a check of roasted capsicum, 3 huge sauteed mushrooms and tomato and lettuce is a bloody genius and for $17 with a side of the most delicious chips, good value too. The peperoni pizza with mint was Divine and well worth the $20. I highly recommend that you check out the menu online and that you don't eat the day before as the meals are very generous.

     With an eye on the future The Australian hotel and Brewery will be installing a canning line into the brewery around September, when asked as to why cans, Neal's reply was they keep the Beer fresher, are easier to store, fill and distribute although not so good for home brewers who reuse bottles.

      All beers are currently only available in growlers for the take away option.

      Brewery tours are available daily but its best to book.

In the Brew Room this Week

     Sad news in the brew room this as we have had to dump the full batch of Fuzzy Navel, an Orange peel infused Pale Ale brewed back in August last year. We had had reservations about this beer as it had finished gravity of 1.020, fairly high for a 5% beer and with some strange tastes which we hoped would mellow with time but unfortunatly have not.

     In other news the Bilge Pump Saison has been bottled, and has come out with a very interesting taste, not as spicy / yeasty / estery as the last one which was extract plus grains with the original Belgium Saison yeast compared to this all grain with the Belgium Saison II yeast. At the moment it's conditioning in the fridge next to the latest Hoptastic at 18.5*c, it will be interesting to try after a week or so as we were expecting some big ester tastes due to the high fermentation temperatures, up to 27*c.

     Check out The Brew Shops new website as they have completly reworked it and I believe that the ES Brewing site is an exact copy, something to check on later in the week.

Cheers and Beers

Schwartz Brewery / Maquarie Hotel Sydney

     Located in the old Macquarie Hotel in Sydney the Schwartz Brewery is quickly making a name for itself in the craft brewing scene by also running the Canberra Craft Beer Festival in April, the Newcastle Craft Beer Festival and the Brew Mountains Craft Beer Festival both in October. Schwartz brew all their beer onsite with the brewery located downstairs along with 2 fermentation tanks and a viewing area for those interested in watching the brew magic happen. There is also another 5 fermentation tanks on the ground floor next to the main bar, this may seem like a lot but the brewery offers 6 different beers and a Cider.

     The hotel is a little disjointed / cut up with a bit of a maze to get through if you enter through the wrong door. With the brewery in the basement, the bar on the ground floor, Bill and Tonis bistro on the 1st floor and the accommodation above that. The bistro is great value for money and the burgers are worth the trip into Sydney alone although I would not wont to have to climb those stairs every day. I had the OG burger and the wife had the Cheese burger both came with chips and a burger pattie 20mm thick, they are awesome at $14 each.

     As for the beers we were impressed with the tasting tray looking like a tool box and the small labels but they do need to be upgraded to keep up with the beers being offered and more info on the beers themselves would be good so that people could match what they are tasting and educate themselves better.

    Now for the beers;

Pale Ale - 5% We didn't notice a lot of hops in this brew but a nice caramely malty taste, very easy to drink, with a late bitterness, dryness to it.

Pils - 5%  The combination of malts used here left us with a pronounced honey taste in an  otherwise excellent soft pilsner with no in your face bitterness you can get from the Saaz hops occasionally.

Hefeweizen - 5.4% Our pick of the day, with it's big fruit flavours you need to think for a moment until you realise it is banana  that your tasting and how well it blends in with the restrained spices, malts and hops.

Summertime -  4.6% This Ale has a fairly big mouthfeel / taste to it yet no one part jumps out at you with the malts and hops balanced nicely.

 Schwartz Bier - 4.9% With a roasted chocolaty taste and hints of coffee aromas this black beer has a complexity to it that makes you drink more so you can find the next layer and if served a few degrees warmer would really make it shine.

Sydney Cider - 4.5% With a low upfront apple taste and a good dose of bitterness this cider is not overly sweet and could use a bigger apple taste otherwise it would be great on a summer afternoon.

Unfortunately the Bavarian Red, Porter and the Belgian Strong Ale were either unavailable or not offered in the tasting tray.

              Tasting tray 6 Beers for $15                   Brewery tours - check with staff no fixed time

    Steve's pick  -   Hefeweizen             Wife's pick   -   Sydney Cider


Pro's  - great beers, food                              Con's  -  Stairs to get lunch

In the Brew Room this Week

    This week we have started a Blueberry Melomel which is basically a blueberry Mead, made the same way we start off by fermenting the honey with water, yeast and the yeast nutrient and after about 2 weeks we then rack it off and add the blueberries ( the full recipe will be on the recipe page), we have decided to make up a yeast starter for this batch, it's like a mini brew just to get the number of yeast cells that we pitch way up and help with the high alcohol content.

     You can see in the picture not only the different colours we get from the different honeys but also how they change as they clear, the middle bottle is the Mead we put down at the same time as the Plum wine it was a dark dirty brown but has changed to a tan / orange colour.

     The Plum / grape wine is coming along and has received a dose of campden tablets to stop fermentation prior to sweetening with 950gm of sugar as syrup and then bottling bottling.

     The Hoptastic brewing in the fridge is going nicely and has gotten it's next dose of Amarillo hops and is undergoing it's secondary ferment.

    We tasted our Boadicea hop trial and thought it tasted very cidery we were quite disappointed with it and will give it more time under the house, as for the Bramling Cross it has a nice citrus / berry taste different to other hops we have tried so we will probably use it again.

    The all grain Saison was tested this week as well and has reached it's terminal gravity of 1.004 which is good news as we were not sure if the higher mash temps were going to stop it short, so once bottled it will come in about 7%. This should be quite interesting as there was no overt alcohol taste of testing.

Cheers and Beers

George the IV in Picton

    The George the IV is located on the main street of  Picton toward the southern end and is quite unassuming with the front tables 1 step from the car park and with a nice view of the trees and creek next door. Going inside your greeted with an early Australianna type bar small and warm and the place to be on a cold winters night.

     The onsite brewery is in mothballs at the moment although there is talk of brewing there again it would take some commitment as it doesn't look like an easy place to brew, tight and compact.

     They offer 2 of their own brews, although they are brewed offsite in Sydney somewhere they are still enjoyable. They are,
     Scharers Bock at 6.4% a nice mild dark beer (could easily be used as an entry level beer for those who don't like dark beers. ) the alcohol is not apparent and I was glad that the bar maid pointed out that it is 6.4% as it wouldn't take many to put you over the limit and it's very easy to drink.
    Scharers Lager at 4.9%   Lightly hopped with a low malt taste, an easy drinking inoffensive middle of the road lager. 

    My pick - Bock       Wife's Pick - Bock    The 2 beers cost $9.90

    Brewery tours not available but you can look through the window.

In the Brew Room this Week

     This week we have transferred both the Meads over, with the medium Mead coming out almost as clear  as water and will only need another 2 weeks before bottling, while the sweet Mead although clearer still has a long way to go.

     The Plum wine has also been racked off again and on tasting we were most disappointed with the lack of plum taste and also quite a strong yeast taste. We decided to modify the brew with the addition of 4.8L of grape juice and we will probably look at sweetening the wine before bottling with some sugar syrup. We will also adjust the recipe and double the fruit and bring the total volume down to 15L

     Finally the long awaited correct fridge controller arrived, this unit plugs into the mains power and the fridge plugs into it. It has a temperature probe which you place inside the fridge ideally against the brew which tells the unit to switch the fridge on and off to suit your selected temperature. At the moment we have it at about 18.5*c and have put down a batch of Hoptastic to try.

     We also had to dump a batch of beer this week that we had brewed in august as it had a very unpleasant green apple taste that was just not going away with time, not an enjoyable thing to have to do but it was taking up room and milk crates.

     Finally we received our order of Ham on Rye and Coffee Pants today from HopDog BeerWorks and we look forward to drinking them.
     Ham on Rye took out the poll for your favaourite HopDog Beer
Cheers and Beers

Why We Homebrew

     We home brew for a number of reasons, the first and foremost is that we brew to our tastes. Because we control the ingredients and the process we can brew to a set result, if we want more or less bitterness we lengthen or shorten the boil time and amount of hops. If we want a very clean taste we leave it on the yeast longer and control the temperature by brewing in a fridge and if we want a smoother taste we lager the brew for longer ( up to 8 months ).
     This allows us to tailor our beers and keep them properly, they don't sit in warehouses or trucks in the summer sun.
      We brew in small batches (23L), this makes it easy to experiment and pretty cheap, your not risking much usually maybe $30 - $50 depending on your grain, yeast and hop bill. By brewing this way and even splitting batches with different hops and yeast we are able to produce a large variety of tastes, alcohol content and body fullness/ mouth feel. For exaple at the moment we currently have 6 different Pale Ales, 2 IPA's, a Double IPA, 3 Meads 2 Saison and a Cider. All this from a home brew set up.
     All this helps to broaden our tastes and means that now the only reason we buy beer is to try new types on the market and when visiting craft breweries.
      We also brew for the fun of it and enjoy the social aspect of the various brew clubs, events and competitions that most local areas seem to have. For those willing to ask, advice and help is everywhere, home brew stores clubs and forums are only to willing to help sort out any problems and most will even demonstrate new techniques for you.
     Most clubs will have a full range of home brewers, from the kit and kilo people all the way through to the exclusive all grain people. Be aware there's always some who think that unless you brew all grain, grow your own barley and hops, brew in a fridge, culture your yeast and keg your beer in 300 year old oak barrels your not really brewing. I say let them have their ideas and we will just get on and brew and have fun.
     Enjoy your brewing we sure do.

In the Brew Room this Week

     We had to upgrade the home fridge this week so this means that the brew room now has a brewing fridge and with the addition of a dual controller for heat and cold we can now start to experiment with temperature controlled brewing and seeing what results come from that.
     I was supposed to be showing you a picture of the new controller here but they online store decided to ship the wrong one, how can anyone make a profit when they make so basic a mistake.
     In other news the Brambling Cross and  Boadicea hop trails have been bottled and are serving their 1 week sentence in the house before moving under the house to lager.
     We also tried the Strongbow clone and decided it needs a lot more time  with very strong peach scnapps aroma a perculiar taste which we think is the lactose powder, so it gets another month under the house and we will check again.
     I received 2 new books this week, YEAST by Chris White and Jamil Zainasheff and BELGIAN ALE by Pierre Rajotte. I look forward to putting some of their ideas into practice
    Punch and Judy took out the title for your favourite Murrays Beer.

Cheers and Beers.