Five Islands Brewing Co

     Located under the eastern terrace of WIN stadium Five Islands Brewing Co looks across the park to one of Wollongong's  many beaches. What could be better we thought than to try these beers in this setting.

     We should have known that it was to good to be true, for as the barman poured the first 4 beers what came out was 4 glasses of foam and the barman swearing at the taps for being crap before heading to another font for the last 2 beers. We should of asked for the first 4 beers to be replaced and next time we will.
     The first beer they offer is a Draught Ale, a very pale straw coloured wheat beer without using the wheat beer yeast that gives it, it's balanced flavour. This beer has a taste that doesn't gel with too much bitterness and nothing to back it up.
     Next is their Koelsch, a plae straw colour, this koelsch has a pleasantly hoppy grapefruity taste that screams out typical german Koelsch.
     Along comes their Wit beer, golden and cloudy don't be put off by this as it's the way that the yeast and malt work in this style with some clove and orange this spicy typical wheat beer is interesting to try.
     Now comes the Rust Amber ale with a nice hop aroma but an over powering malt (I think crystal malt) taste, your then left with a mouth puckering bitter after taste.
     The Porter comes along and has a good espresso and chocolate nose and again just seems typical porter.
     Longboard is theur seasonal ale with hints of cut grass and a bit of citrus and refreshingly lite bitterness although the wife thinks it "smells like an armpit and tastes like she washed socks in it" .
     All these beers are brewed off site and when asked all staff could say was it was somewhere in north Wollongong, It seems that rather than make a name for their beers they are riding on the back of the craft beer name and having it brewed to the middle of the style with no individuality of expression of who they are or their location.

    Steve's pick - Koelsch      Wife's pick as the runt of the litter - Longboard
  
    Tasting panels 3 200ml glasses for $7

    Contracted brewed off site No tours

Changing of the Seasons

     With summer starting to draw to a close it's time to turn from brewing the Summer Ales like Saison and fruity Pale Ales, those light tangy thirst quenchers and move to the heartier more robust Stouts, Double IPA's and Barley wines. Something to put a bit of fire in your belly and warm you up on those cold winter nights.
     It may still be February but we are gearing up to brew a big Russian Imperial Stout which should come out at about 9% and have lots of roast caramel and coffee tastes and aromas. As the alcohol content is quite high it's going to need 6 - 8 weeks in the fermenter and a good 2 months at least in the bottle, may be longer if so it will be great for next year.  We plan for this beer to be pitch black and to this end we will be using a good whack of chocolate malt and maybe some extra espresso coffee. As this is going to be a big beer we are looking for a final gravity of about 1.020, slightly high by some standards but it should leave a nice fullness to it.
  
 Our name for this beer will be Siberian Crude (black as night and twice as thick).

     After that we are looking for a good Oatmeal Stout to bring a bit more rich creamy texture with not so much alcohol as the Imperial and a shorter brewing time, something you can drink on a week night without feeling it too much the next day. We will still be brewing Hoptastic and the Meads, Hoptastic as it's such an easy drinker it never lasts long and the mead as it needs such a long lagering stage.

     Autumn is a good time to get all your brew gear clean and ready for a full winters production as the colder weather keeps brew temps down and slows the ferment a bit, both will help to keep beer nicer as it won't develope the phenol / estery taste that comes with fermenting at high tenps (above 21 - 22*c).  Now is also the time to plan out your brews and to add together the grain bills for all your recipes, this allows you to buy in bulk and save a bit of money you will just need some decent scales at home to break it back down.

Coffee Pants Launch

Don't forget that tomorrow HopDog BeerWorks is releasing it's new Stout Coffee Pants as well as the bottled version of Ham on Rye

 HopDog Beer Works Nowra
2/175 Princes Hwy
South Nowra
0428293132
 www.hopdog.com.au

In the Brew Room this Week

      This week started off full bore with the all grain Saison being brewed on saturday, 5 hours brewing plus the clean up makes for a full day. I was glad to get it in the fermenter and be done for the day. I must say I think the bilge pump cooling system worked a treat and to drop the temperature from boiling to 24*c in 20 odd minutes is great, out of 4 bags of ice we had 1/2 a bag left in the esky so I think we got right to, next time though we will move the keg off the bricks we were boiling it on to cool as I think it added to the cooling time with the bricks radiating all of their heat back to the keg.

     The Plum wine also sees it's first racking this week, and what a load of sediment it's dropped. A few more weeks and it will be crystal clear and ready to bottle.

     The batch of Hoptastic and the Strongbow clone have both served their 1 week in the house and have been moved through the mud under the house waiting their turn to be drunk.

Cheers and Beers
HBB

Brew Day Belgium Saison

    Well the day finally arrived to christen the new mash tun / wort boiler and we decided to do the last Saison of the season and were especially pleased The Brew Shop had a new Saison yeast just imported from the States WLP 566 Saison 2 Ale yeast. 

  
     The day was going to be a long one so we started at 10am heating the strike water for the grain, bringing it to 68 - 70*c. We used 20L for this and it took about 45mins to get there. Once there we readied our grain bag we were using a brew in the bag arrangement as at the moment we do it all in one keg. In went all the grain, just over 5kg worth all up and the calcium chloride (3gm) and calcium sulphate (1gm). Stabalising the temp at 63*c we left it for 80mins stirring occasionally and adding heat when needed. Next we bought the temp up to 68*c for 10min to give us full starch conversion.

      Lifting the bag out into a colander we washed the grain with 5L of hot water to get the last of the sugars out then squeezed out as much of the liquid as we could. Once this was done it was time for the boil, cranking up the heat we started the 90min boil that was required. With 60min to go we added the Hallertaurer hops and then with 10min to go we added the Saaz hops. After the boil was completed we used a wort chiller ( a piece of copper pipe coiled up to fit in the boiler that you run cool water through) hooked up to a bilge pump in an esky full of iced water. Running the pump off an old car battery it took only 20mins to bring the temp down from boiling to 24*c were we could transfer it to the fermenter and add the Styrian Golding Hops, whirlfloc, yeast nutrient and yeast and bring the volume up from 15L left after the boil to 23L.

     By now it's 3pm and we still have clean up, so as I said it's along day but quite fun even if it was one of the rare 30*c plus days we've had this summer. The full recipe and directions are on the recipe page and thanks to the ESBrewing site for the recipe.

    Cheers
Hairy Back Brewing

HopDog Beer Works

    Tim and Therese started HopDog Beer Works in Nowra last year with the goal of brewing top class Ales in their own style in their own brewery. What they have succeeded in doing is setting the east coast craft Beer scene  on fire with their Beers in demand all along the coast by bottle shops, craft Beer pubs and Beer enthusiasts. They run a true micro brewery, 200L at a time and face at the moment the question of how big to grow and how fast. Thankfully it doesn't interfere with the brewing or the releasing of new Beers.

  
     With the cellar door in front of the brewery Tim and Therese are more than happy to guide you through their range of beers and then show you through the brewery and answer any questions you may have.You can purchase stubbies and refillable growlers and kegs are available commercially, also wort kits for some of the beers are available for those who wish to replicate the beers.
 
     HopDog use an effective 3 pot all grain set up and grind their grain directly into the mash tun saving time and labour. They believe in recycling the waste were possible and now send the waste grain to Bombaderry High School and a local farmer where it is composted or turned into stock feed.

     Their beers range from Black Sunshine a delicious Stout smelling of chocolate and coffee (sold out at the moment but will be coming back) to their Horn IPA and Midgee session beer with Citra hops and very easy to drink. This is backed up by the seasonal beers such as the Belgium Lawn Mower, a great summer saison which is running out fast, Ham on Rye with less hops and an all malt taste you get a smoky bacony combination making you feel that your having a bacon sandwich. Available next weekend (25/2) will be the next in the dark and strange series Coffee Pants, made with the help of a local coffee roaster this Stout will have big coffee notes. At this release HopDog will be putting on a BBQ and along with the coffee roaster will be available to tell you all about it.

     The weekend after Coffee Pants release will see a Peach Beer being offered, with partial batch barrel aging and partial aging on the fruit this promises to be very interesting indeed. With the start of winter we will also be seeing the Autumn Ales and Barley wine seasonals.

     Tim and Therese do all the work themselves, filling, capping and labeling all the bottles, it's a nice if time consuming touch. The beers are good value at $4.50 a stubbie or $60 a case of 16 and with postage available very easily accessible.

     HopDog will be at the Canberra Craft Beer Festival on April 14,15 and Paddys Hop Harvest on the 21st of April.

      My Pick -Belgium Lawn Mower        Wifes Pick - Ham on Rye

     Brewery tours available on request  -  Free

HopDog Beer Works   www.hopdog.com.au

In the Brew Room this Week

     This week in the Brew Room has been fairly busy, the medium Mead has been racked off the sediment and is clearing nicely, The hop trails received their second dose of Bramling Cross and Boadicea 35gm each and the Plum wine is progressing nicely in the bucket and is in the fermenter now.

     The Hoptastic and Strongbow clone brews have been bottled and are serving their 1 week in the house before being put under the house. ( the 1 week allows the priming sugar to do it's work and carbonate the
brew. )

     The first batch of sweet Mead has been started, using 2kg of honey instead of 1.5kg for the medium Mead and is and incredibly dark colour thanks to the Stringy Bark Honey from Summerland Honey. The sweet Mead recipe is now on the recipes page.

Cheers