A new experience for RGB!

17 Wednesday Sep 2014

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ale, Apple, beer, blonde, brewing, craft, craft beer, Grove, guy, Hot, Hot Blonde Jalapeño Blonde Ale, jalapeño, Porter, regular, regular guy brewing, review, reviewed, reviews, smoked, Smokey, Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter

This week, like most weeks, started off with an update about our brewnanigans (yes I just combined brewing with shenanigans, deal with it!) that took place over the weekend. This week, unlike most weeks, comes with exciting news, an experience the Regular Guys haven’t had yet.

Let’s rewind to two Wednesdays ago.

It was a day like most other early September days, incredibly hot, terribly humid. After a long day of work I found myself at a FedEx with two packages. One package addressed to Nick from Nick’s Beer Blog the other to Lee from Beerin’it. I was sending our beer out for sampling and review. This is something that we’ve never done before. Sure we’ve given friends and family and a few local strangers samples of our beer, and while we value their opinions, it tends to be ever so slightly biased. Anyway, finally we were going to get an honest review from people who know beer.

Thursday. I didn’t think much about the delivery as it wasn’t going to arrive at the destinations until Friday. My only concern was that the packages would make it in one piece.

Friday. I checked the status of the delivery on the FedEx website every hour on the hour. I gave updates to Nick and Lee every time I checked until finally it had been delivered. Then I proceeded to bug them more about when they were going to sample our beer! Not my most professional behavior, I must admit. Nick came right out and said he wouldn’t be sampling until early the following week. Lee put his in the refrigerator right away, but kept me on pins and needles until last Sunday when he posted this to Twitter.

The complement and beautiful photo were well worth the wait! I felt like a giant weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Someone from a different geographical area enjoyed and appreciated our beer! It’s a wonderful feeling. You can read the full review here.

Now Nick kept us waiting a bit longer, but we just so happened to send our beer to him when he had five other beers to review. Sucks to be him right? So I did get an idea of how his review was going to go when he sent me a direct message on Twitter last Tuesday that went a little something like this.

One of the best porters he’s ever had? That’s a huge compliment coming from a guy who reviews beer all the time! You can read the full review here.

Two beers positively reviewed from two different parts of the country, not a bad start for Regular Guy Brewing! Nick has two more reviews coming, one for our Hot Blonde Jalapeño Blonde Ale and one for our currently unnamed and not quite finished EPA. I’ll share those as they become available.

Until next time…keep the shiny side up!

Want an update? No? Too bad!

15 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by Justin in Brewing

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ale, Apple, beer, blonde, brewing, carbonation, craft, craft beer, fermentation, Grove, guy, Hot, jalapeño, keg, kegging, Porter, regular, regular guy brewing, secondary, smoked, Smokey, Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter

Another weekend has come and gone too fast. At least we got a little work done on Friday. We have a homebrew competition coming up in October and we are taking five gallons of our Hot Blonde Jalapeño Blonde Ale and five gallons of our Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter. It’s a pretty neat concept, it’s more of an informal competition, but there will be about 200 tasters. That’s a lot of exposure!

Anyway back to Friday. Secondary on our Smokey Grove was complete so it was time to keg. Once the kegging was finished, we snuck a taste of the leftovers. I have to say, this was by far our best batch. The smokiness and the apple sweetness were perfectly balanced. Our last batch was a little heavy on the smoke, but this one was damn near perfect. Kudos to Seth for not only creating an amazing recipe, but also for achieving the proper smoke flavor to balance the whole thing out.

I don’t have many pictures to share this week, but here they are!

Secondary fermentation is complete and we’re ready to keg!

Brian is doing…something?

Seth is the beer whisperer. They’re having a conversation right now.

Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter into the keg. Carbonate and let it sit until the competition. It’s going to be tough to not sneak a few pints!

Well, that’s it! Another brew in the books! I hope you all have a great week. Big brew weekend coming up with StolzeStyle Brewing, our super top secret brew is on deck!

Until next time…

I got your update right here buddy!

02 Tuesday Sep 2014

Posted by Justin in Brewing

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Apple, beer, brewing, craft, craft beer, fermentation, Grove, guy, Porter, primary, regular, regular guy brewing, secondary, smoked, Smokey, Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter, strep, strep throat, throat, update

Here’s the facts fool!

– We were supposed to brew our Hot Blonde Jalapeño Blonde Ale on Friday.

– We didn’t brew our Hot Blonde Jalapeño Blonde Ale on Friday.

That’s the facts fool!

So, what happened?

It’s a funny story actually. No it’s not. I had strep throat. Brian and Seth knew how much I was looking forward to brewing, and being the big ol sweeties they are, decided to postpone our brewing session until next Friday. That’s what I’m going to believe anyway. They did, however, transfer the Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter to secondary. Brian sent me a few pictures of the action and I’ll share them with you now.

The first fermentation is complete and from what Brian said, it was a very active and almost violent one! Here is being transferred from primary to secondary.

Here’s the Smokey Grove going into secondary on fresh Fiji apples.

Here’s a closer look at the Smokey Grove and the Fiji apples getting all sexy with each other. Another week in secondary and she’ll be ready to keg!

Well, that’s it. I wish I had more to share, but you know, strep throat.

Until next time!

Monday = Update Time!

18 Monday Aug 2014

Posted by Justin in Brewing

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Apple, beer, brewing, craft, craft beer, grain, Grove, guy, hops, mash, mash in, Porter, regular, regular guy brewing, smoked, Smokey, Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter

Good morning Monday! Said no one ever. At least I have a photo update to brighten your day! Friday night we got together and brewed our Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter. We changed the recipe slightly this time around, but only to lessen the amount of smoke flavor. As one random taster said, “it tastes like a campfire in your mouth!” Not necessarily a bad thing, but we collectively agreed that the smoke could be toned down a bit. So without further adieu, here’s our night in pictures!

The brew session is about to begin!

There’s the magical water correction ingredients to adjust the water to make a perfect porter!

Brewmaster Seth is manning the controls and regulating temperatures.

Here’s some of the grains that make up our Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter.

Almost time to mash in!

Brian and Seth pretending to do something important.

Brian and I mashing in. It’s a tough job, but somebody’s gotta do it!

Brian loves the aroma of the grains as they mix with the water.

Here’s a closer look at the grain.

Seth checks the numbers of the first runnings.

This is the first runnings in the kettle. It’s a beautiful sight!

Brian takes a well deserved break!

The wort is starting to boil and we’re getting ready for the hot break.

Full on boil and hop additions.

Just when you think it couldn’t get any better, throw in some apples!

Aerate, pitch the yeast and call it a night!

There you have it, our Friday night brew session in pictures. This batch will go on to a competition, we’ll keep you posted on the results when we get them.

Hopefully the beer porn will ease you into your Monday! Until next time…

Let’s talk about stuff!

15 Friday Aug 2014

Posted by Justin in Brewing, Business Stuff

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Tags

alpha, alpha brewing company, Apple, beer, brewing, business, craft, craft beer, Grove, guy, Porter, regular, regular guy brewing, smoked, Smokey, Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter, Stolze, Stolze Style Brewing

Hi guys and one gal! How have you been? It’s been a while since we’ve posted anything so I’m going to bring you up to speed. The last time I posted I talked about the business meeting we were having on a Friday night and you complained and said we weren’t doing anything fun or exciting. Boy were you wrong! We lined up the rest of the year’s brewing schedule and drank beer! It doesn’t get much better than that.

Then last Friday we met up with Eric and Jennifer from Stolze Style Brewing at Alpha Brewing Company for a little home brewer meet and greet.

Alpha’s excellent beer was only topped by the excellent company. We shared many great stories and delicious beers and by the end of the night our conversation shifted to collaboration. Now, I can’t tell you all the details about our collaboration beer because it’s top secret, but I can tell you it’s going to be a “Storter.” You might be asking yourself, “what the hell is a Storter?” I will tell you. A “Storter” is a beautiful combination of a Stout and a Porter (thank you Alpha for the inspiration). Basically it takes all the best characteristics of both styles and gently and lovingly swirls them together. I can sense your excitement. This style mash – up is great, but it’s not even the best part. The best part is…TOP SECRET! Sorry I can’t spill the beans just yet. The only other thing I can tell you is this epic collaboration is taking place on Friday, September 19th and it will blow doors down.

Your socks will literally be knocked off your feet. Not unlike that picture up there. Smoke will come out and everything.

That brings us to today! It’s Friday and you know what that means, we’re brewing! We will be brewing our Smokey Grove Apple Smoked Porter for a competition that is taking place in October.

The smokey apple flavor of our porter will go wonderfully with the fall weather and more than likely win the best beer in the entire universe award. That’s a real award and we’re going to win it because I’m Bob Johnson, and I’m a winner! (Where did that Bob Johnson business come from and what does it mean?)

Until next time babies!