Losing My Innocence

04 Tuesday Mar 2014

Posted by Justin in Just for Fun, Observations

Tags

beer, Boulevard, Boulevard Brewing Company, brewing, company, craft beer, guy, regular, regular guy brewing, Unfiltered, Unfiltered Wheat, wheat

Keeping in the spirit of our first times that Seth wrote about the other day, I thought I’d share my first time with craft brews as well. I touched on my more recent experience with all the complex flavors and aromas in a post titled Beer Noob back when we first started brewing. We were doing “research and development” one night and was blown away by all the varieties of craft beer I had never tried. My first time actually goes back a few years prior.

I was working for a Miller-Coors distributor, which was a dream come true for me as my favorite beer at the time was Coors Light (I know, I know), but we also distributed quite a few imports and craft beers I had never heard of. Continue reading →

It’s brew/bottle/drink day!

14 Friday Dec 2012

Posted by Justin in Brewing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

ale, American, American pale ale, beer, brewing, brown, Friday, guy, honey, honey brown, pale, recipe, regular, regular guy brewing, revamped, wheat, wheat beer

It’s Friday!

Busy evening ahead ladies and gentlemen! Tonight we brew our honey brown, bottle our American pale ale, and drink our wheat. It’s going to be a good night!

We’ll keep you posted on all the goods and bads of the evening and a review of the how the revamped wheat recipe turned out.

Have a great weekend people!

Let’s have an update!

27 Tuesday Nov 2012

Posted by Justin in Brewing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

ale, beer, bottle, brewhouse, brewing, Brian, concoction, drinking, drunk, efficiency, Friday, Friday night, guy, mash, night, pale, pale ale, regular, regular guy brewing, Seth, wheat

Last Friday we brewed another batch of our Pale Ale. This recipe was tweaked a little based off our impression of our last two batches and some taste changes we wanted to make. With a hops change and a new grain addition, we are hoping we found the combo we are looking for.

Now to get technical, as far as the hands on brewing stuff, that is. Friday night was a huge night for us as brewers. All of our numbers matched up, our temperatures were constant, our mash and brewhouse efficiencies were were the highest we’ve ever seen them. Seth’s ingenious plumbing set up worked beautifully, we didn’t spill a drop! And it was the fastest we’ve ever brewed beer. All in all it was an awesome night! I’m extremely proud of Seth and Brian for all of the hard work, planning, and creativity that’s gone into our beer so far. I definitely feel like we are on the right track and I can’t wait to sample the fruits of our labor.

This Friday we bottle our latest wheat concoction, wish us luck!

Until next time!

Did we turn a beer making corner?

11 Sunday Nov 2012

Posted by Justin in Brewing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

ale, APA, beer, brewing, brown, confident, efficiency, excited, Friday, Friday night, guy, honey, honey brown ale, mash, mash efficiency, pale, pale ale, regular, regular guy brewing, wheat, wheat beer

Friday night we brewed for the first time in what seemed like a lifetime. You see, our last three beers had some issues. We spent nearly a month brainstorming and having non-brewing meetings trying to figure out what the issues were and what we could do differently to solve these problems.

Our wheat was weak in the flavor department and WAY over carbonated.

Our APA, which is our pride and joy, had decent flavor, but was WAY under carbonated.

Our Honey Brown had a good brown ale flavor, but lacked the honey taste we are going for and was WAY under carbonated.

That being said, we brewed our third version of our wheat on Friday. We came together and knocked it out like professionals! Everything went smoothly and our mash efficiency was that of a veteran home brewer. I think we may have found our combination to brewing greatness!

After three disappointing batches in a row, this was a breath of fresh air and just what these Regular Guys needed! I know I walked away Friday night confident and excited to brew again.

We’ll keep you posted!

It’s Update Time!

17 Wednesday Oct 2012

Posted by Justin in Brewing, What We're Drinking

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

all, all grain, all grain brewing, beer, brewing, corn sugar, grain, guy, heffeweizen, learned, lesson, lesson learned, mash, mash tun, regular, regular guy brewing, revamped, sexy, tun, wheat, wheat beer

Last night we cracked open our second attempt at our wheat beer. While this was our second attempt, it was our first attempt at all grain brewing and Seth’s revamped recipe.

While it was leaps and bounds above our first wheat beer, it’s not quite there yet. First of all, it was WAY to effervescent. Actually, when Brian left last night he thanked me for having him over for soda! We ran out of corn sugar when bottling this batch and had to use table sugar instead, and apparently, too much. How do you fix this problem? You buy a big ass bag of corn sugar, problem solved! The flavor is right on, but a little on the weak side. We ran in to some speed bumps while brewing this batch, but have since ironed out the issues while brewing other batches. Give us a break! It was our first all grain!

The most important lesson learned, if you’re the guy pouring the grains into the mash tun, make sure more grains get into the tun than get onto the floor…my bad.

Anyway we are extremely confident that our next wheat will be right where we want it to be. Seth’s recipe is amazing (as always), Brian’s going to be all sexy (as always) and I’ve been practicing pouring things into other things.

Brewing resumes on October 26th!