1. 843 Amber – did not carbonate, ended up drinking it but mixed it with light beer to create a decently tasty amber
2. Pale Ale #1 – (w/ caramel- Brewing Classic Styles) -first beer I shared proudly with others
3. Sierra Nevada Clone #1 – not quite a clone, but a great, hoppy beer. First kegged batch, first clear beer- enjoyed on vacation
4. Continental Pilsner – delicious and served at friends rehearsal dinner- floated keg easily
5. American Wheat -more like a pale ale but with some wheat liquid malt extract. Much like Goose Island Harvest Ale- my first favorite beer, very very good- 1st and only beer to be entered in a competition so far. “Special Delivery Pale Ale.” No ribbon, no honorable mention
6. Saison – a great attempt at the style. Kegged 5 gallons for best friends engagement party – well received
7. Irish Red Ale #1 (Brewing Classic Styles) – did not carbonate- too lazy to drain pour it. Still in basement. Also first full-boil
8. Righteous American Real Ale (Papazian) – full boil, brewed back to back days with Irish Red #1- great beer. Simplest of all so far, but good flavor. ESB with Cascade hops, no steeping grains
9. Pale Ale (w/o caramel- Brewing Classic Styles) – solid, hoppy beer
10. Blonde Ale (Brewing Classic Styles) Good but not great – syrupy – gravity didn’t lower quite enough – served via keg anyway @ Halloween party
11. Grand Cru (Papazian) – very Belgian. Tasty, spicy, sweet. Good beer.
12. Oktoberfest (Brewing Classic Styles) –first lager. Great beer. So true to style, kegged 5 gallons, served @ Halloween. Very well received and tasty
13. Irish Red Ale # 2, same recipe as Irish Red #1 – same carbonation issue, but much more drinkable, not bad
14. Red Ale (#4 –from Nate) 2.5 oz Centennials for bittering – way too much. Big, red, bitter, monster. Perfect for some days- kegged 3 gal and bottled balance
15. Claus Haus Pale Ale – first partial mash – sprinkled dry Nottingham yeast- could taste the effects of the particular yeast strain. Good, not great, should re-do with different yeast (from EdWorts Bee Cave Brewery Haus Pale –loosely)
16. Red Ale #5 -revision of Red #4, first recipe I tweaked well on my own. Great beer- one of my favorites. 4.2% but flavorful and drinkable.
17. Graff! Cider / beer hybrid. Very easy, inexpensive and a real crowd pleaser…especially ladies. 7% ABV
18. AmberHop –(Brewing Classic Styles- American amber) -Big partial mash, 7.75lbs of grains. overdid the DME, became huge. A bit syrupy, but beautiful clear, ruby color, great dry hopped aroma, very solid and well received by some. Kegged.
19. Rainy Day Pale Ale (Brewing Classic Styles, Hoppines is an IPA)- partial mash- didn’t add enough DME- turned out like Great Lakes Burning River- strong, hoppy pale ale, with just a bit of malt balance missing. Best color yet. Beautiful, clear, burnt orange. Great beer.

Racking this beer as soon as possible, it’s been in primary for 10 days and I don’t not expect the gravity to drop any more at all. I actually wonder if secondary is even necessary, based on samples this beer is already clear. And without the addition of dry hops in the recipe, there’s really nothing left to do but get it in the keg and let it carb up and age a bit more. Is it possible I somehow created a beer that takes 10 days to primary ferment, and another 10 days to carbonate and condition? Wouldn’t that just be great. Hmmm, decisions. We shall see. Any thoughts?

The beer is really good. Big, malty and sweet, but lots of hops in the aroma, flavor, and mouthfeel. One pint turned into about 3, and with the Blackhawks playing in the middle of the day, I basically kissed yardwork goodbye. That is, until my wife got home and I had to pretend I wasn’t sitting on the couch, 3 beers at 7% ABV deep, doing nothing. In my defense, if you saw the work that went into our backyard this past weekend, you would understand the need for a mid-day beer break. Full review coming soon, I want to give it a bit more time to condition before really reviewing it.

Racking the IPA to secondary this week, will update.

Onto the beer. I love the color- reddish copper and clear, with a visual crispness that is coupled perfectly by the crispness of the liquid itself. The aroma smells of hops and caramel malt, but neither being too forward or all that noticable. The taste however, is the logical outpouring of the ingredients used. A partial mash consistening of 2-Row American pale malt, with some crystal 80 for sweetness and color. Hopped with Amarillo for bittering, Centennial for everything else. This is a balanced pale ale with a noteworthy bitterness throughout the front and middle and a great hoppy finish. The carbonation was executed well by force-carbing in the keg and giving it proper time. This is the last one and a half pints this keg will offer so this beer has had its time to “condition” as they say. I’m sad to see it go but I did save two gallons to bottle for archive and sharing purposes.

At a whopping 4.2% ABV I’m still amazed at the combination of flavors and hoppiness in a very low ABV package. This was not inititally an attempt at my sought after “Claus Haus Ale” (the beer I have hoped to brew and have on tap at all times, but this recipe is clearly the frontrunner until another comes around. It’s also the first recipe that I, for the most part, devised myself. A true success. All around I’m going to give it an A-.

Cheers!

• Based on Jamil’s “Hoppiness is an IPA” in Brewing Classic Styles
• Helpers: Olivia, daughter. Vicki, wife.

Ingredients

• 4lbs 2-Row American Pale Malt
• .75 lbs Munich malt
• .5 Crystal 10
• .25 Crystal 40
• 3lbs Dry Malt Extract
• .75 lb dextrose
• 1 oz Magnum 14.4% AA @ 60 min (pellets)
• 1 oz Centennial 9.2% AA @ 10 min
• 1 oz Simcoe 12.2% AA @ 5 min
• 1 oz Amarillo 7.5% AA @ 0 min
• 1 TSP Irish Moss @ 15 Min
• Safale US-05 dry yeast, hydrated

Mashed all grains for about 80-90 minutes total at around 150. Was able to keep temperature pretty consistent this time. Preboil volume was about 4 gallons, post boil closer to 3 gallons.

I decided to replace some of the DME with dextrose after being told some brewers do this in IPA’s to increase the fermentability of the wort. My hope was that it would help the yeast eat more of the sugar, providing me with a bit dryer beer and less syrupy than some of my previous batches. The biggest mistake I feel I made in this batch was not putting enough DME in. I got a bit lazy with my math and decided that 3 lbs DME and .75lbs dextrose was enough to get my OG up where it needed to be. I fell short by almost two whole points. Target OG: 1.065, my OG: 1.048. So even though this is not likely going to resemble a true IPA, all in all, it was a great day to brew, I had a good time with my daughter (until she got a bit bored), and I hope I come out with a very hoppy pale ale at around 5%. I just hope its not too bitter because of the hop / malt ratio. I really do not know what to expect. Its bubbling away in my basement where the temperature is below 70 degrees. I will update as this batch progresses!

• 5 lbs Maris Otter
• 1lb Munich
• .75lb Victory
• .75lb Crystal

Crushed all that grain in my new grain mill (thanks wife) for a total of 7.5 lbs. Did a stovetop partial mash for a grand total mashing time of 1 hour, 20 minutes.

Sparged the grains by steeping for another 15-20 minutes to get all the goodies out. I wasn’t convinced that I got great conversion so my thought was to bump up the amount of dry malt extract I would add to make sure I had enough fermentable sugar in the wort. This is where I got a little crazy. I added 3.4 lbs at the beginning of the boil and also did a 3.3lb late addition at flameout.

Hops were as follows:

• .6 oz Magnum pellets (14.4% AA) for 60 minutes
• .25 oz Cascade (7.5% AA) @ 10 minutes
• .25 oz Centennial (8.5% AA) @ 10 minutes

Repeated that same hop addition at 0 minutes. Total boil volume was 4.5 gallons.

Chilled wort. Hydrated some US-O5 ale yeast, topped off to 5.5 gallons, pitched yeast. OG 1.08!

I let this batch sit in primary longer than it needed to and 2 weeks ago I racked it to secondary and added a full oz of Simcoe 12.9% AA whole leaf hops for aroma. It’s ready to keg or bottle this week.

It’s more copper than amber, which I’m fine with … and a bit syrupy. The final gravity is 1.028 yielding an ABV of just under 7%. I have high hopes for this beer and will update once it’s ready to drink! Any comments or critiques on the recipe are welcome and encouraged…

I began in April of 2009, and have logged a grand total of 17 different beers, with one currently fermenting in the basement, making it 18. At an average yield of 5 gallons per batch, that is approximately 90 gallons of beer!, only 10 shy of the legal homebrewing limit. Since I live with my wife, the limit is actually 200 gallons per year, so I have lots to look forward to in 2010. What’s more is that out of those 90 gallons, I consider only one 5 gallon batch undrinkable, yet I still haven’t brought myself to pour it down the drain in hopes time will do it well. So far it hasn’t.

Since joining forces with the group that comprises The Perfectly Happy Man in late 2009, my love, knowledge, and overall appreciation for beer has grown exponentially. When Taylor asked a few of us about doing a Homebrewing section for the PHM, I couldn’t refuse. Although I have done some scattered blogging about my first year of homebrewing, I wanted a fresh start now that my hobby is in plain view of a larger audience, thanks to the PHM.

You know a bit about my family history, but let me introduce myself. My name is Matt Claus, I’m 27 years old, married to an amazing woman named Vicki, and together we raise our daughter Olivia who is currently a whopping 5 years old. I work for a company in the near west suburbs of Chicago that manufactures bloody mary’s, bbq sauce, cocktail mixes, and concentrated beverages. You’ll see throughout this blog what a blessing it is to work where I do, especially as it relates to homebrewing. I run the purchasing department, comprised of only me, and I like it that way. I buy all the ingredients and packaging necessary for our company to conduct business. To my wife’s dismay, I also occasionally play ping pong and basketball at work, even partake in an annual paintball outing, because that’s just the kind of company we are. We sell to many companies that are directly related to the beer industry, which has been helpful in acquiring necessary equipment and hardware for my fairly basic kegging setup, more on that later.

In early 2009 we purchased our first home in the NW suburbs of Chicago, and it was then, with all this new space and freedom, homebrewing entered my life. Instigated by a simple Mr. Beer kit given to me by my friend Matt for Christmas, my homebrewing hobby has come quite a long way in one year. We made one batch of the Mr. Beer kit, got our whistles wet, and then quickly upgraded to more conventional and advanced homebrewing practices.

You will see that I use the term “we” fairly often, and it refers to a group of friends that has developed over that past year that in one way or another, all take part in the process. Some guys join me in the brewing process, others in the intermediate phases of transferring fermenting batches to secondary containers, and others in the wonderful and tedious bottling process. What’s certain, all of us have enjoyed the final phase, the drinking process. So I can in no way take credit for our achievements, instead chalk it up to a group effort, where I take the reigns on the brewing science aspect of things, but everyone helps in their own way. At this point I need to recognize my partners in crime. The most thanks goes to Eric, who spends a lot of his free time with me in all aspects of brewing; joined by Matt, Noah, and Keith. A shout out also goes out to my brewing brother from across the country, Nate with whom I share and receive tips and tricks. The sense of community that this hobby has fostered has been rewarding enough to keep pressing on, and I think we all agree and look forward.

The posts on this site will vary from quick updates about current batches, to reviews of finished batches, and all things in between. This can include tasting events, parties, sob stories of beers gone bad, special event batches, beer education, backyard hop growing (coming spring 2010!), to a full blown walk-through of making an actual batch of beer. So you’re reading this because you’re interested, and I hope my windy introduction didn’t scare you off, but rather enticed you to learn more and share the ride as we continue on the road we’ve started of making good beer and enjoying all aspects of it together. Check back often, and please please please, use this site as an open forum to ask questions, correct me when I’m wrong, make suggestions, invite yourself over for a brew session or to simply have a beer, or whatever. I will always admit that I am no expert, but I’m anxious to learn and to grow, and to make better beer every time. Welcome.

In the middle we have Red Ale #4. For me, its red ale # 1, but the recipe was from my brother Nate and his homebrewery, Flightless Bird Brewery. This is his 4th attempt at creating a West Coast style, house red ale. Think Northcoast’s Red Seal Ale (sort of.) Mine tastes like a big red IPA. Bitter throughout, especially at first, but there’s enough extract in there to sweeten it up and make it go down surprisingly easy. I will tweak the recipe next time and use more than one hop variety and a slightly different hop schedule, but this one is good.

And on the right, a less than fully attenuated Blonde Ale. Too sweet, apple-y, and not a dry enough finish. But 3 gallons were consumed via keg at our annual Halloween party and no one complained, at least not to me. What was supposed to be a blonde ale actually came out looking like Sam Adams’ Oktoberfest in color. Orange. Not a repeat brewing offender, although if the yeast finished doing their job, which my opinion is that they didn’t, this could be a good beer. Not giving up on brewing a Blonde. I’d love to have one on tap all the time.

So that is the story of the three little beers. Okay, 2 beers and one knock your face off 9.5% apple cider wine that cost next to nothing to make . There’s still about 2 gallons of Red Ale #4 on tap in the basement and about 20 or so bottles of Blonde. So come over and pour yourself a glass. Oh, and there is still 2 gallons of Apfelwein on tap also, despite having poured pitchers of it a few weekends ago while playing Beatles Rockband. Good combo, fyi.

In the basement right now? Mish’s Sierra Nevada Pale Ale clone which is at 4.5% and tasting mighty fine…ready for secondary and dry-hop. And my 5 gallons of Claus Haus Pale Ale (first attempt) at about 4.5% and tasting good, but young. Racking both to secondary this weekend.

In other news, overnight temperatures hit -15 Degrees windchill thus rendering my garage fridge next to useless. As a preemptive strike, Eric and I moved all the beers plus the 2 kegs and CO2 tank into the basement. We finally got the chance to bust out the Monster fridge and put it to use also. Check out the setup above.