I know this is the third post this month and it is not even the third week in April, but the auburn Appalachian brought something to my attention that I had to share with all you DGBC folk I know are out there:
above: Calvin College's SAO website (please see their alcohol appreciation series)
Apparently, some Christian colleges appreciate alcohol. Now this is no slam on the college of the DGBC participants, it is just a little golf clap for Calvin's Student Activities Office. To think that one could go to a Christian college and be educated by older, more mature, and wiser believers on how to make mature choices! Wait a second...oh no...now I get it.
To be completely fair, the Drinking Goat Brewing Co.'s college tuition prices are much lower than they could be because our school has not had to purchase a multimillion dollar policy to protect us from alcohol-student related accidents. At most state schools the most expensive insurance policy is their alcohol accident policy.
Additionally, friends I know both at Calvin and Gordon have mentioned the problems associated with living on a wet Christian campus (sexual assault, partying, $$$, being hungover in chapel/church, etc.). To think that even believers fall into moral potholes. Not here though. Wait a second...oh no...now I get it.
In short, it's complex. And now I will very carefully climb off my soapbox.
adventures in alcoholic fermentation at a dry private christian college
Showing posts with label community covenant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label community covenant. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Yup. We brewed that.
above: the rugged German (left) looms over as the fake-Frenchman (center) and the real-Frenchman (ground) rack the cyserYou can’t always get what you want (i.e. a perfect cyser on your first try) but sometimes you get what you mead. Ha. In the latest edition of the Drinking Goat Brewing Co. (DGBC), we had the largest brew-crew on record, with three regulars and two newbies. Sadly, the beautiful Swiss lady couldn’t join us, however the DGBC men were joined by the avid Archeologist and the auburn Appalachian (both women, how fun!). We also learned three valuable lessons:
1) Champagne yeast may not be the best route to go when shooting for a final alcohol content by volume (ABV) of 5.5% (because champagne yeast targets an ABV of 12%).
2) When trying to tweak the specific gravity of your must, THINK before adding water willynilly.
3) Don’t stick your face in the primary fermentation container just after you open it, as the concentrated alcohol vapors will make your eyes, nose, and mouth hurt for hours (and in the real-Frenchman’s case...days)
above: after primary fermentation, the apple parts, lees, and vanilla beans are caught by a filter; thus we rack our cyserOur community covenant approved taste tester (curious...) thought our cyser lacked body and tasted a little weak. This was disheartening. To the DGBC crew, it smelled like a common European cloudy cider. We hope that with another few months of aging and bottle priming (carbonating) with honey we can fix our mistake, but we make no promises. We’re still looking forward to it though, because we made it!
The rugged German and the fake-Frenchman picked up some French oak chips for treating and rounding out our ultra dry red wine during a trip to Chicagoland Winemakers Inc. After treating our dark brown oaky delicious sexy...oak...in a warm water bath with crushed Campden tablets, they were added to our re-racked wine. The oak chips will be removed in a month when our wine is ready to be bottled.
above: the French oak chips soak in a warm sulfur bathUpcoming brewing events involve oatmeal + rye stout, bottling wine (we’d love to use your empty red wine bottles), and titrating to determine our ultra dry red wine’s acidity (which we may or may not have to treat with limestone).
above: the rugged German (left) and the fake-Frenchman (right) sort grapes for the ultra dry red wine (this photo is from the archives)Saturday, January 23, 2010
Apple Crumbler Cyser (yes, you read that right)
The first victory for the French since Napoleon: the fake-Frenchman and the real-Frenchman of the Drinking Goat Brewing Co. (DGBC) concocted and executed their original recipe for a hard cider.
Ingredients included (but were not limited to):
-“gala” apples, frozen and pulped
-sprig of fresh vanilla bean
-flaked brewing oats, baked
-local honey, courtesy of a Wheaton apiarist
-ground cinnamon
-WE CAN’T SAY MORE
In truth, an apple cider made with honey as the primary sugar source for the yeast is called a “cyser.” It sounds like a sci-fi weapon, so you run the risk of sounding like a Battlestar Galactica geek, but if you explain it to people then you’ll sound like a legit alcohol connoisseur. Our cyser will take the next two weeks to ferment, then it will be filtered and left to age and settle in our NEW ONE GALLON GLASS CARBOYS. The DGBC crew is very excited about these because it allows us to try more recipes in smaller quantities.
Upcoming brewing events, with the rugged German, involve “oak treating” our ultra dry red wine, bottling our ultra dry red wine, and beginning our stout. And if you'd like to help, we could sure use any empty red wine bottles you have lying around; we're trying to recycle --> reduce --> reuse. You know, to lower our carbon footprint...and bottles are expensive.
above: the real-Frenchman stirs and simmers the must
Ingredients included (but were not limited to):
-“gala” apples, frozen and pulped
-sprig of fresh vanilla bean
-flaked brewing oats, baked
-local honey, courtesy of a Wheaton apiarist
-ground cinnamon
-WE CAN’T SAY MORE
In truth, an apple cider made with honey as the primary sugar source for the yeast is called a “cyser.” It sounds like a sci-fi weapon, so you run the risk of sounding like a Battlestar Galactica geek, but if you explain it to people then you’ll sound like a legit alcohol connoisseur. Our cyser will take the next two weeks to ferment, then it will be filtered and left to age and settle in our NEW ONE GALLON GLASS CARBOYS. The DGBC crew is very excited about these because it allows us to try more recipes in smaller quantities.
above: the fake-Frenchman slices the vanilla bean
Upcoming brewing events, with the rugged German, involve “oak treating” our ultra dry red wine, bottling our ultra dry red wine, and beginning our stout. And if you'd like to help, we could sure use any empty red wine bottles you have lying around; we're trying to recycle --> reduce --> reuse. You know, to lower our carbon footprint...and bottles are expensive.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
The Drinking Goat’s first beverage: mostly straight up mead
Vikings are under appreciated. If you’re honest, when you think of a viking you think of a giant smelly oaf with an undersized brain and an oversized sword. However, vikings were clever. For example, they switched the names of Greenland and Iceland to trick other folk into avoiding the better island. Apparently they wanted the tectonically active island all to themselves!
In addition to being clever the old Norsemen also had quite the palate. That is to say, anthropologists credit them with the invention of the oldest alcoholic beverage on record. Smelly and oafish? Maybe. But only because they were the first guys to get a buzz. Their invention is now commonly referred to as “mead” or “honey wine.”
On December 19th, the Drinking Goat crew bottled and corked 22 bottles of our mead.
“Must” recipe:
10 lbs of local (wheaton, il) honey
1 can of riesling concentrated grape juice
5 gallons of fresh water (non-chlorinated!)
1 packet of Red Star’s Côte des Blancs Wine Yeast
5 teaspoons of yeast nutrient
This mead’s primary fermentation began somewhere around the end of February last year (2009). After 3 separate rackings that took close to 9 months total, to get our mead off of its lees, it will age in bottle until the beginning of May. Just in time for graduation.
Hydrometer readings show our mead to be around 14% alcohol by volume.
Vocabulary:
must (n.): the liquid (or juice, if you’re into that sort of thing) that is formed when you first mix all of your ingredients together. basically, it’s the unfermented and therefore non-alcoholic form of your mead, beer, wine, cider, etc.
yeast nutrient (n.): a powder of diammonium phosphate and...this is actually gross...urea (apparently it’s “food-grade,” but come on, that aint foolin’ anyone). this is added to nourish the yeast and ensure they stay healthy and able to complete their very important mission (turning sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide).
primary fermentation (umm...adjective?): when the yeast is added (or “pitched”) into the must and allowed to eat as much sugar as it can before the alcohol it creates kills it. vicious, we know.
lees (n.): the nasty residue left at the bottom of your must after it has been allowed to sit and settle out. in our mead the lees consist mostly of random bee parts, wax, pollen, and dead yeast.
racking (a sweet verb.): the process of siphoning the clear liquid of the must from one container to another, where it is given more time to sit, settle, and clear.
hydrometer (n.): a handy tool that measures the specific gravity of your beverage before and after fermentation, which allows one to determine the final beverage’s alcohol content. neat huh? we thought so too. that’s why we bought one.
above: the fake-Frenchman and the real-Frenchman siphon the mead from its carboy into the bottles
above: the fake-Frenchman and the beautiful Swiss lady use a very fancy hand corker to seal up the bottles
above: the fake-Frenchman samples the final product straight from the carboy
The Drinking Goat would like to thank the folks at Chicagoland Winemakers Inc., our go to homebrewing supplier.
Stay tuned to the Drinking Goat as we wait out the winter developing two new mead recipes, brewing a stout, and bottling our ultra dry red wine.
In addition to being clever the old Norsemen also had quite the palate. That is to say, anthropologists credit them with the invention of the oldest alcoholic beverage on record. Smelly and oafish? Maybe. But only because they were the first guys to get a buzz. Their invention is now commonly referred to as “mead” or “honey wine.”
On December 19th, the Drinking Goat crew bottled and corked 22 bottles of our mead.
“Must” recipe:
10 lbs of local (wheaton, il) honey
1 can of riesling concentrated grape juice
5 gallons of fresh water (non-chlorinated!)
1 packet of Red Star’s Côte des Blancs Wine Yeast
5 teaspoons of yeast nutrient
This mead’s primary fermentation began somewhere around the end of February last year (2009). After 3 separate rackings that took close to 9 months total, to get our mead off of its lees, it will age in bottle until the beginning of May. Just in time for graduation.
Hydrometer readings show our mead to be around 14% alcohol by volume.
Vocabulary:
must (n.): the liquid (or juice, if you’re into that sort of thing) that is formed when you first mix all of your ingredients together. basically, it’s the unfermented and therefore non-alcoholic form of your mead, beer, wine, cider, etc.
yeast nutrient (n.): a powder of diammonium phosphate and...this is actually gross...urea (apparently it’s “food-grade,” but come on, that aint foolin’ anyone). this is added to nourish the yeast and ensure they stay healthy and able to complete their very important mission (turning sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide).
primary fermentation (umm...adjective?): when the yeast is added (or “pitched”) into the must and allowed to eat as much sugar as it can before the alcohol it creates kills it. vicious, we know.
lees (n.): the nasty residue left at the bottom of your must after it has been allowed to sit and settle out. in our mead the lees consist mostly of random bee parts, wax, pollen, and dead yeast.
racking (a sweet verb.): the process of siphoning the clear liquid of the must from one container to another, where it is given more time to sit, settle, and clear.
hydrometer (n.): a handy tool that measures the specific gravity of your beverage before and after fermentation, which allows one to determine the final beverage’s alcohol content. neat huh? we thought so too. that’s why we bought one.
above: the fake-Frenchman and the real-Frenchman siphon the mead from its carboy into the bottles
above: the fake-Frenchman and the beautiful Swiss lady use a very fancy hand corker to seal up the bottles
above: the fake-Frenchman samples the final product straight from the carboy
The Drinking Goat would like to thank the folks at Chicagoland Winemakers Inc., our go to homebrewing supplier.
Stay tuned to the Drinking Goat as we wait out the winter developing two new mead recipes, brewing a stout, and bottling our ultra dry red wine.
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