End of Summer Update

Wanted to give an updated as to what's going on in Two Things land. I have less going on than the other guys for the time being, so it's officially my duty to catch everyone up to speed.

Between today and last weekend's beermaking get-togethers, I am starting to understand the brewing process a heck of a lot more. Irish Rover also realized today that I've taken the simpler end of the hobby group because wine, such as the watermelon wine we started a short time ago, required very little work in comparison to brewing.

Although today was certainly peppered heavily with Wiffleball and frisbee, we got a lot done:

We bottled the (award winning) Broken Treaty Wheat.

We transferred some IPA (x2) and Porter.

We took an inventory of all the grains in storage.

We also brewed beer for my upcoming wedding.

To us, having homemade beer at our weddings is kind of the standard for so far, but it truly is something special and an amazing touch that will make our wedding day that much more awesome. I (and my future wife) want to extend a sincere thank you to Rover, Der Brauer, and Matus for dedicating a Sunday to adding something special to our wedding. We are forever grateful for the time and hospitality.

Wine Patience

Just to keep everyone up to speed: We transferred the Watermelon wine tonight. It's going to be pretty dry. After giving it some serious thought, I think I am going to leave well-enough alone and not sweeten it unless we age it for 15 months and it isn't drinkable as Dry Wine.

According to what I've read on Watermelon wines, we need to wait at least that long to get an accurate idea of the taste. It's been hard so far for me to not judge the wines harshly after a short period of time. Two months ago I would have said the Blackberry was a total loss, but the Control group has aged well (and it's only been about 7 months since we fermented).

Patience is going to be key.

Crown Valley Brewery and Distillery Homebrew Contest

On July 31st, 2010, we took 1st Place Overall at the Ste. Genevieve, Mo, Crown Valley Brewery and Distillery Homebrew Contest with our Broken Treaty Hefeweizen.  Click Here for more information!

We are currently getting ready for the next Homebrewer's Contest at the same place.  Come on out for a good time!

Beer Smith

For a long time now, we have been using Hopville.com to calculate and store our recipes.  Well, I have been playing around with Beer Smith on the trial version that I downloaded and I am going to be purchasing it for $20.  It takes everything to the next step, not to mention the ease of it, and the ability to print out brewsheets(checklist and step by step of what to do on the brew day.  Using the measurements you pre-entered and calculated.), Competition sheets both simple and complex. The ability to mail each other the recipes through the program.  Carbonation tools, attenuation tools, hops age tools, pressure tools, water needed tools.......guys I could go on.  Do yourself a favor, download the trial version @ http://beersmith.com/ and spend the rest of the day with it,  YOU WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.

-Matuz