If there was one forum on the old forums that definitely needed CPR, it was the homebrew forum. Hopefully this changes things (though I’m skeptical)
In other news, I think I have finally dialed in my first recipe to the point I want it. It only took 7 years of homebrewing, but I finally have a recipe I will not touch next batch. Feelsgood
I haven’t done enough brews to even consider doing the same brew twice. I have so many ideas still that I won’t be able to learn from my mistakes and refine recipes.
My latest brew is a 15% oaked barley wine that turned out quite good (and is still young) , and an ESB from its second runnings. My best ones so far are a raspberry milk stout and a blueberry baltic porter (my first lager). Fruit works well to balance the sweetness of these beers. My first attempt at a neipa was quite ok. Until it became heavily oxidized within 4 weeks… and it turned out to be my worst beer. I drainpoured the last bottles.
Do you keg? I’m not sure I’d dare bottle my NEIPA, the amount of oxygen going into those bottles via the homebrew bottling process is kind of scary. In the keg it stayed quite good for 2 months which is how long it took to kill it! Batch 2 is just as good, so I’m really happy about it!
Unfortunately I don’t keg. With the way my first NEIPA turned out, I won’t have another try at it soon. I didn’t realize beforehand how much impact it would have. I do have a west coast-style dipa (malt-bill/hop schedule/mash-wise) with pacific hops planned (including some 2017 harvest hops). And I might just give The Yeast Bay’s Vermont yeast a shot in that, and see what happens. But first up is an imperial porter with oats and a about 10% brown malt.
Got a brew scheduled for today. Smores brown ale. Wish me luck…
Break a leg 
I’m brewing something amber with pure cranberry juice this weekend, kinda going off the track. Hope it turns out decent.
Taking over CPR maneuvers.
I don’t think I ever brewed the same recipe in 5 years. I guess I’m still experiencing. But I just upsized my setup and finally got into kegging. I guess that if I want something decent on tap all the time, I’ll have to dialed in my recipes. Looking forward to it.
Don’t leave us hanging, what kind of beer did you improved and what did you changed. Process? Ingredients?
Cheers
I haven’t brewed a single time in 2017 and that makes me sad.
I’m brewing an abbey dubbel today. First one. I’ve never done the same recipe twice yet, but I did a smoked porter that I’m gonna have to make again.
I caved in and started using wheat instead of oats in my NEIPA. I also stopped trying to use hop filters altogether, “free the hops” they said, turns out they were right.
Recipe goes like this:
10lbs of Golden Promise
2lbs of wheat malt
4 oz melanoidin
1 oz Magnum @60min
8 oz of hops (whatever nice hops I want to use, but so far Mosaic, Summit and Citra have been the best). I have a counterflow chiller setup with a pump so I run a bit of wort through to get it down to about 190-195 and throw the hops in. No bags, screens or filters (I use pellets). Give it a good whirlpool and let it sit for 15 minutes, the cool/transfer to fermenter. Ferment two weeks, toss in a 6 oz dry hop for 24-48 hours (again, no screen) and transfer to keg. I actually use the screen I purchased to keg dryhop to keep my racking cane hop free. It works well and the result is glowing hazy orange beer with no hop particle, it’s great.
I made a super simple pils (100% pilsner malt, only Hallertauer hops) a while ago, kegged it three weeks ago. Used the Brulosophy quick lager fermentation method. It was a bit cloudy and all over the place taste wise just after kegging, but it’s starting to taste really nice by now! Also crystal clear, my phone had problems focusing on it when I took this pic yesterday 
Also, re NEIPA and oxidation. I’m with JulienHuxley, they’re hopeless to bottle. I take all precautions I can in order to minimize oxidation when brewing such beers (and pale lagers). Only do primary, keg straight from the fermentor, purge the fermentation bucket with CO2 every time I open it, which I try to do as little as possible. Even got a digital hydrometer so I can take gravity readings without opening the fermentor. Also make sure to purge the keg really well with CO2 at kegging. I avoid pouring it in growlers even as I’ve noticed those kind of beers going off very quickly if subjected to air at all.
Nice looking pils, did you use Saflager W-34/70 brulosophy has recently been raving about?
I have 10 gallons of pils lagering right now for Christmas, looking forward to a couple nice crisp pints.
I brewed a 6.3% Mild about three months ago. It is now starting to taste good. The first month or so it tasted like a molasses mess, but the sweetness seems to have relented and more liquorice and boozy notes have come through.
Has anyone else come across the change?
I used WLP838, have used WLP830 a couple times before (which I supposed to have the same source as 34/70, Weihenstephan that is). I found this to produce less acetaldehyde (green apples) and generally a cleaner beer, though some sulphur. That’s totally gone by now though.
Definitely. It’s pretty crazy how quickly (exponentially I should say) a beer ages in the first couple of weeks. I had a batch of belgian IPA this summer that I found pretty good when fresh but just kept getting better and better as it aged over about 2 months. The last bottle I drank was probably the best in terms of the profile I was going for, a nice hoppy flavor with a strong peppery belgian yeast flavor.
I hate aging beer in general, but it’s different when you are the one brewing it. Commercial breweries release beer when it’s ripe, we sort of have to judge that ourselves. I generally have enough homebrew at home that sitting on a couple of cases waiting for it to improve is not generally a big deal.
My lagers always tend to peak at 6 weeks or so after kegging. Even my NEIPAs are better if you let them calm down for a week. I had one that wasn’t as good as I had hoped for earlier this year though, and it turned clear after two months in the fridge. I ended up pouring a couple liters out.
Which one do you have? Tilt or another? Did you get it in Europe? I’m thinking about getting one, but the Tilt is rather expensive and has to be shipped from the States and possibly customs want their share as well.
Btw, that’s a great looking pilsner!
I have an iSpindel. It’s DIY but I haven’t built it myself. Shouldn’t be too difficult to put together one if you’re a bit tech savvy (I am but also too lazy).
Yep. Still here. 
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