Friday, January 06, 2006

Brewing Beer: Imperial Stout, Wee Heavy & Barley Wine

With all the holiday hoopla I forgot to check on the Stout & Wee Heavy! I guess it will wait until get home. :-( On another note, I have decided that I'm not going to open up all those bottles of barleywine. I really don't mind the low carbonation. OK what should I brew next? Any of you have suggestions? Matt you don't get to choose again. You chose the Wee Heavy ;-) Speaking of which we need to have a taste of that soon!

6 comments:

Ben, aka BadBen said...

Speaking of big beers:
Why don't you try an Imperial Stout or an Imperial IPA?

Cheers,
Bad Ben

Adam said...

The Stout is Imperial and its the first time I brewed on of those. From what the wort tasted like it should be pretty tasty.

You know I have never brewed an IPA. An Imperial IPA would be a great way to bring in the new year ;-)

Bryan Kolesar said...

I agree. The past few months have given us imperial porter and imperial stouts. I, too, am feeling "imperial" let's do it!

Adam said...

Anybody else wanna throw in their two cents?

Badben, I read your site and noticed that you have gone the full mash route. What's it like? Why would one leave extract brewing for full mash?

Bryan Kolesar said...

I'm in the middle of listening to a podcast where John Palmer is discussing all-grain brewing. He sites the main advantages for going to all-grain as being control and creativity/flexibility.

Real quick here...he mentions that some extracts are produced to be more or less fermentable than you may desire. Also, that the dehydration process of creating malt extract strips out some of the fresh grain flavors, colors, and aromas.

He says the main investments in new equipment that you'll need to make are the mash/lauter tun and a larger aluminum boiling pot for the wort.

This is obviously all my interpretation of his words...since I'm the farthest from an expert on this subject!

It's about 1 1/2 hours...I'm about 1/2 way through, so as I learn anything else....I'll post it :)

Adam said...

Thanks Bryan. I think I'm getting the idea. I have books on it. I just need to get reading and listening to podcasts...heheh.