Beer Diary...

Just when I thought I had nothing left to say, I'm launching a new blog. As Susan and I head south for the winter, we thought it would be fun(?) to write about our Mexican experiences in a kind of 'he said'-'she said' format. We will be covering the activities we share together and writing individually about them from our own perspectives. Please click on the image to go directly to the Gringado website and then click on the follow button to join us as we explore the people, events and culture of Mexico and develop our own creative writing styles. In the mean time I plan to continue posting here at Beer Diary...  as I search for decent beer and interesting beer stuff in Mexico. Muchas gracias!

I've been busy with family stuff recently, along with getting ready for another trip to Mexico. These events are taking up a lot of my beer and beer blogging related time. Once I get to San Miguel de Allende I will be checking out the local beer scene and reporting my findings here. We'll see you there. Drawing by Susan Dorf

There will be some changes to the brewing classes this coming spring. I've found that the five week course is too labor intensive and cumbersome for me to continue. The main problem is shuttling full fermentors of beer back and forth between the campus and the area that the fermentation takes place. This moving of heavy liquids can be a real pain and it doesn't contribute to a healthy and clean beer in the end. So, until I have a facility where the fermentors and for that matter the brewing equipment can stay put I will be modifying the classes. Beginning this Spring I will be offering a one day entry level or beginner brewing class and also a one day advanced or all-grain brewing class for those with some brewing experience. These classes will incorporate the study materials that were used in the five week course but modified to address the concerns of these two areas of brewing. Additionally, besides the already existing 'Beer tasting and appreciation' cla...

It's time once again for me to get ready to leave the country for a few months and in preparation for my absence I want to have forty gallons of lagers in kegs by December 1st. to begin aging. They will stay in cold storage during the cool California winter months. My plan is to return to enjoy a Schwarzbier, Dunkel, Bock and Doppelbock when I return for the spring season in April. This meant that I needed to create some yeast starters that would get the beer fermented in a reasonable amount of time so I can keg and get them aging by December 1st. (departure date). I'm using White Labs WLP830 and WLP833 lager yeast for this years beers. Each vial is stepped up two times to achieve what I believe will be about 200 billion cells per pitch. This I will use for the Schwarzbier and the Dunkel.  Lower cell counts than what Mr. Malty probably recommends but I've had good success with this pitch rate in the past. Once those two beers are fermen...

Near the top of my list of favorite beer styles is the Belgian Tripel. I can't get enough of these beers and regularly have a homebrewed clone version of Chimay's Cinq Cents on tap at my house, (yeah, pretty pedestrian but they make a great tripel). So when I saw a unique brand on display at the Whole Foods beer cooler I snatched it up to do my typical comparison to the giant of Tripels, Chimay. The Straffe Hendrik Brugean Tripel is less of a strict Belgian tripel but seems to be more of a cross between a Belgian Dubbel and tripel. De Halve Maan (the half moon) Brewery claims to be the only authentic(?) Belgian brewery in the city of Bruges for whatever that's worth. The brewery first mentioned in town records from 1546 has been owned by Maes-Vanneste family since 1856. For more information about this historical brewery go here . What is authentic and for that matter more valuable is the flavor and quality of this beer. I like it a lot. For a tripel there is an inor...