I took the summer months off from brewing. Too many other irons in fire (and most of them are still in there :roll: ) and it’s just too hot to brew with my primitive set-up where I have to be checking the temps two or three times a day and swapping out ice packs to keep my home-made fermentation chamber cool enough to keep the yeasties happy.
While this may sound like it sucks (and it does) it gives me a portion of the summer months - once my home-brew pipe-line runs dry - and some of this fall to try out the myriad of micro-brewed beers that are available at the surrounding bottle shops and watering holes. And I am happy to say that there are more and more tastier and tastier beers available all the time.
But now the ambient temps have dropped into optimum beer brewing levels and even with my primitive set-up I can easily keep the temps of the beer up where I need them with the use of a simple desk lamp and a 25 watt (I think) bulb inside the fermentation chamber.
I’m a simple man with simple tastes so I brew just four beers; an IPA and a brown ale both done as close to English styles as I can get them. I do an APA and for my “crazy” beer I make an Imperial stout which I have been told is as good as any commercial imperial stout available. (Yes. I’m bragging. :lol: )
I just put a batch of my brown ale into the bottles and as soon as I get the ingredients (those irons in the fire that I mentioned put a severe drag on not only my time but on my assets) I’ll get my brewery up to full production in a week or two.
I brew more in the cooler and winter months myself, which is unlike my earliest brewing experiences, but it’s easier to keep it warm than it is to keep it cool while fermenting. Brewed twice a couple of weeks ago. For the sake of an easy brew day I plan on an extract pretty soon. It’ll probably be a Cream Ale with some Centennial late additions. That stuff is awesome!
I brew year round on an electric system in my basement brew room. Its nice in the winter, but I do miss out on the outdoor experience during the nice weather. It’s nice when the Lake Erie water cools in the fall and winter. Chilling the wort takes a lot less effort and doesn’t require a prechiller. Not many negatives to cooler weather brewing for me.
I normally skip June, July, and August to do local beer fests. This year a root canal knocked Sept out. I brewed an APA Oct. 22nd and everything fell into place pretty good.
Me too- I skip the warm summer months. So I do 3-4 batches in May, finish them in June, and then don’t start back until September. I’ve done 5 batches since 9/1, with another 5 batches scheduled by 1/1/2015. That will bring me up to 50 total.
I brew pretty much every 2 weeks regardless of the time of year. Gotta keep that pipeline going and use harvested yeast. Plus, I really really like to brew, every 2 weeks isn’t really enough to satisfy me. Kind of why I’ve been thinking I should pick up some 2.5 gallon kegs and brew small batches on the off weeks. Just need more fermenting space, which is the main issue. I can really only have one batch going at a time. But in the winter, it’s cool enough in my house that I could ferment at ambient temps.
