The Evolution of my Brew

The Brew Rig today

So below are some pics of my brew rig today, however this was a long work in progress to get here, I thought I would write this article to share how the road in home brewing ultimately led me here.

E-Brew Rig 2.0 as of 6/27/2013

50 amp Ebrewsupply panel as built as of 5/27/2013

In the beginning

So when i started brewing I more or less began with extract kits... I started with a blichmann boiler maker 10g kettle doing full wort boils in my garage on a propane burner. That setup worked really well for me for years. I concentrated initially on refining my process and sanitation techniques etc... My first brews were alright, but were not stellar to say the least... I knew there was definitely room for improvement.  I began listening to the podcasts archives of the brewing network , the Jamil show, Sunday Session and Brew Strong... Let me tell you, that was time well worth it, and helped me step up my brews 10 fold. I was commuting a few days a week, 50 miles one way into Washington DC, and those podcasts made a very disturbing and frustrating drive palatable and productive.. As I listened more and more, it became abundantly apparent that the cold side is where great beer is made.

This is a picture of the first brew I ever did on my first extract rig. 

The cold side of brewing.

Probably the biggest revelation I have had brewing early on is this... The biggest difference you can impact (for good or for worse) on your beer starts when the flame (or element for that matter) is turned off. Don't get me wrong, everything up until that point is important, but the impact pairs in comparison. Things on the hot side are relatively forgiving, however, the items of impact on the cold side don't afford the brewer nearly as much margin of error. The point at which the hot side ends results in wort. If you have ever tasted wort at this point (and I taste every brew at this point), it is not nearly as enjoyable and palatable as a beer. The point at which the yeast is inoculated in the wort is where the transformation from wort to beer occurs. From my point of view, the biggest improvement in my homebrew came after I understood that happy yeast make substantially better beer. Here is a list of the main items I see as important on the cold side.

• Fermentation temperature control - Yeast are single cell organisms, and as such are extremely sensitive to changes in temperature. To provide some context... For me, a day @ 79 degrees is a bit warm and a day @ 69 is a bit cool. I am perfectly comfortable at 74-75 degrees, a great day for a tee shirt and shorts. So to put that in perspective, I am made up of billions upon trillions, upon (my mind is about to blow).. you get my point, a ridiculously large amount of cells and I am aware of a slight swing in temperature. Now imagine from a yeast perspective (a single cell organism), an even narrower/smaller degree of temperature fluctuation could be much more noticeable...  I compare it to walking from death valley to the arctic in a single step. Net is: ass on fire at one second, and being cold burned by dry ice the next... I am sure you get the point. That just sounds extremely uncomfortable... Just like I am aware of the temperature around me, yeast are even more so. In a typical late summer/ early fall day here in VA it is not unreasonable to see a 20-30 degree shift in temp from day to night. When yeast are to warm or to cold, or if they sense a mere change in temperature  they get stressed and produce chemical compounds that result in various types flavors that generally do not contributing favorably to the flavor, aroma or body of our beer. In fact if the yeast is stressed out and produce enough off flavors, it can totally overwhelm the beer.

• Oxygenation - During the initial growth phase, yeast need oxygen to reproduce. If they don't get enough oxygen,  this can lead to poor cell  reproduction which can result in low cell counts... All things considered this can and likely will  ultimately produce off flavors. The ambient air around us is said to carry around 8 ppm of oxygen. So at most if you completely saturated your wort with air by swirling, shaking, etc... best your going to get is about 8 ppm. The amount of oxygen needed for yeast is dependent upon a few things, but mainly: the amount of yeast, and the initial gravity of the wort. If your doing anything above a 1.065 OG you likely will not get the required oxygen needed for happy yeasts. So investing in a pure oxygen delivery system will greatly accelerate the quality of your beer. Here are some reference links I trust on oxygenation (WYeasts Article, BYO aerating wort techniques) and here is the oxygen aeration kit I use (Williams Brewing Oxygenation Kit)

• Proper cell counts - To properly ferment wort, yeasts need to have the correct initial pitch count. The number of cells affects the quality of the fermentation. I use the Mr Malty Calculator to determine how much yeast I need to pitch. This may involve a starter or several packets of yeast. To better understand starters here are a few reference links( Mr Malty Starter FAQ's. Mr Malty Pitching, Wyeast Pitch Rates)

• Lower pitching temperatures -I feel this is something that is often overlooked, but has a substantial effect on the end product. I prefer pitching my yeast on the lower end of the recommended fermentation range (the fermentation range is usually provided by the vendor on there website, and is specific to the yeast strain your using). I typically use WLP001 , WY1056 or US-05 and pitch between 60-65F. I have found a difference in my brews pitching on the lower end of the temperature  range, specifically lower ester profiles and cleaner characteristics. I believe it allows my yeast to approach the wort in front of them a bit more methodically. A valid analogy to me is when they see some sugar worth being devoured,  rather than taking off like rioters in the gate at Fort Knox, they apply a bit more reasoning to the process and plan there approach. I tend to start lower in the temperature range, and allow the initial heat of fermentation to rise the temp until my set point (typically 65-68ish). I am not as concerned with lag time as most are.  I think as long as good sanitation practices are followed, it really is not as relative. I am much more cautious of off flavors that can be generated by a to quick and ballistic of a fermentation. I rather have a slower cleaner fermentation rather than one that takes the head off my carboy. So the unintended consequence of this, is a bit longer of a fermentation,  but I am not in a rush, relax and have a homebrew. 
• So you probably wonder how I get my pitching temp so low... I use a plate chiller w/ ice water (not a pre-chiller) and pumps. So one pump recirculates the wort out of the kettle, into plate chiller , and back in to the brew kettle. The other recirculates ice water through the other side of the plate chiller. Typically I drop Ice in, right when I start chilling to really knock down the temps quick, to preserve the hop aroma.Then I put another charge of ice at around 100F to knock it down quick to 65ish. I chill the wort after flame out, and recirculate the chilled wort back into the kettle which also drops the temp within the kettle quicker. I more or less got the idea from this article. Jamil is really a proponent of whirlpool immersion chilling, because it chills the entire volume of wort at once, he also describes this type of approach lower in the article.  Here is a look at my rig when I added that component. 

Extract Rig with Pump 

• Let your yeast consume there bi-products - So during fermentation yeast produce precursors that result in chemical compounds such as diacetyl and acetaldehyde. These compounds are relatively noticeable to human perception in extremely low concentrations (even down to 10ppm). Yeast will naturally re-absorb these compounds in the conditioning phase (after fermentation is complete). In the beginning, I would let my beer sit just long enough on the yeast to complete primary fermentation (about 7 days) then rack to a secondary (another 7 - 10 days)... and then rush it into the keg, force carbonate etc... Net is I rushed the beer along because I was always excited to taste the finished product. The fact is that was and still is a bad idea, rushed beer tastes like rushed beer.  I noticed an improvement allowing my beers to complete the conditioning phase on the yeast. Typically two to three weeks after I have noticed the yeast dropping out of suspension (3 -7 days average, depending on OG). I no longer use a secondary fermenter for this reason, and my typical time for my beer in the fermenter is about 3-6 weeks now, depending on the OG/FG... I have noticed the higher OG beers, need more time to condition to get those compounds out of the mix. 

• Use the proper size fermentation vessel - So if your making 5 gallon batches, you probably need to be fermenting in a 6 gallon fermentation vessel at minimum. Proper fermentation vessel sizing is important, for the following reason: The fermentation vessel should be able to hold all wort and yeast at high krausen. To me, If you are using a blow off tube and yeast is being evacuated through the tube, the best crop of yeast is being evacuated from the carboy durring fermentation, that does not make much sense to me. I usually fill my fermenter with 5.5 gallons, and I use 6.5 fermentation carboys.

• Concentrate on Sanitation - So there are tons of articles on the web about proper sanitation, so I will save some words here... But I will highlight some areas that I was able to identify as areas of concentration for me. 
• Plate Chiller Sanitization - I sterilize my plate chiller on brew day by putting in the toaster oven for about 45 mins at 425F. I then blast it with pbw water, and starsan...  and then I hook it up in line with a pump and recirculate boiling wort about 20 mins prior to flame out / element out... I also clean it with PBW water right after I brew... Cant be to carefull with these things in my opinion. 
• Maintain lines in kegerator - I have a kegerator and love it, I readily clean my lines and sanitize... It is possible to backwash beer from the line back into the keg, i noticed this when purging C02 from the keg, without the CO2 in side closed, while the liquid is open. It basically creates a reverse vacum within the beer line. I try to clean my lines at least every two weeks. I made me one of these so it is pretty easy. I occasionally disassemble everything from keg to faucet and blast it with PBW cleaner and heat sanitize as well. Also somewhat related, if you dont have perlick type taps and are using the typical sticky ones, perlick taps are worth the investment. I noticed it was much more work to maintain the normal taps rather than perlicks, and the seal on the typical taps seemed to be a great place to find grime after minimal use. Everything touches the beer lines and tap, so I see that as a very important component in the delivery system. We spend all this time and effort to create the best beer we can, it makes no sense to have a kegerator and have bad lines or faucets that are going to impact the end product. Just my .$02
• Use proper concentrations - Make sure your mixing the proper volume of concentrate w/ water don't just guess. I also always have spray bottles with plain water,PBW/water and Starsan/water topped off on brew day.
• Clean first than sanitize - If it is not clean, it is not sanitized. Just because you soaked it in PBW does not mean it is clean. Heat is an excellent assistant for cleaning and sanitizing brew equipment.
• Make sure the airlocks are functioning properly - Airlocks will only work properly if the water level is at sufficient volumes, if they are not working properly they provide an entry point for bacteria and wild yeast.
• Minimize air movement - After the flame goes out, make sure any fans are off and any wind is minimized, this also includes protecting the wort. Example cover the brew kettle/wort after flame out/element out to minimize risk of contamination through airflow. Also clean & sanitize the lid prior to covering. This also goes for anytime the beer is transferred /  or exposed in anyway. 

In Summary

So the net of the equation is before I went further invested on the hot side, I got the cold side straight. I really think those components were the best value investment to the quality of my brew. Oxygenation, Temp control, using fresh yeast, and pitching the right amount.... easily these things over time improved my brew...

On to the hot side

So I started with extract brewing as most do, doing clone kits. I had varying success with clone kits, so I really started developing my own recipes.