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Just an update . . .

10 Jan

I’m just checking in because it’s been a while. I like to write most of my posts in Word first and make sure they’re complete before publishing them up here. Currently working on a WANTED ad for a business partner. This one has taken a lot of thought. I will post it at the end of the week.

Taking a few days off to celebrate my 30th birthday. I’ll be in SoCal and hope to check out a few breweries while I’m there (Stone is #1 on the list, followed by Lost Abbey and Green Flash). Of course I’ll be posting about that, too. :)

CHEERS!

Check out the birthday card I got from my parents :)

Birthday Card

1 Comment

Posted in Beer + Life

For-Profit until we make a profit!

07 Jan

So, after doing some research, I have learned a few things about the whole non-profit beer company idea.

Legally, I cannot establish a beer company as a non-profit entity. Basically, I’d have to establish two companies, one for-profit, and a non-profit organization. The profits from the beer company can be then passed on to the non-profit arm.

Since it usually takes most microbreweries a couple years to break even, much less, become profitable, I will just be incorporating the for-profit beer company for now. Once we become profitable, I will do one of two things:

1. Open a non-profit to utilize profits from Robey Street beer sales.

2. Make all profits from specific beers benefit various local charities and organizations.

I’ve been leaning towards the second option.

So, there’s the update. Thanks to everyone for their feedback on the previous post(s)!

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Posted in Beer + Business

Happy Brew Year!

01 Jan

Brew Year’s Eve went off without a hitch. I made good time and all my numbers were great. 80% efficiency. :) I ended up doing a second batch of the Burnham Brown Ale, but used a different yeast (London Ale) and hop plugs instead of leaf. We’ll see how much this will change the beer. Hopefully for the better, as I hope to enter it into a Brown Ale competition in February.

So, now it’s 2010 and this year is going to be all about business. There are some major hurdles that I have to get over in order to get this brewery off the ground.

Some of the goals for Robey Street this year include:

Find a Business Partner
Write the Business Plan
Get Funding
Finalize the recipes for the first 4 beers
Finalize the graphic design and branding for Robey Street and the beers

I GREATLY appreciate all the support I’ve received thus far and hope that craft beer fans will continue to support this endeavor. Especially those of you in Chicago. :)

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to go into greater detail about my goals listed above. I have a feeling that none of this can move forward without finding a business partner first. As much as I’d like to do this all myself, it’s just not realistic.

3 Comments

Posted in Beer + Business

Brew #4: Jingle Bell Hop

26 Dec

So, my 4th brew was for my own consumption and not an experiment for production. I was craving something hoppy and having not experimented with a super hopped up beer, I thought it was time.

Grains:

10 lb 2-Row
1lb Munich 10L
1 lb TF&S Crystal (I)

OG: WAS SUPPOSED TO BE ABOUT 1.06, but mine was 1.03 (see Notes below)

FG: 1.01

Hops:

3 oz Cascade (pellets) [1 oz @ 45 min, 1 oz @ 15 min, 1 oz DH @ 7 days]
3 oz Amarillo (pellets) [1 oz @ 60 min, 1 oz @ 30 min, 1 oz DH @ 7 days]

Yeast: Wyeast American Ale

Primary Fermentation: 14 days

Secondary Fermentation: 7 days (+dry hop)

Brew Date: 12/14/2009
Bottle Date: 01/04/2010
Taste Date: 01/15/2010

Notes:

I messed this one up, royally. I mill my grains at the store where I purchase them, and I guess the spacing was off on the malt mill that day and I didn’t think about why it was SOOOO easy to grind them. Needless to say, it wasn’t until I didn’t reach my OG numbers that I figured something was wrong. A very helpful homebrewer online helped me narrow it down to the grains not being properly milled. I checked the spent grains and sure enough, half weren’t even cracked. :(

We shall see how this India Fail Ale turns out. Updates to come … :)

2 Comments

Posted in Beer + Life

Brew #3: Blommer Chocolate Stout

26 Dec

The third beer I brewed was a chocolate stout. I used some chocolate from the Blommer chocolate factory Outlet Store. Recipe below.

8 lbs 2-Row
1 lb German Munich
1 lb Flaked Oats
1 lb Black Patent
1/2 lb Chocolate Malt

Original Gravity: 1.05

Final Gravity: (I suck at keeping notes)

Hops:

Bittering: 1 oz Golding (pellets) @ 60 min.

Aromatic: 1 oz Golding (pellets) @ 15 min.

1 tsp Irish Moss @ 15 min.

8 oz Alpine Dark Chocolate (Blommer) @ 15 min.

Yeast: Wyeast London Ale

Brew Date: 11/11/2009

Bottle Date: 12/10/2009

Taste Date: 12/24/2009 (just a sneak peak) Letting the bottles condition another 2 months before this is actually DONE.

Notes:

After realizing I didn’t have the proper chocolate (I wanted to find something unsweetened, but they didn’t have any), I only put the chocolate in at the boiling, and chose NOT to ferment with any.

This was my first time using Irish moss. I’ve had good clarity with the previous two beers so I wasn’t too concerned but mostly just wanted to see if I’d notice a difference. (I didn’t).

Robey Street Blommer Chocolate Stout

Tasting:

I sampled a little on Christmas Eve and it’s tasting good! Reminded me a lot of Young’s Double Chocolate Stout. Good head, dark chocolaty flavor. I think it needs a couple more months for the flavor to develop further but so far so good. Will update later.

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Posted in Beer + Life

Brew #2: Red Ale

26 Dec

On October 25, I brewed my second beer, a red ale.

Per usual, I based my recipe off of other ones, but slightly tweaked to my own preferences. Below is the recipe and some notes.

Grains:

8lbs 2-Row (Briess Organic)
1 lb Caramel 60L (Briess Organic)
1 lb German Munich
1/4 lb Chocolate Malt

Hops:

Bittering: 1 oz Golding (plug) @ 60 mins
Aromatic: 1 oz Amarillo (pellets) @ 15 mins

I did a 60 minute single-infusion mash at 155 degrees F. Sparge at 175 degrees F. 60 minute boil.

Yeast: Wyeast American Ale

Single fermentation: 19 days.

Original Gravity: 1.054

Final Gravity: 1.010

Brew Date: 10/25/09
Bottle Date: 11/13/09
First Taste: 11/29/09

Thoughts/Lessons learned:

I didn’t properly mix the priming sugar into the beer before bottling, so it came out inconsistently carbonated. Some bottles were flat, while others had the proper amount of carbonation.

Stadium Red Ale

Tasting:

Overall low head retention on the beer. The flavor is OK, moderately hoppy (compared to my 1st mildly hopped Brown Ale). I can actually smell the Amarillo subtly coming through. Good color and clarity. Pretty good to drink at home, but nothing I’m going to share with others. Got to perfect this recipe for production. :)

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Posted in Beer + Life

Brew #1: Burnham Brown Ale

22 Dec

I brewed my first batch of beer (all-grain) on October 16, 2009. Here’s how it went…

Recipe:

SECRET!

(This recipe is only secret because I plan to use it for the actual production version for the brewery. I’ll be publishing all my other recipes for those interested.)

Notes:

This was my first day brewing. I based my recipe off the “Awesome Brown Buddy” brown ale recipe found here: http://www.tastybrew.com/newrcp/detail/238

Although I did use most of same grains, I used different proportions of the Belgian Aromatic and Belgian Biscuit grains.

I did use the same type of hops (Goldings), but did 1 oz at 60 mins (instead of 40 mins) and 1 oz at 10 minutes.

Additionally, I used the Wyeast Euro Ale XL (1338) instead of Wyeast Ringwood Ale.

Spent grains, post-sparging

Lessons Learned:

Perhaps it was because I was so nervous about my first brew day, that I made sure to take every step slowly and thus did not encounter any MAJOR issues or problems. The only real problem solved was rigging a suspension using bent hangers for my colander during sparging!

Additionally, it ended up being a VERY small batch (just over 3.5 gallons instead of the expected 5. Due to a minor grain/water miscalculation, I ended up with a smaller than expected boil which of course led to even more boiling off and ending up with 3.5 gallons in the fermenter.

Wort boil, with hop leaf bag

Fermenter

For those new to homebrewing, I have documented the process in photos at: http://public.fotki.com/miriam001/2009/first-brew/

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Posted in Beer + Life

My Favorite Beers of 2009

20 Dec

My Top 10 Beers of 2009

This is a list of the most memorable beers I tried this year. Note that these are not necessarily new beers, just new to me:

Rock Bottom Chicago (Rotating) Dry-hopped Oatmeal Stout
Two Brothers Red Eye Coffee Porter
Three Floyds Alpha King
Hertog Jan Dubbel
Hertog Jan Dubbel, Netherlands
Rock Bottom Chicago Instigator Doppelbock
Grimbergen Brune
Grimbergen Brune, Belgium
Galway Hooker Irish Pale Ale
Galway Hooker, Ireland
Live Oak Oaktoberfest
Live Oak Oaktoberfest, Texas
St. Louis Kriek
St. Louis Kriek, Belgium
Bosteels Tripel Karmeliet
Tripel Karmeliet, (Chicago by way of) Belgium

Honorable Mention:

My first homebrew batch of Burnham Brown Ale! Perhaps it was just a fluke that my first batch ever turned out so good, but oh well! Don’t worry; subsequent brews have been nothing to write home about, so I’m not exaggerating just because it’s my beer. ;)

Robey Street Burnham Brown Ale, Chicago

And of course, the WORST beer of 2009:

Jupiler Pilsener. I bought a can of this for the train ride from Brussels back to Amsterdam. It was pretty rank.

Jupiler Pilsener, Belgium

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Posted in Beer + Life

Brew School: “Start Your Own Brewery” at Siebel Institute of Technology

19 Dec

Just a few weeks after I made the executive decision to quit my job and make beer my life, I started to look at some courses being offered at the Siebel Institute of Technology in Chicago. It is THE internationally recognized brew school, having been around since 1872.

I didn’t have the money to enroll in one of their Master Brewer programs, but I did see that they were offering a new course called Start Your Own Brewery. It was a 3-day course (9 to 5) and covered everything from writing a business plan, getting funding, selecting brewing equipment, building a brewery, to operating a brewpub. The course description also mentioned that there would be several people from the craft beer industry presenting at the course. Perfect. And, it started in just 4 weeks!

So, I enrolled and plunked down the money. I wasn’t sure what to expect, because while most of Siebel’s other courses were more on the technical side of brewing and production, this was about business. However, having read a lot of brewing books and done a lot of technical research on my own, a class focused on the business aspect was exactly what I needed.

Unfortunately, the week before class started I was dealing with a terrible bout of the flu and was not feeling 100% by the time class started on Monday November 30. However, I managed to get through all three days without too much trouble.

The course was facilitated by Ray Daniels, and consisted for various presentations by several different industry pros. I learned SO MUCH and it was great to hear from all of the well-known brewers, brewpub and brewery owners and operators, etc. I only wish I had been feeling better so I could have been a little more social and done some more networking. There were about 40 people in the class from all over the country (and world!) all working on starting breweries and brewpubs in their respective cities and towns. Everyone had great questions and I left the 3 days learning so much that I could not have learned in any book or online. “Mad props” to Ray Daniels, the presenters, and all the people at Siebel who put it together.

I will be referencing what I learned in greater detail in upcoming entries. Suffice to say that it was definitely money well spent.

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Posted in Beer Education

Recipe: Fromage Fort

19 Dec

Fromage Fort

3/4 cup shredded sharp cheddar
1/2 cup shredded appenzeller
1/4 cup shredded smoked gouda
1 tablespoon grated parmesan/romano/asiago mix
1 tablespoon softened butter
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoon white wine
dash Colman’s dry mustard powder
dash pepper

Mix all ingredients, microwave for 20 seconds to soften everything if necessary.
Put onto sliced pieces of French bread.
Put in broiler on low until cheese is melted and begins to brown on the edges.

Pairing recommendations:

Due to the different types of cheeses used in this recipe, this will go well with a variety of beers. I’d say your choice will ultimately depend on what season it is when you make this. Winter favorites include brown ale (Barley Island’s Dirty Helen) and oatmeal stout (Rock Bottom Chicago’s dry hopped oatmeal stout, YUM). During the warmer months, a pale ale (like Bass) will go well.

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Posted in Beer + Food