Heavenly hefe

I wish it hadn’t taken so long between posts.  I was doing well for a week or two, but that was far too long ago.  Life has been pretty busy around here.  The Rootbeer Ranger has been keeping us both on our toes, but I’ve found time to brew now and again. 

I finally switched to all grain brewing.  Thru the local homebrew club, I made a contact who sewed their own BIAB Bags.  I gave them the dimensions of my brew kettle, and presto… I’m in the All-Grain game.  I was also able to procure a 1/2 barrel Sanke and am working on making that into a fully loaded Keggle.  I was able to pick up a BIAB Bag for that too, but I’ll need a pulley system to lift that much wet grain out of the Keg.

I did a beer tasting for an old Army buddy and his fiancée.  They asked that I brew up some beer for their wedding.  While honored, I knew that it was going to be a lot of work.  They decided to go with a few clones.  One was  Sierra’s Pale Ale, another of New Belgium’s Fat Tire, and I convinced them to do a Hefeweizen and have Lemonade on hand for Raddler’s or Shandy’s.

Brew Days came and went, and everything was going really well.  I was very happy with the flavor of both the Pale Ale and the Phat Tyre.  However, the Hefe was just not turning out right, and I had 10 gallons of it!  It was sulfury to the point of triggering my gag reflex.  I’ve smelled some horrible smells in my life, but this was pushing it.

It came down to the day of the wedding, and a few hours before we had to leave.  I decided that the Hefe just wasn’t going to cut it, even if you mixed heavily with Lemonade.  I was so glad that Total Wine and More opened up at 9 a.m. and that they had a 1/4 barrel of Widmer Hefeweizen (which happened to be one I used for the tasting).  I made a quick run up to the store while the Cider Wench got the Rootbeer Ranger ready to go.

We got to the wedding with a few minutes to spare, and all the beer was very well received.  It was liked so much that we ran out of nearly 16 gallons of beer in a little over 2 hours.  Fortunately they had a back-up plan.  The Groom and his lovely were very happy.  So was the Best Man.

I nearly tossed the Hefe I had made as soon as we got home, but cooler heads prevailed thanks to CW.  She told me to just give it awhile and just use a lot of Lemonade.

Well, last weekend…. nearly a month after the wedding, and nearly as long since I last tried it, I took a few growlers up to my friend’s place, Danny Boy.  By some miracle, the good lord saw fit to turn my 10 gallons of garbage juice into a lite, crisp, heavenly white cloud of heady goodness. 

Just goes to show you, that even if you think you made a terrible beer… it can shine up to something sparkly and delicious.

Slainte

NWBB