Journal of Brewing

Recipe Source: Keystone Homebrew

This entry was written many months after the actual brewing and consumption of the Oatmeal Stout. As such, it will not be very detailed and will mostly be what I remembered. This was my first in home brewing experience.

So after reading, studying and watching the Good Eats episode entited Amber Waves I decided to take the plunge into brewing. Fortunately, at the time I was working and living around greater Philadelpia and had access to lots of brewing help, mostly by word of mouth. I borrowed a True Brew kit from a friend of mine and proceeded to take my first attempt at homebrew.

Keystone Homebrew was recommended to me as a place to go and grab ingredients. I found the store owners to be more than helpful in guiding me along of path of zymurgy. My (now) Canadian friend ok_with_today and I decided on their oatmeal stout recipe feeling confident in our cooking skills.

Brew Day Impressions

Oatmeal Stout Recipe

By this point, I had the recipe and process memorized. I got my mis en place set up and proceeded as directed. I steeped the specialty grains, warmed the cans of extract and went at it. The yeast packet swelled to max size in a couple of hours. All the equipment was sanitized with a dilute bleach mixture. Our pace was swift, our determination unwavering. After two hours or so we had completed our first brew session. It was now up to the yeast.

Fermentation

I fermented in my closet. It seemed to me to fit the temperature range. I remember expecting to see activity that evening and I was concerned when I did not. By the next morning however, there were certainly bubbles starting to form. By Tuesday, the airlock was poppin. This made me very excited because it meant something was happening inside that bucket. I wasn’t sure if what was happening was good, but I knew at least it was a fertile breeding ground for the yeast. I had concerns over whether the sanitizing was complete enough.

Bottling

Two weeks elapsed to the day and we opened it up to find our oatmeal stout had successfully passed stage one of fermentation. I spent all morning sanitizing the bottles and all the equipment. Bottling was messy but a quick process after all. I think it took us nearly an hour to fill exactly 48 bottles. There was much rejoicing.

Tasting

Two weeks after that point (sometime in July 2005) came the fateful day we had been waiting for. I planned a special dinner and invited my girlfriend, ok_with_today and his new wife over for a dinner party/tasting. To our surprise we opened the bottles to find a perfectly crafted beer. It poured nicely, had great head retention though we noticed a slight twang that we were unable to explain. We chalked it up to first time and inexperience. It was certainly chocolately, decent hop presence. I had not taken a hydrometer reading so I didn’t have any idea how far it fermented. It was certainly full bodied and of course, tasted like oats. Truly a success for my first time. This got me hooked. I returned the borrowed kit to my friend and purchased my own. Thus began my homebrewing career.