A Brewful Weekend

Yes…my plan for this weekend involves a lot of brewing.

Since I’m planning to enter at least one beer into the National Homebrewer Competition, I need to acquire the beer-gredients today for the cookie beer.  I also have all the beer-gredients for a Belgian Dubbel which I want to use before too long.  So I think I’m going to do it — I’m going to brew today and tomorrow.  CRAZY!

Crazy Reason #1: The brew shop doesn’t open until 10:30am, so I’m already behind on my normal brew day.

Crazy Reason #2: I’m waiting for a contractor to come by the house at 11am, which means we can’t be at the shop when it opens, so I probably can’t begin mashing the grains until at least 12:30.

Crazy Reason #3: We need to rack the Roasted Beet Lager into secondary for lagering.

Crazy Reason #4: We need to bottle the Belgian Witbier.

There are other crazy reasons, but I think 4 crazy beer related reasons are enough.

So today I’ll be brewing up my first beer for competition.  Suzi’s Sugared and Spiced Cookie Ale will be submitted into the Christmas/Winter Specialty Spiced Beer category in at least one regional competition this spring.  If it scores 30 points or higher, it advances to the final national competition in June.

I’ve also decided to enter my Roasted Beet Lager into the Spice, Herb or Vegetable Beer category.  It will be fully lagered and bottle conditioned in time, so why not?

Tomorrow we’ll rack the roasted beet brew into secondary and begin lagering.  Five weeks at 40 degrees.  Let’s hear it for the small wine fridge turned fermentation locker!  We’ll also be bottling the Belgian Witbier (possible competition entry?) and brewing up the Belgian Dubbel.

Did I mention we also have friends coming over tonight for homemade pizza?  We’ll be serving homebrew of course.

Here’s to a beautiful and brewful weekend!

Mini-update:  I brewed the Belgian Dubbel and racked the roasted beet lager today.  Tomorrow we’ll bottle the Witbier and brew the cookie ale.  🙂