[Divemaster]

Helped my buddy (another 1st SFG vet) brew in his garage tonight. By helping, I mean I either watched, while drinking free beer from his three tap fridge (pale ale, Belgian quad, and Red IPA home brew), or did exactly as I was told, while drinking free beer from his three tap fridge. It was my initial time seeing the process, much less lending a hand, and I learned quite a bit. This is going to be a Belgian quadruple that he expects to come in at 15% ABV, same as the last one. The difference is that this batch will be aged two months in a 10 gallon bourbon barrel sourced from a craft distillery, also QP owned (I’m seeing a trend here).

He is a whole grain brewer, and this beer is taking 30 lbs of barley and, in total, four ounces of hops, just to end up with the first five gallons of ten. Initial gravity is 29.6 brix. Don’t ask me technical questions, as I’m just parroting what I’m told. Yes, I'm trying to get him on PS.com and to this page.

The first picture somewhat shows the setup. From left to right, hot liquor tank, mash/lauter tun, and boil kettle containing 12 gallons of wort that will be reduced by half during the multi hour boil.

In the next picture, well into the boil, I’m adding hops. Three 1 oz bags went in at this stage and a final ounce later.

Pic 3, 12 gallons of wort on the boil

Last pic shows 30 lbs (dry weight) of spent grain in the bin. It tastes like a bland, hard shelled oatmeal. That's good. Any sweetness means we didn't get all the sugars out. The tubing is a siphon tube we used to transfer some wort back to the hot liquor tank which we used as a second boil kettle due to the volume of wort in this batch. With the kettle maxed out, boil over was imminent. By putting a few gallons into the hot liquor tank, we could speed up the boil.