A Chef's Beer

[wnissen]

IMHO, the ability to do bulk aging in tap-a-drafts is what sets it apart. A wheat beer I made tasted much better a few months later, but it would have been completely impractical to have two cases of bottles tied up for those months. Similarly, I had a pale ale turn out cloudy. Doesn't really bother me, but a clear beer does look nice in the glass. Put the tap-a-draft in the back of the fridge for a few weeks and it settled out. Very nice. Third, you can have a 4 oz. beer. Lately I've had homework to do, and a 12 oz. just does not leave my head clear.

Big downside is that you can't have more than one kind of beer at a time. We do a lot of cooking, so the fridge is usually full and there isn't room for the mini-keg. That's why I like to bottle at least a 12 pack to have an assortment. Also, the first unit I had cracked badly, but Beer Beer and More Beer cheerfully replaced it and I haven't had any subsquent problems.

Walt

[iain]

Excellent. Thanks both. I'm thinking that for my next batch, I'll split it between tap-a-draft and bottles. Perhaps two of the big bottle (one force carbonated, one bottle conditioned) and the rest in 12 and 22 oz glass.

Question: if my current bottles don't carbonate (haven't checked them since the weekend) do you guys think there'd be a problem transferring the contents to the tap-a-draft system? I guess it might aerate on the way out of the bottles, but that's preferable to no fizz at all.

Also - what's a 4oz. beer? I've never heard of such a thing.

[cdh]

IF my bottles don't get fizzy enough for me, I'm totally going to dump them into the TAD and hit them with a couple of CO2 charges. I foresee no real issues, other than the sediment issue.. which was fine when I conditioned right in the TAD bottles. Go for it!

[jhlurie]

Are any of you folks still working on this? I was fascinated while it lasted...

[iain]

I've been working on drinking the beer, actually. For some reason, it never really carbonated fully. I'm thinking it was because I used those PrimeTabs instead of just using regular priming sugar or something. I'd like to hear if anyone has had a good experience with this product. Maybe the problem was somewhere else.

If anyone in NYC wants to try some of the beer, I do still have some left. We talked around doing a meetup, but nothing has come of it.

[theakston]

Mine took a long time to carbonate but now it's about perfect (carbonation wise at least). I suspect it was the late cold snap that slowed it down (especially as I left the heat off as I was on vacation)

I've got loads left too. I now have a closet that is entirely given over to beer (I'm in a couple of mail order clubs too, so I had Belgians all over the place too).

It's an interesting beer. I definitely overdid the hops for the style - and added a bit too much of the dark malts too so it is dark and hoppy, not a classic nut brown ale but plenty of flavour.

I saw you guys are doing a Belgian soon? (I always wanted to try and brew a Belgian style, never have) Good luck with that - I'll be watching but not brewing - I have family visiting this Summer, so I'll need to stash the stuff away for a while.

Cheers!

[cdh]

I'm nearly through my supply, which is what prompted the new brew project... Mine took about a month to carbonate fully in the bottles... which made me quite pleased I had the tap-a-draft thingy which really did carbonate the first 6L on bottling day, and provided me with a few weeks of fine beer before I started trying the bottles and finding them not quite there yet.

Was a great project, and a fun brew with you all! I'll keep everybody up to date on the progress of the Belgian Blonde that has been in my primary for a week and a half now... feel free to join in that brew too if you feel like something in the vicinity of a Duvel, or a strong Leffe Blonde.

I've not been in NYC much recently... if I find myself up there any time soon, I've still got my two give away bottles that I'd gladly tote along to swap.