The End of the Road - Blueberry Breeze
Well the Blueberry Breeze is in the bottles and carbonating. Soon we will be on the first week of bottle conditioning. This post sits down and looks at the experience of this beer from start to finish.
Brew Day
This was my very first all-grain batch. I learned a lot about all-grain brewing and recipe design as I create this recipe from scratch. Up until then, I always brewed from ingredient kits. So not only was this my first all-grain brew; it’s also my first recipe.
This will make things difficult to truly judge the effects of my methods on the beer. However, I did brew to style on this recipe so I can always compare it to a commercial pale ale.
Some of the problems I experienced on brew day included husks in the boiling pot and a lack of knowledge about calculating efficiency. I also missed my final volume and cooling the wort took a lot more time than I allotted for.
All in all, the brew day took 6 hours from start to finish.
Bottling Day
Bottling day went well without many problems. The beer was still hazy but I believe that is from the pectins in the fruit. I had added the blueberries to the secondary fermenter seven days after I brewed the beer.
The beer had fermented out nice and clean. I was able to harvest enough yeast to make four more batches of beer, although I will need to use a yeast starter.
Overall the beer turned out very well for a first attempt at all grain brewing. There weren’t any harsh off-flavors during the tasting samples at the secondary and bottling stages. The beer is presentable to say the least and it was a first attempt at fruit beer, all-grain brewing and my own recipe.
Now it’s your turn… share with us a brief story of a first in your home beer brewing hobby.
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