Brew Day: The Beginning of the End

This weekend I finally got around to brewing.  I was supposed to brew this beer about 3 weeks ago.  Weather and life just got in the way.  At the time I am calling this beer the Beginning of the End.  Essentially it is a La Fin du Monde clone.  I am making it for my friend who recently started drinking good beer.  His gateway drug?  La Fin du Monde.  This is the same friend that I had to make a hard lemonade for so he has come a long way.  I should start a series called the Friendship Series and keep track of these beers.  We will save that for another post.

Everything went smooth on this brew day except for one thing.  I forgot to take a OG reading.  My wort chiller busted on the previous brew day and I just plain forgot to buy a new one.  I was left with only a cold water bath to cool my brew down to pitching temps.  By the time my beer got to temp I forgot to take the reading. I guess you can say two things went wrong as I did not want to let the beer sit that long while it cooled.  I much prefer using a wort chiller and getting it cooled down in a half hour at the most.  This took many hours because it was hot yesterday and it just took too damn long.

Fermentation was rolling this afternoon so it took off in less than 24 hours.  Not too bad considering I did not use a yeast starter.

This may be the first beer I keg.  More on that later.
Until then...

Update:
This beer sat in the primary for two weeks and one day.  This was due to my travel and not necessarily planned.  I have been thinking about really reducing my secondary time as I hear more and more people say it is not worth the risk of adding more oxygen to your beer.  Some are even abandoning the secondary all together.

Its a very nice straw yellow color.  Still cloudy. Hopefully that clears up some.  Smells like a nice Belgian beer.

This will be my first beer on tap.  I have 4 mini kegs (3gallons each) coming to the house tomorrow.  I am stopping at the homebrew shop to put in a grain order for a new beer along with buying the rest of the supplies to get up and running.

Really excited about this development.  Having 4 kegs will let me age 2 beers while having two on tap.

Tasting Day - Barn-Cat Black Sour Stout - 2 Months

This is the two month mark of the Barn-Cat Black being in the bottle. The carbonation is great.  The flavor seems the be a bit young.  Its not as crisp as it was at the one month mark.  I think some of the roast flavors are coming out a bit more and creating a muddied effect of the flavor.  Time to let them sit for another month and then taste another.  I will be curious to see how this beer changes over time.  For my first attempt at blending back a beer that was too sour I am extremely happy with how it turned out.  I can only hope that it gets better as it ages.  About once a month you can look for a new tasting note from me.

• One Month - Carbonation great.  Flavor seems bright and lightly sour.  Well balanced. 
• Two Month - Great carbonation again.  Flavor seems less bright.  Roast and sour are clashing a bit on this one.  The beer is finding itself.