Heathenous Monk's Brews

My basic idea for this blog is just to highlight my brewing and cooking adventures. I started brewing about 2 years ago.

The first batch of ale that I brewed was a liquid extract kit provided by Homebrew Headquarters in Dallas. It was a Belgian Wit in style. To this day, that is my Father in Law and his Brothers favorite ale that I have brewed. It was modest in flavor and alcohol content. That was the only all extract brew that I have made.

From there, I went directly into partial mash brewing. I used some dry malt extract and adjunct grains to brew my second batch, which was a nice Belgian Dubbel. I did not follow the exact recipe that time, I took some liberties with the extract to boost the alcohol some. From that brew on, I was hooked. I had gotten a taste for how easy it was to work with grains and I had a good time tweaking to turn that liquid into what I wanted.

My third batch was my first all grain. I made a British Stout. I followed a recipe from "Radical Brewing" by Randy Mosher. I changed the recipe again by adding a larger quantity of malt to boost the alcohol and I also added coffee. My Brother in Law loved this ale, but he was one of the few who did. I do not think the coffee translated well into that beer. I think I would have preferred just the stout unadulterated.

Many of the brews that I have done since that time are a blur of hardware and recipe tweaking from the many books and websites that I have read. I would use portions of many things I would see in books and on sites and would tweak to my own personal tastes. I made an IPA, which made my hophead friends happy, and I found my true liquid love during this time...Belgian Ales.

Some of my more current brews were brewed from my own head. I created "The Raven", a nice Belgian Strong Dark Ale. This ale was created for my theater teacher. I had planned on delivering it to him, but sadly, he passed away the weekend that I was going to bottle. Instead of bottling, I left the ale to age in the secondary for an additional 6 months. Upon kegging, I learned that it had turned into a 15% alcohol monster. I was shocked that the alcohol could not be tasted or smelled, while acting like a sledgehammer to myself and my friends. I have also created a Belgian Strong Pale, Belgian Pale Ale, Belgian Kriek, Flemish Oud Bruin, Belgian Chocolate Milk Stout, and I have plans/recipe for a Belgian IPA.

I built a Keezer, which is a chest freezer that I converted into a kegerator that has a 8" sleeve around the top, which has the taps mounted to it. I plan on drilling and mounting some antlers from a recent hunting trip as the new tap handles. I will be staining one of them with some coffee. This will be done since I almost always have one pale and one dark on tap. That idea just seemed to work.