30th Anniversary!

Today marks the 30th anniversary of my wife, Brenda, and I. Mrs. Lazy Brewer doesn’t read this blog, so this post isn’t really being written for her eyes. But, today is a landmark day. Many people don’t reach their 30th anniversary, even with multiple wives/husbands. We did it with just each other – and a couple of kids!

Brenda puts up with all of my quirks, obsessions and hobbies. She keeps our lives in order and is the foundation of our home. She is the glue of our family. And I love her:)

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1. 28 Glorious Years!
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The Brew Sculpture in Action

As several of the Lazy Brewer’s readers have pointed out, it been a while since my last post. It’s been a mix of general real life busyness, and sheer laziness. I’m brewing a German Hefeweizen as I type this (on a new toy – but more on that later:) and enjoying the aromas only those of you who brew can understand.  I’ve brewed several times since last posting in January, including an IPA, an American Brown Ale, and a Russian Imperial Stout. Friday I brewed a Belgian Wit and then today a German Hefeweizen.  I’m trying to get several of the crowd-pleasing summer ales ready to go before the summer drinking season starts.

Today’s brew is the last of an era.  The next brew I do will be my 100th batch!  I’ll be working on an original recipe for my centennial ale over the next week, and I’m 99% sure it will be an IPA (big surprise, huh?).  I want to brew an easy drinking, high flavor/aroma IPA that kind of goes back to the roots of my brewing – bittering with Columbus, flavoring with Centennials and then finishing with either Cascades or Amarillo (or both:).

So where am I in my brewing after 100 batches?  Well, I’m making consistently good ale, sometimes great ale.  I’ve tried brewing a lot of different styles.  Some of them have become favorite ales that weren’t on my beer radar five years ago.  I’ve really come to love the darker ales; browns, porters and particularly stouts.  Some wheat beers are now a part of my regular brewing routine, like wits and German hefeweizens – though I still have very little love for American hefeweizens.  I also really like the big beers; barley wines, imperial reds and old ales.  I’ve also learned what I really don’t care to drink – some of  the Belgians are just too much for me.  A Belgian Golden Strong Ale is the only keg I’ve poured out.  It was brewed to style, and came out nicely, I just didn’t like beer.  More than anything, I’ve learned that when it comes to brewing, time is your friend.  Letting beers finish out in the fermentor, and then giving them time to mellow, clear and generally become stellar ales is what conditioning is all about.  Finally, I’ve also learned that brewing is all about people.  Many of the best friends in my life are, or have been, brewers.  Brewing with them, and enjoying ales in their company, is what life is all about.  Also, seeing a non-brewer’s face light up when they are sipping one of your hand-crafted brews is priceless:)

Other recent events, in no particular order, that have kept me away from here are more than a bit of wine tasting, shuttering the doors on my ten year web hosting business (no tears here:), planning a trip to Italy in October, installing a commercial WordPress theme for this blog, and an impulse purchase of an iPad.  I may create individual posts about some of these things in the future:)

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1. Teach a Friend to Brew Day 2009 A Success!
2. Teach a Friend to Brew Day 2009
3. At NHC…

Merry Christmas!

Another year is on the horizon, and it’s time to reflect on everything that is good in my life.  My family loves me and puts up with all my eccentricities, and I’m truly blessed to have some of the best friends in the world. I have a fun and challenging job. I get to travel to places that feel like home. I get to enjoy wonderful ales on a regular basis.  Life is good!

Merry Christmas to all of the Lazy Brewer’s readers.  Open a good ale and share it with someone you love:)

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The 2009 Teach a Friend to Brew Day Crew

Today’s Teach a Friend to Brew Day event was successful in several ways.  First and foremost, it was a wonder social event – many good (old) friends, some good (new) friends (I got to meet some local Twitter folks – Hi @AlexisDias !) and many friends of friends.  Homebrewing just seems to attract high quality people.  It’s one of my favorite things about the hobby:)

Between Brad and I, we brewed 20 gallons of ale, 10 of my annual TAFTBD IPA, and 10 of Brad’s German Hefeweizen.  My brew day went well, short of forgetting to add clarifier and yeast nutrient (I get distracted with so many fun people around:), and the IPA has been put to bed for a nice cozy fermentation.  Everything else aside, we made beer!

Most importantly, I think we may have picked up as many as four new homebrewers out of the event!  The Teach a Friend to Homebrew Day event is all about showing people how easy it is to brew great beer, showcasing the ales you’ve brewed and lighting the burner under new brewers.  I think we did that today:)

A Photo Gallery has been posted of the day’s activities for your viewing pleasure.

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I’ll have coffee and morning munchies early in the day, as well as sausages (John has offered to be the event’s GrillMaster:) and lunch munchies in the afternoon.  Additionally, attendees will have full run of the 8 ales I have on tap throughout the day:)  We should be done around 3:00 p.m.  My best guess is that there will be about fifteen attendees.

Last year’s event at Sociables was a huge success!

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Dust Bowl Brewings BevMo Tasting

Friday night, a group from the Central Valley Brewers Guild descended on our local BevMo for a tasting with our local up and coming brewery, Dust Bowl Brewing.  It was exciting to see our buddy, Don Oliver (of Sam Adams Longshot fame), standing in the 6′ x 6′ tasting box as we entered the store.  The box was already full when we got there, so we had to wait a few minutes to work our way in for tastes of his Hops of Wrath IPA, and two other pre-production brews, a white ale and a buckwheat ale.  The Hops of Wrath IPA is great, and I particularly liked the white ale.  Don told me he backed way off on the coriander for a more subtle spice profile in the ale.

We probably over stayed our welcome, but I was able to enjoy at least half a dozen tastes and Don was as gracious as always – answering questions and shooting the breeze during lulls in the action.  Don is also welcoming the CVBG with open arms for our September 2nd gathering, by opening up his brewery to us.  This guy remembers where he came from:)

Several of the CVBG folks wrapped up the evening by having dinner at our local Applebees, where Dust Bowl Brewing’s Hops of Wrath is on tap.  Here’s to hoping Dust Bowl Brewing continues to make inroads into local (and not so local:) pubs and restaurants.  These guys rock!

And congrats to Don on his upcoming wedding.  His girl was smart enough to wait and see him actually become a professional brewer before committing!

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Static electricity handprints on my milled grain tubs!

I’ve been a terrible blogging slacker lately.  I’ve brewed twice – 10 gallons of Two Hearted Ale and another 10 gallons of my house German Hefeweizen.  Unfortunately, work has been very busy as we prepare hundreds of new computers for a brand new middle school that is opening in early August.  I’m off until mid-July, but then it’s back to work earlier than usual to make sure we are ready for all the teaching staff and students as they make their way to a new campus.  I’ll be taking some time off next fall or winter to make up for the additional days I’ll be working this summer.  I hope to do something special with the time off that I normally couldn’t do because I’m working:)

Stephen and I are heading off to the National Homebrewers Conference in Oakland on the 18-20 of this month, so hopefully I’ll have plenty to report here to make up for my month long blogging absence.  I’ll try and catch up on the activities of the last month sometime next week.  Lots of exciting things have been happening with our new brew club, the Central Valley Brewers Guild.

Eddy, the Boston Terrorist, is also keeping us busy.  Thankfully, he’s been sleeping through the night for the last three weeks.  I’m much more attentive in the daylight hours when I haven’t been up watering/pooing a puppy two or three times a night!  All in all, though, we do love us some Eddy in the Lazy Brewer household!

Finally, one of the most exciting thing to hit the Lazy Brewer’s household recently is an AT&T U-verse installation scheduled for this morning.  We’ve been TiVo fans for over six years, but one of our Series 2 TiVos gave up the ghost a couple weeks ago.  With U-verse hitting our neighborhood in the last couple months, the timing was right.  I’m really looking forward to HD programming for my Pioneer Plasma (Series 2 TiVos have never supported HD programming) and even more excited about getting an 18 MB Internet pipe.  I just hope the install goes well.  I hear the TV/Internet part usually goes well but the phone part (VoIP) can be sketchy.  Kind of ironic that the phone company has trouble with the phone part!

Again – sorry for the downtime.  More info to follow next week.

Cheers!

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Happy Birthday to The Lazy Brewer!

Today marks the one year anniversary of The Lazy Brewer!  I really wondered if I’d see this day.  I started this site as an experiment – of myself.  I wondered if I’d take the time to post regularly.  At this point, I’ve exceeded my own expectations and have posted 87 times.

If the Lazy Brewer has made your life any more interesting than it already is, please open your favorite ale, and raise a toast (and maybe leave a comment:) to the Lazy Brewer.

Cheers!

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