Dennis O'Toole
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Aging into it

2/28/2014

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This is a Belgian Dubbel in my five-gallon carboy.  I had it in a six-gallon for the primary then moved over here to… I don’t know, let it clarify or something.  The recipes tell you to do shit, so I do it.  Being only three recipes and less than two months in to the hobby, I don’t have a firm grasp on the reasons to use a secondary fermenter (and evidently the homebrewing message board scene doesn’t either).  The science is, likewise, beyond me.  The Oxford Companion to Beer (which is fantastic) notes as an afterthought in the entry for secondary fermentation that, “Amateur brewers often use the term… to refer to the aging period after the primary fermentation.”  The real thing has to do with the reabsorbtion of diacetyl by yeast and/or the addition of actively fermenting wort once primary fermentation ceases. Duh. So I guess I am aging it and that homebrewers are idiots.

Whatever I’m doing, there is a good chance I am the fourth Floyd.  My very first brew, an American wheat, was boss, and I am stone cold optimistic on the pale ale I get to crack open the second day of Lent (unless I stupidly give up beer).  And this dubbel?  Oh boy.  When I racked—[brewer slang, means “moved”]—this to the secondary it smelled so good I almost cried. 


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    About Dennis

    Dennis O'Toole is an all-set cobra jet creepin' through the nighttime.  He lives in Chicago. 

    If you need to reach me, dial:
    denotoole AT SYMBOL gmail DOT co LETTER M.  

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