4 Dog Brewery

Having a hard time adjusting my different size grains. Think I got a good crush now. Pic down below.   I think I will go with this one for now. Not milled to flour at all and will see when done. This setting is .050. I think I can go just a little finer but not doing it. Will do it with the next brew because I will be using Crisp Maris Otter because I don't have any of this grain left. I will have to play with the mill again anyway.  Today is May 8/25 and by looking at that pic, there seems to be a lot of grains still intact. I just made a 1.036 IPA because of a inefficient grind. I adjusted it a lot and should be okay. I will take a pic and put it here to compare grinds.

  Martin Brugard who made Bru'n Water has a method of getting the moisture out of calcium chloride.  Toss on a baking sheet and pre-heat the oven to 392F. Bake for an hour and it should dry it out so you can get true measurements when weighing it out. May as well try it now and if it fails, I have time to buy some new stuff to use in the future. I don't have a lot. Doing this on Nov. 28. 2024. Done. Yes, it was quite dry. It must of picked up a ton of moisture  when ever I bought it. I vacuumed sealed it. I need to buy more in Feb. 2025.

  Making my own West Coast Style IPA because I already have the malts so why not give this a try? I do remember many, many years ago the Brewhouse kits used honey malt. This will only cost me $19 ( hops and yeast ) because I get free delivery to Bobcaygeon Brewery but I have to buy a 6 pack of beer. Better than bloody shipping which is out of this world. Do not forget to tell Brewers Pantry to deliver to Bobcaygeon Brewery. They deliver it on Tuesdays. I am looking forward to brewing this on the 22nd. No hockey, no storey xmas, just beer and world juniors on tv. Ingredients 11 lbs. Rahr 4 ozs. Honey Malt 2 ozs. CaraFa Special III 25.3 grams Magnum at 60 min. 2 oz. Cascade at 15 min. 2 ozs. Cascade at 0 min. 1 oz. Cascade dry hop in fermenter 3 days before kegging. US-05 Mash Volume - 5.25 gallons Sparge Volume - 5 gallons O.G. - 1.044 F.G. - % - SRM - 8.3 BU - 41.3 PH - 5.31 CA - 75 MG - 9 S04 - 150 CC - 51 Mash Gyp - 4 grams CC - 1.6 grams Eps - 1.9 grams Lactic Acid - 1 ml ( for ...

  Did this one last and it went fine. The temp strip was defective so I need to get another one.  Ingredients 6.3 L of Wine concentrate. 34 grams of yeast nutrient Wine Yeast Spring water Well water which I had to top up with since I ran out of spring water. O.G. - 1.090 ( this is just a guess, it could of been 1.090 or higher ) F.G. - .990 % -    13.6 Turned wall heater on for now but will check it often cause I want to ferment all 3 wines at 72F.  Same Night - Starting to see activity late when I was going to bed. Day 2 - Same. 72F. I need one more temp strip, mine is crap. Day 3 - Had to turn off the heat, too warm. Day 14 - Rack to a carboy if the gravity is at .998 or less. Racking on Friday, Dec. 6 which is Day 14. Add the rest of the ingredients in order as they say. Let it sit for 14 more days before filtering. Rack on Thursday, Dec. 5. Check gravity before racking. I am sure it is below .998 but check it anyway. Let it sit for 14 more days before filter...

  No oak chips to deal with but the yeast nutrient was a bit of a pita. I added 34 grams to 23 litres of wine. Seems like a lot, but that is what they say to do. Use no more than 1 tsp. per gallon. I work in metric, so that is 5.69 grams per gallon which comes to 34 grams. Better work. Same Night - Saw activity when going to bed. Day 2 - More active, 72F. Day 3 - Had to turn off the heat, too warm. Day 14 - Add the rest of the ingredients in order, de-gas and follow all instructions.                Let it sit for 14 more days before filtering. O.G. - 1.090 ( just a guess. I will take a reading next batch ) F.G. -  .994 % -     13 Should be able to rack on Friday, Dec. 6 into carboys. Top up with RO water that did not come from the water cooler. Hope the yeast nutrient worked, or even over worked. I followed the instructions and it seemed like an awful lot. Just a couple points or so higher than mine for some reason. Didn't...

This kit has it all, 3 bags of oak chips and a bag of dehydrated wine skins. I didn't have a muslim bag to put them in. I just hope they don't get caught in the syphon tube when it is time to rack the wine. Next time change what you do with the oak chips. Hydrate them in hot water right after you add the bettonite and use a muslim bag with them and the wine skins. That will be 2 muslim bags. Ingredients 12L of wine concentrate 34 grams of yeast nutrient 11 L of spring water wine yeast - EC-118 dehydrated wine skins 3 packets of oak chips ( in a muslim bag ) Oak chips should be put in the fermenter just after you add the bettonite. It is kind of hard to add it plus the water which is left over from the hydration of the chips. Easier when the pail is almost empty.  Same Night - Activity when going to bed. 72F. Day 2 - More active. 72F. Day 3 - Had to turn off the heat, too warm. Day 5 - 74F. Turned down heater again... Day 9 - Just about done. Rack on day 14. Day 11 - No activity...

We sadly had to put Murphy down on November 20, 2024. He is almost 20 years old now and was sick a lot. He was a good cat through the years and we will miss him terribly.  

This is a good choice because I don't have to do anything but pour into a carboy and add yeast. I bought this in Lindsay and the price is $45 for this kit. Others are $40. This is more expensive than making my own of course, but is a good kit if all you want is beer with no mess. I will certainly think about this when I get older or just don't want to make my own beer any more. This is half what I would pay at the Beer Store. Actually less than half price. Most IPA cases are around $60 - $78 or more a case. That is $120 for 2 cases and this kit makes 2 cases for $45. Big savings where there is never any savings in this idiot province or country  Putting this kit altogether and pitching the yeast.  Foam, foam, and more foam. Fermcap did little to help, so I am waiting between dumps of wort to add more. This will take awhile. I do love the smell of this wort. I tasted it and it was pretty good. I may go back to making  this style if I can figure out the hop schedule without...

I changed my recipe to reflect the recipes in my British Ale Clone book. I didn't with the last one and the beer was too dark and of course malty. I used too much specialty malts. I fixed that so hopefully this beer will taste more like the British Bitters I am after.   Ingredients 11 lbs. Crisp Maris Otter 6 ozs. CL ( 40 srm ) 14.17 grams CaraFa Special III 49.50 grams EKG Wyeast British Ale 1098 Slurry Over Build I got way more yeast slurry this time around compared to the first one. But, you can't go by the amount, just by the estimated cell count. Estimated - who knows how much? Just a guess. CA - 50 MG - 10 S04 - 75 CI - 63 PH - 5.45 Water Profile - Amber Balanced O.G. - 1.042 - (75%) F.G. -  1.010 % -     4.2 BU - 35 SRM - 6.5 Mash Volume - 5.25 gallons Sparge Volume - 5 gallons MASH Gyp - 1.3 grams CC - 1.9 grams Eps - 2 grams Lactic Acid - .5 ml BOIL Gyp - 1.2 grams CC - 1.8 grams Eps - 1.9 grams Since I am down with a very bad cold, brew day has been re...

Smoking this one just like the last one. Do not forget to inject it with oil to help keep it moist. The Ottawa pros smoke their Pork Loin to 145F and that is what I am doing. They serve to the public so if they do it, then so can I. Instructions are in the orange binder. Since this is half the size of the recipe, it should take me around 1 hour or just past that. It is not really cold out now, going to 12C. No rain until maybe tomorrow night so you need to clean Mr. Smoker tomorrow morning. Since I was having company, I did smoke this to 160F. Dry of course but no one got sick.

It was easy to calibrate Mr. Robobrew once I did it a few times to get it right. However,  Mr. STC1000 was a different matter. I had to watch You Tube and remember it for when I went downstairs. I eventually did it and it seems to be fine. You don't have to be exact since I do have the temp strip to look at. The temp was at 60F so I carried the carboy into the beer room and turned on the wall heater. It is hit and miss since it doesn't have any temp measurements to go by. These heaters aren't accurate anyway. Just so it is anywhere between 64F - 66F.   I should check both these units for accuracy every time I use them. Maybe I will get good at doing it and it will be a quick thing to do. The temp controller was off .7C which isn't too bad. It all depends on the ice/water glass if it is really 0C when you do calibrate it. I left the temp probe in it for 5 minutes and it was right in the middle of the ice. I had to go with that and set it to 0C.

                                                             BIRTHDAY BOY RIBS Smoking 2 or 3 ribs and will use the rib rack. There is no way around the spritzing of them when they are on the rack. Just hope the spices don't drip off when I spritz them. Since I am the only one living here that likes these ribs, I may just smoke 2 ribs. Currans will eat them, at least Frank will. I may smoke 3 just to have lots. Need to buy one more Rib though. Weather is supposed to be good, so it is a go.                                                          SMOKING SCHEDULE 1. Smoke at 225F - 275F for 2 hours. 2. Double wrap in foil for 1 hour at 275F on the smoker or the oven. 3. Unwrap Ribs, add bbq sa...

We have only 1 rib in the fridge and I am going to smoke it today. I need the practice. The recipe I am going with is straight forward and easy to follow so get to it Pit Guy. Will start to smoke at noon and should be done around 5 pm. 2 hours smoke at 225F to 250F. 1 hour in foil in the oven at 275F. 1 hour in foil in the cooler wrapped in a towel. ( i add sauce, butter and honey ) 2 minutes in the oven on broil with more sauce. More details like spritzing etc. are in the binder. Rib was good. Tender and juicy. The under side of the rib was black but didn't taste burnt. Not sure why though, it was only smoked for 2 hours. The temp was around 250F most of the time. The probe said way higher though, like 25F higher. May need calibration. Or the smoker temp is wrong. Either way the rib was fine, just the way I like it. Yes, it was pulled back from the bone too. Apparantly no one else liked the ribs. Too dry. I did not find that at all. Still going to make some more on my birthday. Th...

There are a lot of British Ale recipes out there but the ingredients are similar in most of them. I bought a lot of ingredients in small amounts so I can easily switch them out to see which one I like and go with that. Not sure about the times using EKG hops. May do a 60 minute boil only, but most if not all go with these times. That is being cheap on my part. Since I bought my grains at Defalco's, they are metric. 250 grams, 500 grams etc. Cut in half it came out to 8.8 ozs.  Ingredients 11 lbs. Crisp Maris Otter 8.8 ozs. Simpsons CM 8.8 ozs. Biscuit 1.60 ozs. CaraFa III 30 grams EKG at 60 min. 18 grams EKG at 30 min. 20 grams EKG at 5 min. Wyeast British Ale 1098 - Pitched at 10 AM O.G. - 1.040 - 67% - why so low? Wort tastes good so go with it I guess. F.G. -  % - SRM - 10.6 BU - 30 Water Profile - Amber Dry CA - 50 MG - 15 S04 - 110 CI - 51 PH - 5.49 MASH Gyp - 2 g Cal Chloride - 1.7 g Eps - 3.3 g Baking Soda - 1.2 g BOIL Gyp - 1.8 g Cal Chloride - 1.5 g Eps - 2.9 g SPARGE...

Since my previous Kolsch seems okay, time to brew another one. I adjusted the recipe to get a slightly more hop aroma as in a late addition. T storms all night but gone at 5:30. Sticky  out but wet. Should dry up by the time I clean up. I added up all of my Munich malt orders and can't account for 1.8 lbs. of it. No idea how much I added today. No matter, I am not using it for awhile and will most likely just use Pils or 2 row. I have 1 batch left and it is a Robobrew brew because there isn't that much left.  Ingredients 22 lbs. German Pils Malt 1 lb. Munich I ( more like 4 ozs. However nothing is labeled since the grain got mixed up ) 35 grams Magnum at 60 min. 56 grams Hallertau at 5 min. ( I want aroma only ) Escarpment Labs Kolsch O.G. - 1.046 F.G. - % - SRM - 3.4 BU - 24 Water profile, salts amounts, mash volume etc. is the same as the previous batch except the BU are higher.                            ...

  I may as well smoke the loin and take it off at 145F. The ribs take 4 1/2 hours and the  half loin may take less than an hour. I guess I will have to smoke the loin around 3 and smoke the ribs at the same time but they will be in a cooler later on in the day. I assume the ribs won't be ready until 7 pm but this is just a test to figure out what is the best way to do them. Today I don't care when they are cooked. These ribs suck anyway. The butcher cut them in half and they are too thin. They did cook too fast so I assume that is why they were burnt. I am buying my own ribs for now on and not letting anyone else buy them. If I saw them in the store I would not of bought them.                                                    HOW WERE THEY? The pork loin is very good. So easy to make. 145F and that is it. Smoking took less than an hour because it w...

The first thing you have to do is inject it with pork broth or hell anything like that to get it moist as the final temperature of 160F will dry the pork out. I am sure the injecter with help a lot to get it moist. It sure helps with chicken.   First time smoking this. The smoke is only for an hour. Smoke it until the internal temperature reaches 150F. Remove from the smoker, sauce it up and immediately toss it on the smoker until the internal temperature reaches 160F where the Canada Food Guide says it is safe to eat. I left it out at room temp too long. I got up in the middle of the night and tossed them in the fridge. Well, we have done that before and are still alive. Will smoke them for an hour today around 4 - 5 pm.                                                            TASTE They were okay, the smoke flavour was just like w...

  Using a newer recipe from You Tube. This guy is good. He is keeping it simple for a simpleton like me. Since the smoke is close to 4 hours, I will most likely have to add more charcoal to finish them. I am smoking 4 ribs because MP ( military police ) wants her rib in the slow cooker.                                                                THE SMOKE 4 hours of smoke and 2 hours in foil. Have more charcoal on hand incase you need it. Hour 1 - 225F. Hour 2, 3, and 4 - 275F. You will have to open the lower vents wide open, or close to it. I decided not to spritz them as they are in the rib rack on their side. I will do that when not in the rib rack. Hour 5 and 6 - Wrapped in sauce, honey and a few slabs of butter in FOIL. Tossed in the oven on trays at 275F. Start at 11 am to have ribs at 5 pm or an hour later to eat a...

There is finally no time contraints to brew this. I can take my time and just get it in the Conical. I thought about using Mr. Robobrew along with this, but no need to do that now. I have made a decision to make Kolsch beers for the immediate future. May change and brew something else, but for now at least I can keep this yeast going for at least 4 brews. After that? Undecided. No UK beers though. I checked my history and it is not good.  I tossed a lot of them out. This is a simple recipe so why change?                                                  CHANGE OF PLANS Well, since my Helles is questionable, I had to get this going now. Made a starter earlier just to keep the yeast viable. Now I had to punch it up now just to be able to brew a Kolsch now. Hate being rushed. At least it will be almost done by the time we get back from glamping. Better be worth i...

  Okay book but nothing new. Had to buy it though. I thought he would do something similar to BCS only upgrade to the all in one brewing systems like Mr. Robobrew.

I can do a one step starter in my 5 L flask. There is a change of plans due to being busy. I made a small starter just to update the yeast before it gets too old.  Made a 1.4L starter. ( used all of my DME I had ) I ended up with basically 200 billion cells. That will sit in the fridge until I can top it up to brew a Kolsch in July sometime. I have to let it slide for 17 days and make another starter just for brew day. On July 12, make a 4 L starter and when done, remove 500 ml for an over build. Done. After this I can just make a simple starter when ever I want. If you want to brew earlier, just do it. The few days won't make a difference in the size of your starter. You won't need all 4 litres of starter wort, just do it to have lots so if there is any delay, you will be okay. You won't be brewing your Kolsch before company on Aug. 9, so you won't be rushed.                                   ...