Brewing in Philly

[mashamatician]

Greetings!

Been brewing for around 2.5 years now. I'm a BJCP judge as well. Started brewing AG about 4 months ago, and things have been going pretty well. I got turned onto the BN pretty recently (via the Jamil Show), and it's been a lot of fun, as well as useful. I'm digging it.

Anyway, I have some pics up of my ramshackle AG "rig" up on my blog (see my sig). I'm also into creating easy-to-use brewing spreadsheets - so if you've been wanting one to calculate something for you, let me know and I'll see what I can put together for you.

Lastly, anyone else in/around Philly on the board?

[DannyW]

I'm not from Philly, but pleased to meet you anyway.

Does the flame on your burner always look like this?


Might want to open up the air shutter (or clean out the spiders, lizards, and/or mud daubers) to get a blue flame and you'll run through far less gas.

Otherwise, how do you like that burner? I've been thinking of replacing my rusting, cantankerous 2-piece turkey fryer burners with those donuts-with-holes type.

[mashamatician]

It typically doesn't look quite like that. I'll have to adjust for that next time, though. Thanks for the tip!

I like it just fine! It's the Bayou Classic SQ-14. (http://www.weliveoutside.com/index.asp? ... &ProdID=35)

I bought it from the local Home Depot for around $50. It's been taking me around 15 minutes or so to get to a boil post-sparge. (I typically collect around 6-6.5 gallons in a 10 gallon kettle.) I'm actually planning on collecting a bit more since I haven't been hitting the efficiencies (or volumes, for that matter) that I want. I trust it will still the job well with another gallon or so. In all, it's been very easy to work with.

[J.Brew]

Ramshackle it all looks familiar to me! Welcome brother.

[mashamatician]

Thanks J. Brew!

[PortlyPorterGuy]

Yo mash!

There are a bunch of philly guys around here. I live in MontCo now but grew up in the NE (that's NE philly for the uninitiated). I spent a few years in your part of the city as a Drexel student.

Welcome!

[mashamatician]

Hey Porterguy,

Always good to see more brewers around the area. I actually took my BCJP class a few years back at the Iron Hill in North Wales. If you ever see the head brewer around there, Larry Horwitz, say hi - he's a hell of a nice guy and brimmimg with beer knowledge.

Do you plan on entering anything in Allentown's Malt Madness?
http://www.lehighvalleyhomebrewers.org/competition.html

[PortlyPorterGuy]

I met Larry at a White Labs seminar at Iron Hill. Great guy.

I'll be entering my American Brown in Malt Madness. I'm dropping it off tonight actually right before our club meeting (Keystone Hops).