Homebrew Recipe: James Brown Ale

Two admirers of your homebrew want a batch to split for themselves? This was a problem I was practically born to solve! There was some debate over what style of beer they wanted, but once a brown ale was settled on I was off to the races. This is a style I’ve brewed several times and I was eager to put my newly discovered all grain skills to work. Seeking to make an easy drinking but satisfying brown ale would prove to be a good test indeed.

Hacksaw Hop Growing

Gardening - it's probably my second biggest hobby after homebrewing. The wonderful thing about homebrewing as it has allowed me to blend the two hobbies together in the glorious pursuit of hop growing! I grew hops last year on a homemade trellis in 5 gallon buckets just off the back porch of my apartment. People called me crazy until they had the beer I brewed with the hops that I grew!

Now that I'm a homeowner I had this master plan to grow my hop plants up the posts of the pergola that I built in the back yard. I learned quite a bit... for example - hops don't like to wrap themselves around 4X4 posts very well at all. Halfway through the summer I made the move to some yarn lines dropped from the top.

Beer Tasting: Hardywood Park Bourbon Double IPA

Hardywood Park Bourbon Double IPA
9.4% ABV, 80 IBU 
Enjoyed on 8.9.14

A particularly arduous business trip saw me returning home on Saturday evening with only a few hours of sleep. True to form, I opened the fridge and found that my wife and personal beer goddess had gotten me a surprise: Bourbon Double IPA. If that won’t chase the travelling blues away, I don’t know what will!

One Year Old Birthday Bash

Seeing a keg at a 21^st birthday party wouldn’t seem all that out of place – but when you homebrew you get unique opportunities. How about bringing a keg of homebrew to a 1 year old’s birthday party? When you have mobile keg abilities and homebrew available, a multitude of gatherings suddenly transform into homebrew tasting sessions and conversions to craft beer are made.

Learn to Brew - Part II

Learn to Brew!

This is the second in a series of posts about how to break on to the homebrewing scene. For Part I, click here.

Part II: Your First Brew Day

Now that you have all of your supplies and ingredients for your first brewing creation, it’s time to walk through the first brew day. I’d like to give some serious props to John Palmer and his How to Brew for teaching me when I started out. He goes in to much more detail, and it’s a great read if you want to know more about the science and the “why” involved in brewing. Hacksaw read The Complete Joy of Homebrewing by the infamous Charlie Papazien before starting his homebrewing adventures. John Palmer is the preferred read but Charlie’s work – while dated - is still a classic and very helpful.

Homebrew Recipe: The Dunkel (Extract)

Once upon a time, shortly after I became a confident brewer, I had the dream that I was going to
revolutionize the beer world by inventing or pioneering a new style. In my pursuit, I thought to myself,
“what about a dark wheat beer, surely that’s never been done before!” Well, I emailed this to Hacksaw
Brewing, excited to share my genius. And then I remembered, ye olde dunkelweizen is a dark wheat
beer and has been around for quite some time. You win some, you lose some I suppose. Nevertheless,
I decided to take my realization and brew it up.

Small Batch Beer Company

What is one thing that makes attending a wedding even better? How about checking out a new brewery the same day! I am often times at fault for trying to cram too much into a single day, but this little visit with all of Mrs. Hacksaw's family was perfect. Small Batch Beer Company in downtown Winston Salem is about as small a batch as you can get to be a brewery. Take a look at the brewing system these guys use!