Wasn’t sure where this belonged (didn’t see useless rambling as a forum) so feel free to move if need be.
SO, I’m brewing a pale ale this weekend after a year or so break from brewing. Brew day goes good, and as I’m going to put my fermenter in the fridge, it dawns on me that maybe I shouldn’t keep my nice clean wort so close to my 1 year+ “infected†beer. So I pull it out from under the stairs and the carboy cap comes off; so of course I smell it, and well it didn’t smell bad (odd for an infected beer). But none the less I move it to the garage and top up the air lock (I’ll deal with it tomorrow).
So the next day I’m picking up around the garage and I see my carboy full of what should have been dark, spicy, sweet goodness known as aztek fire porter (chocolate habanero porter). So being the brewer that I am, and not wanting to throw out a batch without tasting it, I grab my wine thief (why can’t we call this a beer thief, COME ON!!!) and grab a half a wine glass full (wort/beer tasting glass) and give it a swirl, then a taste, then another taste; and I’m like WTF. From what I could tell this wasn’t infected at all (not even a little), I’m no super taster but I didn’t even get any oxidation off it, just smooth spicy sweet goodness. So I do what any brewer with a cool wife would do; I say honey, Try this, and she agrees it’s good and finishes the glass. Now mind you this was still; so this bad boy is now carbonating in my keg. Now that’s what you call a good weekend ïŠ new beer and aged beer as a bonus.
Now saying that let me qualify why I thought this was infected; it had what appeared to be a film on it; which I’m now thinking may have been all the coco and maybe something from the pepper. Having never brewed this recipe (first run) I didn’t know how it should look or taste, but man if it tastes this good with 1 year of age on it, I have a tough decision to make, to age or not to age (the next batch).
Sorry for the rambling but I’m as giddy as a school girl, I put a lot of time into designing this beer and to have it go off, pissed me off. Guess it was just someone trying to tell me to let it set…thank god I’m lazy.
