Monday Activites

With spending my day Friday in the ER and much of the weekend home sick, today I had planned to just hang around the house. After all, I couldn't leave because I have not car. As you all know, I had a car accident last week and the VW is not drivable. Kristin had to go not the office today, therefore leaving me with no car.

This morning I did not do much. I watched the Today show, read some emails and played with the dog because she missed her mommie. This afternoon I spent working on my beer. To brew beer, it takes 2-4 weeks depending on what type of beer you brew (sometimes even months) Once the beer is brewed you can either bottle it or keg it. When you bottle it, you have to mix sugar into the beer so that while in the bottles, the yeast east the duagr and naturally carbonates the beer. This process takes a minimum of 2 weeks. Not only does it lengthen the process but it is also tedious to sit and clean sanitize, bottle cap 50+ bottles. The kegging process is much easier and faster because you force carbonate the beer with CO2. I have never kegged my beer but needed to this batch because I wanted it to be ready for Thanksgiving.

Yesterday I spend the afternoon reading up on how to keg the beer, regulate the CO2 tanks, force carbonate etc. So, this afternoon I spent an hour cleaning and sanitizing the keg and all its components. I then transferred (racked) the beer into the keg, sealed and moved to the garage. I had to put in the garage because when you force carbonate, them temp needs to remain under 60 so the beer absorbs the gas. I hooked up the regulator and gages, hooked up the gas line to the keg, the output line and turned the gas on, closing my eyes fearing an explosion. Once I opened the valve, I quickly regulated the amount of gas going in so that it was at 12 pounds. For the next several hours, I will go out and roll the keg so to increase the surface area for the CO2 to be absorbed by the beer. End result, beer ready to drink tomorrow and it will pour fresh from my own keg! I have a picture below is the keg (Cornelius) and what the CO2 tanks and regular look like. One gauge shows how much gas left in tank and other shows pounds of gas going in.



Well, I am off to watch the 24 premiere I DVR'd yesterday. The towing company should be here shortly to pick up the VW.