1st Event Proposal - " The Birth"

James :
You kids are reasonably smart...
Winter is approaching...
My supply is dwindling...
Who wants to start homebrewing? I know Leland has expressed an interest, and I know Keith has done it in the past. I've got a few brews under my belt (in more ways than one), but I'm still relatively newbish.
With the strong-ales fest at the power plant only a memory, somebody's gonna have to make all of those barleywines!
- James

On Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 6:48 PM, Keith :
You had me at "barleywine"
got any good recipes?
...more importantly, who has what apparatus? I decided my aluminum pot and kitchen stove had to go before I tried again (the stove actually had good output, but would prefer something not in the wifes kitchen). I haven't found a 5/6gal stainless steel pot that was in my pricerange yet, though I have seen a few high output propane burners that were reasonable (usually attached to aluminum turkey pots). My most valuable input would be one good carboy (or two, now I don't remember) and an immersion wort chiller. If anyone has a line on cheap stainless steel I'm all ears.

On Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 7:40 PM, Leland :
As James pointed out, I am certainly in. I was planning on a reasonable investment this fall, so if there is a particular toy that would benefit us all, speak up....
I (of course) will be attempting an IPA.

On Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 8:17 PM, James :
An IPA to start out with would probably be a good thing - if people are excited about doing a barleywine, I'm all in - my keggletun (part of a goofy Australian allgrain method) will only hold 20lbs of grain, unfortunately, so I'd have to do some tweaking of my recipe to get it to work. We'd also have to wait six months before it would be aged long enough to be good.
Leland, I think, is interested in going all-grain immediately, which is both commendable and insane.
Come to think of it, it would be pretty interesting for one of us to start with a simple in-kitchen stovetop extract setup (investment of about 150 bucks), while Leland goes ballsout with a traditional allgrain setup, and I continue with my all-in-one keggleton brew-in-a-bag method.
morebeer has some good stuff, no matter what your initial investment might need to be. I can answer most beginner's questions, so shoot if you have any.
Time to start saving bottles!

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 8:38 AM, Jeremiah :
Since I haven't ever actually invested any time towards research, I would be interested in being the "extra wheel". Keep me informed, I will just observe this year and I am more interested in documenting your hairbrained idears.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 9:48 AM, Matt :
I have several carboys and some other gear, but would all need a good cleaning as it has sat unused for a few years. I was contemplating brewing a new mead batch to commemorate the year.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 10:05 AM, James :
mmmmm mead.
if people are interested in contributing gear to others to get them started quicker, and save some dough, then maybe we should list the stuff that we have extra.
I've got:
3 gallon enameled pot for small extract batches
(I did my first batches in this - it works fine)
1 plastic fermentor bucket
(I've since moved to an all-glass setup)
probably some odds and ends.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 10:17 AM, Carl :
Should someone with a lot of space volunteer to host this chemistry experiment?
Then everybody can just bring all their stuff and see what's available to work with?

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 10:22 AM, Matt :
I could host some brews, but it would be a few weeks before I have the space available for storage.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 12:32 PM, James
Once we all get going, it would be awesome to do a multi-brew-day where we all make a batch at once.
Goes well with chili and a cold day. Everybody should probably get a few brews down before something like that happens, though.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 12:36 PM, Leland :
I was actually thinking that we could do something like that during
the event I sent the invite for in early November.
Everybody interested could put together a batch.
There is space out on my deck, and if its to cold outside the shop can
be cleaned for brewing.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 12:42 PM, Matt :
Perhaps I missed that invite. None the less, sounds like an excellent plan. As a bonus, one of my sales girls is going home to Hungary this month and promised to return with some of her father's schnapps recipes. We will see how that pans out.

Nevermind leland, I just got the invite.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 12:43 PM, Jeremiah :

Can we be in agreement that there will be no glass bombs detonated on the tablesaw? Because I would have to count myself out if that were the case!

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 12:45 PM, Matt :
With the bulk we are speaking off, perhaps we should just crank up the temp on leland's water heater.