Posts Tagged ‘William’s Winter Warmer’
The Friday Question
Friday, November 5th, 2010
Before we get on to the business of The Friday Question I should point out that I forgot to mention in yesterday’s post that Metropolitan will also have a cask of The Darkness on offer some time later this month, look out for it!
Tomorrow, my beautiful son William turns 9 years old, so, in celebration I do what any proud Father (who happens to be a brewer) does … I put a beer on in his honor. William’s Winter Warmer will be available on the beer engine at The Pratt Street Ale House tomorrow morning and the draft version will follow late next week. The beer formerly known as Little William’s Winter Warmer is brewed for release on his Birthday each year. When William turned 7 he told me in no uncertain terms that he was far from little now and insisted that I drop the “Little” from the title! In the spirit of such growth I decided that the beer should grow with him. It was 7+% abv for the first 7 years of his life. When he turned 8 it was 8 % abv and this year it is of course 9% abv …. the next few years should be fun. Come warm yourself.
That's my boy!
So, on to the Friday Question! I had a suspicion that, despite the obscure question last week, someone might actually guess correctly. I was wrong. The theme to the Allied Domecq Convention was Star Trek and “To boldly go” so no winner this time around … I will add the prize to the bottle of 2007 Three Philosophers “Belgian Style Blend’ Quad generously donated by last week’s winner, Trevor, and a growler of William’s Winter Warmer. Incidentally, here’s proof that what I say is true …. never ones to miss an opportunity to waste money, Allied Domecq gave a cd of the Star Trek theme to all attendees, photographic evidence below. The highlight of the convention for me was the unlimited free Dunkin’ Donuts (also owned by Allied Domecq). Back in those days Dunkin’ Donuts outlets were still few and far between in the UK so myself and some of my colleagues with the sweet tooth filled our pockets for the journey home! By-the-way, turns out it was the ’96 convention , not the ’97 as I’d originally guessed (and NO! don’t e-mail me telling me you’d have got the correct answer if I’d have got the year right first time!)
Yep, I've still got the free cd!
As I said last week, within a few years it was all over. Allied Domecq sold much of their pub estate to Punch Taverns/Bass who had no interest in the breweries, they simply wanted the pubs. Myself and my fellow Firkin Brewers (there were about 40 of us) from around the country were called to a meeting in Leeds one Friday where we were informed that brewing operations had ceased and that our services were no longer required! That made for a fun weekend! We were informed that the following week we were to dispose of all dry stock (grain, hops etc) and ensure that all paperwork was up to date. I called another local brewpub, told the brewer what was happening and that our grain, hops, shives, keystones and pretty much anything else he wanted was his for the taking. I swear that he was outside my brewery with a truck before I’d had a chance to put the phone down! He was a grateful man … I’d received a malt delivery just before the news broke so he “made out like a bandit”. He was gracious enough to give me a couple of hundred quid to “go out and lock one on!” I missed my last week with the Firkin Brewery as I had already booked a vacation (to Baltimore) and by the time I returned the brewery was locked and shuttered. I ran in to my assistant of the time, Jon, at the GBBF in 2001 and it turns out that he sneekily sold as much of the equipment as he could before any sort of inventory could be taken (including the cask washer and brew burner!) Good for him I say … needless to say the company did not compensate many of the redundant brewers very well.
So, this week’s question …. returning to William and his Winter Warmer … I’ve just been reading the original beer menu for Winter 2001 and it turns out that I had originally planned to brew a beer, the abv of which represented William’s birth weight (as I have now done for my son Jacob with Jacob’s Summer Celebration) … gotta say I don’t remember this, thought I’d always planned for it to be around 7%! According to the notes on the beer menu “I had not, however, anticipated that he would be a giant of a baby, weighing a whopping ….. ” So that’s the question … how much did William weigh at birth? I also stated in the beer notes that although I could have brewed to his birth weight it wasn’t practical so bare that in mind … I’ve brewed stronger beers! Good luck. As always, please post your answer via the comment section below.
Have a great weekend.
Steve
New on cask
Sunday, January 3rd, 2010
Yeah, it’s cold, damn cold outside. Pretty cold inside too …. 48F in the brewery office this morning! But, y’know what, I’m not going to worry about it now because I’ve got a snifter of Oak Aged William’s Winter Warmer which is providing a warmth you can’t get from BGE, oh yeah! It’s on the Brewer’s Choice beer engine right now so come on down and try one. You know that it makes sense!
Thursday Night Is Cask Night!
Thursday, December 10th, 2009
Seems that Thursday Night is a good night to get cask conditioned ale in the region. As usual it’s firkin night in the upstairs bar at Metropolitan in Federal Hill from 6pm. Tonight’s featured cask is our Merry Ole Ale, a 6% abv spiced brown ale. Max’s on Broadway and Frisco Grille out in Columbia have also started featured cask nights on Thursday. One of the ales on the engines at Max’s is our “William’s Winter Warmer”, 8% abv with just a hint of festive spice, perfect for these cold nights. I don’t know what Frisco’s featured cask is tonight but the Merry Ole Ale is on the beer engine at the moment. Here at The Pratt Street Ale House we’re hosting the SPBW Christmas Party in our upstairs bar with 3 firkins on the bar for those guys but don’t forget that we have 3 beer engines at the downstairs bar serving cask ale all the time, with a special ($3 pints) night on Tuesday after 5pm.
new on tap
Monday, November 30th, 2009
Today our trinity of Winter Seasonal offerings is complete with the debut of Merry Ole Ale, a spiced Winter Ale. Weighing in at an Original Gravity of 1.060 and fermented to 6.2% a.b.v. this brown ale is medium bodied and fairly low in hop but is spiced with cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice for that festive finish that will have you ho, ho, ho-ing and hearing sleigh bells before you know it! That takes us up to 19 Oliver taps @ The Ale House! As soon as we can secure another tap space we’ll be putting up a keg of ’08 Winter Warmer that we squirreled away in a darkened corner of the keg store last year. It should be interesting to compare the two as they are quite different recipes!
Merry Ole Ale on tap now
It’s coming up to Winter Warmer time
Thursday, November 5th, 2009
Only one more day to go until William’s Winter Warmer goes on tap at The Pratt Street Ale House. The first pour will be at 1.30pm tomorrow … now there’s a lunchtime beer!
on tap Friday 11/06, 1.30pm
cask update
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009
New on cask today ….. drum roll …. Hot Monkey Love, oh yeah. Come try one and then compare it to the regular tap version. The malt flavors explode out of the cask version, exquisite!
Also coming soon will be William’s Winter Warmer
I see a Winter Warmer in your future!
Two of the firkins are on Oak, the first of which will be released in mid December.
seasonal offerings
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
The Fall/Winter is without doubt my favorite beer making season. I love the winter warmers/barley wines/Christmas ales that come out around this time and of course I love brewing our own seasonal offerings. I’m delighted with the way my first ever pumpkin ale turned out (especially on cask) and it’s been a very popular beer, we’re already down to our last keg! If you haven’t already tried it, be quick, it won’t be around for long. I guess we’ll be doing it again next year and probably doing a double batch (14bbl) so it will at least make it through Halloween and hopefully even Thanksgiving!
Today we’ll be putting the Hot Monkey Love on tap (just as soon as the tap handles are ready). As I’m sure you already know, this cheeky monkey was brewed back in April and weighs in at about 10% a.b.v. It’ll be served in 10oz pours only (trust me, this is one monkey that can kick your ass!) so come along and share the love. The Hot Monkey Love will be on cask soon(see future blogs for details) and its Oak Aged brother “My Monkeys Got Wood” will have a very special release on Valentine’s Day 2010.
Coming up on Friday November 6th is my son William’s 8th Birthday so to celebrate we will be releasing the new 8% a.b.v. “William’s Winter Warmer” at about 1pm, come along, sing happy birthday, and try this wonderful ale. The following week we will aim to release “Merry Ole Ale”, a spiced Christmas Ale (6% a.b.v.) …. it’ll put some color in your cheeks and have you hearing sleigh bells before you know it!
Cheers!
and good morning
Wednesday, October 21st, 2009
William’s Winter Warmer is off to a decent start. In the 12 hours after pitching yeast the gravity has reduced to 1.070 and the temperature increased to 72F. The yeast will shortly be entering the logarithmic growth phase and we can expect to see a more rapid decrease in gravity and a rise in temperature. Both will be monitored closely as the fermentation progresses to avoid an excessively hot or rapid fermentation which may result in “off flavors” developing.
The yeast head on William's Winter Warmer 12 hours after wort collection and pitching
goodnight william
Tuesday, October 20th, 2009
Well there it is, done for the year. William’s Winter Warmer has been “put to bed” in FV1, one of our 14 barrel vessels, yeast has been pitched and the wort vigorously roused to aerate it as much as possible. Aeration is very important at this early stage, especially for a relatively high gravity beer such as this, to promote good yeast cell division and get fermentation off to a rapid start. If we were to under aerate for example we may experience an extended lag phase and we’ll be in for a correspondingly lengthy fermentation which may require re-pitching of active yeast. Ensuring that we have a viable yeast pitched into a well aerated wort at optimal temperature (70F in this case) will get us off to a good start and avoid problems further down the line. It is for this reason that we collected our 7 barrels of wort in a 14 bbl FV, it is physically easier to rouse (and hence aerate) the wort. The large head space in the open fermenting vessel also helps avoid loss of yeast from the vessel as the yeast head rises during exponential growth or due to rapid release of dissolved CO2 from the fermenting wort which sometimes happens as the night time ambient temperature falls and the wort is then roused the following morning. I collected the wort at an original gravity of 1.080 and will be aiming to attenuate to about 1.016 before crash cooling giving a final a.b.v. of a little over 8%. I will fill a number of firkins with William’s Winter Warmer, at least 2 of which will be aged on Oak for release in January.
Cheers
Steve