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Mehan and I recently brewed a greater than expected high gravity beer. It ended up with a potential abv of 18 percent. After one month it's up to 6 percent with 12 percent potential (highly potential) remaining. We started with a regular german hefe yeast since the beer has a lot of wheat in it, but this had no effect and was quickly overwhelmed. The fruit content is what pushed it up over into this level of ridiculousness. A high gravity yeast was  then added a week or so later and got the aforementioned attenuation. It doesn't seem to be fermenting anymore according to hydro readings.

 The worry now is that this beer will remain an undrinkable, albeit delicious syrup.

 Thoughts? Champagne Yeast?

Here's my Ginger Ale recipe by popular request--

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of regular sugar
• .5 to 2 tablespoons of fresh grated ginger
• 1 lemon
• Any active brewing yeast you have around
• 2 liters of water - I used tap
• You will also need an empty 2 liter PLASTIC soda bottle, a funnel, a grater.

Directions:

1. Grate the ginger if you haven't yet.

2. If you have a smack pack of yeast, get that going well ahead of time.

2. Grate ginger. I do this with a cheese grater or a veggie peeler or even a pairing knife. Finer is better of couse.

3. Put cup of suger into the bottom of soda bottle.

4. Add yeast to soda bottle.

5. Squeeze lemon juice into a bowl or measuring cup.

6. Add ginger to lemon juice in bowl.

7. Pour mixture into bottle. 

8. Add warm water leaving two inches at the top. Cap it. Shake to mix every thing. (Warm water will help sugar mix and yeast ferment.)

9.  Put in the closet or whereever you brew. Someplace with brewing temps.

10. In 24 to 48 hours the plastic bottle will be rock hard. Put it in the fridge. Cool it. (This will stop the fermentation and prevent explosions).

11. Drink it. (May want to strain into you glass to keep ginger chunks out.)

Brew at the Zoo tickets went on sale Monday. It is Thursday, August 21, 2008 from 6-9PM.

http://nationalzoo.si.edu/ActivitiesAndEvents/YoungProfessionals/AfterHo...

Tickets can be purchased through Ticketmaster.

Anyone else going?

If anyone is interested, here is a blog post with the recipe and brewing notes for the no-boil Berliner Weisse I brought last night: http://madfermentationist.blogspot.com/2008/02/berliner-weiss.html

Glad most people seemed to like it, I'll be bringing some of my other sour beers to future meetings.

I thought this was something funny to share. A while back Brian and I used to be regulars at Dr. Granville Moores on H Street. One time a photographer from the Washington Post came to take pics for an upcoming review and he took a bunch of photos of us at the bar. Those pics never made it into the article, so we didn't become famous beer snobs. However, I noticed today that one of the photos did get on the Post's interactive map of the H Street bar scene. Haha.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/artsandliving/features/2006/street-life/gallery.html 

Click the target icon for Granville Moores to see it... Sadly not the most flattering of facial expressions, haha.