I love beer. I especially love hoppy beer. If you are a Miller Lite person, I won’t make fun of you, but I would make the analogy that your Miller Lite is a plain saltine cracker compared to the delicious cake that is a bountifully hopped homebrew. I like to make beer. Over the past few years, a growing bandwagon of interest in well-hopped American Style Pale Ales has led to many options for the hop-head…It has also contributed to a worldwide shortage of the hops essential to create their signature bite and aroma. At the Lappenstein household, we find ourselves sheltered from the crisis. As far as hops go, we are loaded for bear…(Beer!)…

Growing up the side of our house are three hop varieties essential to the creation of the Lappenstein Pale Ale: Chinook, Cascade, and Nugget. The Cascades are four years old and have yielded enormously. The Chinooks are now two, and are looking great. The Nuggets are the new kid and have yet to produce. I had maintained some other vines at another location, but these were given away when the 52nd Street vines matured. By the Harvest Moon I will be brewing my Harvest Pale Ale in celebration of another fantastic hop cornucopia. I will post more about the process then. Cheers!

These Chinook Hops are almost ready to harvest. They will be used to "dry hop" future batches of the Lappenstein Pale Ale. Dry hopping is when you add some hops to the secondary fermentation. It gives the beer an extra hop explosion in taste and aroma. Hops

STRAWBERRY MOON 2008 Maycation 2008...the rest of the story

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