Top 5 Five Winter and Holiday Beer Recommendations
02 Dec 2010 Leave a Comment
in basic wine making, beer bottles, custom beer birthday, custom beer labels, Holiday Beer, home brewing labels, wedding favor ideas, winter Tags: alcohol, beers, Boston Lager, brew, brewery, Celebration Ale, christmas, Christmas beer, craft beer, custom beer labels, custom birthday wine labels, dry hopped, holiday, Holiday Beer, seasonal brews, six pack, wine brewing, Winter, Winter Welcome Ale
By Bryce Eddings, About.com Guide
Winter and the holiday season see a lot of really good, small production seasonal brews in the form of Christmas beers and winter warmers. Christmas beers are often malty and complex although there are no rules for how they should be brewed. Some are made with fruit or spice and some rely on artful malt or hops combination for wonderful complexity. The winter warmers are similar though they are rarely made with any adjuncts. Both typically contain more than usual alcohol and are usually available from November to February.
And so, in no particular order, here are my Christmas and winter beer selections.
1. Samichlaus
The king of Christmas beers, Samichlaus is the highlight of the holiday season for many beer enthusiasts. It is a rich, aged doppelbock brewed at the Austrian brewery Schloss Eggenberg.
2. Samuel Adams Winter Classics
This mix pack contains a variety of beers. This makes it a nice way to try some unusual beer for beer lovers who are just discovering craft beer. Though it can change from year to year the mix pack often contains Boston Lager, Old Fezziwig Ale, Winter Lager, Holiday Porter, Black Lager, and Cranberry Lambic.
Cut any shape and design holiday cards
3. Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale
How do you say Merry Christmas to a hop-head? With a six pack of Celebration Ale from Sierra Nevada. Besides have a pretty significant bitterness at 62 IBUs, this beer is also dry hopped which raises the hops in the aroma and flavor.
4. Samuel Smiths Winter Welcome Ale
Samuel Smith’s Winter Welcome is a traditional winter warmer and in many ways has served as the modern benchmark for the style. It is big in flavor and alcohol. Though maltiness dominates it does have a good bit of balancing hops as well as hints of apples and caramel.
5. Odell Brewing Co. Isolation Ale
Odell Brewing brews Isolation Ale as their winter seasonal. This beer is packed with hops character without a lot of the bitterness. It’s a bit unusual as a wintertime beer in that it does not carry the huge, dark malt flavors of many of the others.
To read this full article, check out: Top 10 Ten Winter and Holiday Beer Recommendations
Also, if you are looking for great custom beer labels make sure you check out: Custom beer labels
Uses for Your Empties
02 Nov 2010 Leave a Comment
in birthday ideas, custom beer birthday, custom beer labels, custom design labels, custom photo coasters, home brewing labels, personalized graduation gift, personalized labels, wedding favor ideas Tags: beer ingredients, beer kit, beer labels, beer making, beer making kits, beer making supplies, Bookplates gift tags, Coasters, custom beer labels, custom design labels, custom wine labels, DIY Home Brew Labels, Favor Tags, Holiday Labels, home brew, Home Brew Label Printing, Party Favors, Personalised home brew labels, personalized coasters, Personalized Wedding Labels, photo coasters
If you enjoy or brew your own beer chances are you may have some stray empties lying around the house, and while they can fetch a pretty penny down at the recycling plant empty beer bottles can also hold other useful purposes. The same thing goes for old wine bottles.
For instance, if you clean the bottle’s inside, fill it with a bit of water, and place a single flower inside you can give your sweetheart a fairly simple, yet charmingly unique wedding or birthday gift.
Another romantic gift idea is the wine bottle candle. You simply wash the bottle well and place a long, narrow candle in the neck of the bottle until it is snug. Wine bottle candles can help add a romantic atmosphere to any ordinary dinner table.
Empties can also be easily turned into Christmas decorations. Just look at the example below!
If you’re looking for a more artistic use for your empties, you could always try assembling broken bottle glass into a mosaic, or you could also set them up for a still-life painting.
Most importantly, if you are a home brewer or wine maker you can reuse your commercially purchased wine bottles and save a considerable amount of money. Don’t forget to re-label your recycled wine and beer bottles with your own, customized beer and wine labels. A variety of expertly designed bottle labels can be found at Labels on the Fly.
15 Summertime Recipes
24 Sep 2010 Leave a Comment
in custom beer birthday, custom beer labels, custom design labels, home brewing labels, personalized labels, wedding favor ideas Tags: backyard parties, beer, beer glasses, beer ingredients, Beer Supplies, brew, brew beer, Brewfests, brewing, celebrate, craft beer, custom beer bottle labels, homebrew, seasonal recipes, summer brew, Summertime Recipes
Most of us don’t need an excuse to celebrate summer weather. Brewfests and competitions abound, family reunions are planned and backyard parties pop up — even wardrobes get the special treatment with short sleeves and sandals. So why not brew something that tastes great at the beach or barbecue, a thirst-quencher that goes down great after a day of gardening or while grilling?
Summer brewing doesn’t differ that much from brewing during the other seasons. You may slap a few more mosquitoes while mashing, but the biggest difference comes when it’s time to chill your wort and maintain your fermentation temperature. When making a summer brew, make sure to check the temperature of your chilled wort (with a sanitized thermometer). As your tap water is likely warmer in the summer, you may need to add a few more ice cubes to your water bath to cool your wort down to proper fermentation temperatures. Likewise, higher outside temperatures means your usual “cool spot” in the house may be too warm for fermenting.
Try one of these tried and true seasonal recipes from homebrew shops across the country. (BYO calculated the brewing statistics, such as OG and IBU.) Or, use them as inspiration for designing your own summer sipper. In this collection, we present a beach-ready golden ale from the U.S. Gulf Coast, a Mexican lager from California (lime optional), a crisp rye pale ale from Vancouver and many more. Feeling refreshed yet?
DeFalco’s Golden Ale
DeFalco’s Home Wine & Beer Supplies
Houston, Texas
www.defalcos.com
(5 gallons/19 L, extract with grains)
OG = 1.047 FG = 1.011
IBU = 23 SRM = 5 ABV = 4.6%
It’s so bloody hot on the Gulf Coast, this summer recipe is popular pretty much year ‘round.
Ingredients
6.0 lbs. (2.7 kg) Alexander’s Pale liquid malt extract
(or 5.0 lbs. (2.3 kg) Muntons Extra
Light dried malt extract)
1 lb. (0.45 kg) domestic two-row pale malt
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) CaraPils® malt
6 AAU Cascade hops (45 mins)
(1.0 oz./28 g of 6% alpha acid)
2.25 AAU Liberty hops (10 mins)
(0.5 oz./14.2 g of 4.5% alpha acid)
2.25 AAU Liberty hops (0 mins)
(0.5 oz./14.2 g of 4.5% alpha acid)
1 pkg. Burton water salts
1 pkg. Nottingham Ale or Wyeast 1056
(American Ale), 1007 (German Ale), White Labs WLP001
(California Ale) or WLP 029 (German Ale) yeast.
1 pkg. Bru-Vigor
0.75 cup corn sugar (for priming)
Step by Step
In a small saucepan, bring a gallon (3.8 L) of water to 160–170 °F (71–77 °C). Add the bag of grains and water salts and steep 30 minutes. Now, gently sparge (rinse) the grains with hot tap water (ideal temperature 168 °F/76 °C) and bring the total volume up to two or more gallons in your brewpot. Bring to boil.
Turn off heat and add malt extract. Return to boil, add the hops at the times specified in the ingredient list. Add the last does of Liberty hops and immediately turn off heat. Let stand for 20-30 minutes in a cooling bath. Pour the cooled wort into the fermenter. Bring the volume up to five gallons (19 L). If the temperature is less than 80 °F (27 °C), pitch the yeast and the packet of Bru-Vigor (if using) into the wort and place the lid and airlock over the fermenter. Ferment at 65–70 °F (18–24 °C). After fermentation, check the specific gravity. The F.G. should be 1.011 or less. If it is higher than 1.016, allow to ferment and settle for a few more days. Prime and bottle. Allow beer to age at room temperature for at least two weeks. Peak flavor is reached after six weeks.
To read this full article, check out: 15 Summertime Recipes
Wine Bottle Wedding Vases
26 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in beer bottles, custom beer labels, custom labels, custom stickers, custom wine labels, diy wine craft ideas, empty wine bottles, home brew, home brew beer ideas, home made beer, home winery, wine bottles, wine making Tags: bottle cutter, candle, cost effective, custom design labels, custom hang tags, custom stickers, custom wine bottle hang tags, custom wine bottle labels, custom wine labels, empty wine bottle, empty wine bottles, flowers, fun arts and crafts, glass terrarium, home winery, wedding center peices, wedding ideas, wine, wine bottle crafts, wine bottle storage, wine bottle vases, wine bottles, wine making, wine making bottle labels, wine recipes
Are you looking for a fun and unique wedding favor? Do you have a pile of empties in your garage or kitchen that need to be utilized?
Why not turn them into a wedding table flower vase?
Wedding center pieces tend to add up, especially if you purchase them in sets. But if you make your own out of cost effective wine bottles you save quite a bit, not to mention you get a set of center pieces that are truly unique.
Here’s a quick tutorial on how to turn your empty wine bottles into the perfect wedding decoration.
Items you’ll need:
-An empty wine bottle (if you don’t have enough lying around try asking friends, family, and local bars for their empties)
-Flowers (your wine bottle and flowers can match in color if you like)
-A bottle cutter (if you don’t have one the highest in price they range is around $40, well worth it in the long run)
-A candle (and eventually, matches to light the candle)
-Ice cubes
Directions:
- Clean the bottle thoroughly in warm soapy water. Try to scrape off as much of the original label as possible.
- Score the bottle using the bottle cutter. It’s important to maintain pressure on the bottle toward the back end of the bottle cutter. The lines should be even and match up with each other at the end, but if they don’t it’s easily corrected. (Please note that the sound scoring glass makes isn’t exactly pleasant, so you may also want to invest in earplugs or play some Heavy Metal with the volume turned to 11)
- Slowly rotate the scored line of the bottle over a candle flame. Maintain inward pressure on the bottle, gently flipping and pushing the neck and the bottom rim toward the center.
- Take an ice cube and quickly slide it around the scored edge to cool it down.
Wala! Now you have a brand new flower vase that can be given away as wedding decoration, a birthday gift, even a holiday present. Attach one of the many expertly designed labels or gift tags available from Labels on the Fly to complete the look and you’re finished.
Image provided by: http://greenwinebottles.com and reproduced with permission of the copyright owner
Bottling Your Home Brew
23 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in beer bottles, custom beer labels, custom labels, custom stickers, home brew, home brew beer ideas, home made beer Tags: beer bottle labels, beer bottles, bottle neck labels, brew beer, custom beer bottle labels, custom beer labels, custom bottle labels, home brew, home brew beer, long neck beer bottle, personalized bottle labels, personalized labels, stubby beer bottle
So you’re interested in brewing your own home made beer? And why shouldn’t you be? It’s estimated that that 250,000 to 500,000 people in America make their own beer, which makes home brewing more or less of a great American hobby. It’s extremely cost effective, with kit prices being as low as $100 in some cases and ingredients being as low as $60 in other cases. It’s also a fun process that allows you to experiment with different recipes and provide yourself and friends with a superior beer that’s much less expensive than any commercial brand.
If you’re on your way to becoming your own independent brew-master you’ll have a lot to think about. Besides what recipes to attempt, here are a few tips about the kinds of bottles you might want to look at for bottling purposes, and also what kinds of branding you may want to try.
BEER BOTTLE TYPES:
First off, it should be noted that beer bottles come in various sizes, shapes and colors. Dark glass prevents light from spoiling the beer. However, lighter colored bottles are often used for marketing reasons
The Stubby: Shorter and flatter than standard bottles, having virtually no neck, stubbies pack into a smaller space for transporting. The bottles are sometimes made with thick glass and are therefore sturdier, and can also be cleaned and reused before being recycled. Stubbies are normally tinted brown or green, and very few American beers are bottled in the stubby.
The Growler: The growler can hold half a gallon of draft beer, but also comes in a liter and quart size. The typical take-out beer, customers can bring in their personal growlers for refill from their favorite tap. One of the advantages of buying beer this way is that it is generally cheaper. Growlers are usually tinted a dark color.
The Long Neck: Lastly, there’s the long neck beer bottle. The long neck is the most prevalent type of bottle used in America. Tall and slim with a long neck, these bottles are known as the ISB, or Industry Standard Bottle, according to the Beer Club. Long neck’s can be recycled and reused many times, and can come in clear glass and tinted. However, they are more highly represented by clear glass than other types of bottles. The bottle is easy to hold, and most consumers tend to hold the neck rather than the body in order to prevent their hands from warming the beer inside.
LABEL TIPS:
Now that you’re more familiar with the types of bottles that are available you should begin to consider the types of branding suitable for your beer. Investing in custom beer labels is a wise decision as they are often less expensive than machine-placed labels and can come with more creative leeway, which will enable you to put your own authentic style into them. This is very important because you want your beer to emphasize your style as a brewer, therefore the label on the bottle should be as good as the beer inside the bottle.
With that having been said, what you ought to consider first is the type of material your beer label will be made out of. Several materials to consider are foil, clear plastic, or high-grade paper. You should also consider the shape of your label and whether or not to include a neck label as well. Most importantly, the design of your label should have the most thought behind it. Just think of people’s reactions if you show up to a birthday party, holiday event, or even a wedding with your own brand of beer decorated with well designed labels.
A wide variety of expertly designed, custom beer labels can be found at Labels on the Fly.
Stay tuned for home wine and beer recipes and tips from Custombottle!
