Pretty active beer!

The guys came over the other night to bottle four batches and make four more. It was pretty efficient: some beer got spilled on the floor during bottling, and the flies were irritating—but we each took away 21 litres at $1.59/l.

The new batches got a quick start with the (finally) warm weather.

A very vigorous start to a batch of Cream Ale. ©2009, Eric Fletcher

When I went in to check on things the next morning, the Cream Ale in the insulated cabinet had pushed up through the stop cock and flowed over the top and out to drip down onto the floor.

The yeast certainly seemed to like this American Premium Lager! ©2009, Eric Fletcher

There isn’t room in the insulated cabinet for more than two pails, so when we do four batches, two need to be started on the counter. Both batches were active, but the American Premium Lager had pushed the top aside and foam was flowing out onto the counter. Fortunately, it can just drain down into the sink so it was a lot less hassle to clean up than the beer on the floor. Too bad those two hadn't been on the sink together...

For the record, the kits we bottled were:

• 218: Brewhouse Cream Ale
• 219: Brewhouse Honey Blonde
• 220: Brewhouse Pilsner
• 221: Munton’s Anniversary Ale

The new ones started August 10 were all Brewhouse kits:

• 222: Cream Ale
• 223: American Premium Lager
• 224: Red Ale
• 225: Honey Blonde

I'll rack them to glass Wednesday, and we’ll need to plan another bottling bee sometime near the end of August.