Another thing:

I have a new project. This is something akin to the Julie/Julia project in that it involves doing a whole bunch of things in a food/beverage nerd realm for no apparent reason other than to say I had done it at the end of the day.

I am going to brew every beer in the Beer Judge Certification Program Guidelines, and I am going to do it "All Grain" (ie. the hard way). I will give myself credit for the one I have already done in that way, which means that there remains only 79 categories to brew.

Needless to say, I will be giving myself more than 1 year to do this. After all, when Julie decided to cook each dish in "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" she knew that she could reasonably consume more than one dish in a day. I cannot reasonably consume 400 gallons of beer in 1 year. To do so would require me to consume approximately a case of beer a day for a year. I find that to be an unreasonable expectation. At the same time, it would be illegal, as there is a 200 gallon per year limit on homebrewing.

I plan to have help, at least in the immediate future, both in the brewing and the consumption of the beer. I have a certain amount of commitment in terms of assistance from Nick the Mighty Brewer, and with dedication and perseverance, I hope to have this quixotic project completed in, say, 4 years.

This will take planning, patience, and a liver of gargantuan proportions. I think we're set.

First off, we will need to establish some ground rules:

1) I will attempt to brew 80 styles of beer as recognized by the BJCP 2004 style guidelines. I will be required to re-brew only if a) the beer is wildly not to style or b) faulty.

2) I will brew all these beers "The hard way" which means that I will be "mashing" at least partially for each beer. If I miss my gravity by enough points, I will feel free to hit my beer with some malt extract, but every beer will be mashed.

3) If there is an option of brewing one beer and using two yeasts to make two distinct styles (eg. American Wheat, Weizenbier) I am so totally allowed.

4) Beers brewed off of the "Big Brew" will count towards the total.

5) No repeats until all the styles have been brewed. If that means that I spend 3 months drinking nothing but barleywine and straight lambic, that's my own bad planning and bad luck.

This means that I will need to pick up certain things over the next little while to make things easier, and if you happen to have any of these things lying around that you want to get rid of, let me know.

-I will need an external thermostat for my little chest freezer so that I can start lagering my beers. I had better get this set up soonish so that I don't wind up lagering a ton of beer all at the end.
-I will need to set myself up with a keg system shortly thereafter, because I can fit 2 corny kegs in that freezer, but only one carboy, and also because kegs kick ass.
-I will need a grain mill so that I can, well, grind my grain.
-I will need something to placate my wife, she is bound to get pissed at me soon.


There has to be a strategy here, to keep me from drinking horribly unsuitable beers, for example having too much barleywine and dopplebock in the summer, or heffeweizen in the winter.

The first three beers will be as follows:
8A Ordinary Bitter (already brewed, turned out nice)
15A Heffeweizen (May 6, big Brew)
16A Belgian Wit (May 6, big brew)

Then I need to come up with a plan for the next few. The next brewing session I will do will be the June 1 weekend. That beer will be the first beer that I am brewing specifically to meet my new goal, and as such I want to start with a bang. I want to make something that will be good to drink through the tail end of summer (the heffeweizen and wit will be great for this too)

I will be thinking about his for a while, I think.