While attending BJCP John Watson’s birthday dinner at Firehouse Brewery & Grill, I was invited by Firehouse brewmaster Steve Donohue to swing by the brewery on Friday to help bottle his scotch ale that he’s been again in a bourbon barrel since October of last year. Initially it was going to be just the two of us but we were joined by Pete Slosberg and his son Alex as well.
I was supposed to have arrived at Firehouse by about 10:30am or so but due to some water issues I was having last week, I didn’t get to Sunnyvale until a little past 1:30pm. By that time, Pete and his son Alex had already arrived. Steve had all his bottles sanitzied and he was in the process of racking the beer out of the barrel and into a keg from which we would be bottling from. Racking from the barrel to the keg required a little bit of specialized equipement. Essentially, Steve used a bunghole tap (I don’t know what else to call it) to use CO2 to push the beer out of the barrel and into the keg.
Bottling the beers in 22oz bottles was not unlike how the average homebrewer would bottle his/her beers. Steve had put in some priming sugar and fresh yeast into the keg prior to racking the scotch ale into it with the bunghole tap. From there, we used a siphon, some tubing and a bottling want to fill up the bottles. Steve filled the bottles, Pete capped them, Alex pulled out empties for Steve while I gave them a quick rinse in peracetic acid to sanitize the bottles before putting them into their respective cases. When the cases were full, I moved them to another, dry part of the brewery. It took us about 1.5 hours to fill and bottle 10 cases worth of beer. Steve was surprised by how quickly and smoothly the process was.
I wasn’t quite sure what to have expected from bottling on a “professional” level. If anything, I was surprised by how low tech it all was. It was almost exactly like how a homebrewer would be bottling their own beers, just scale everything up to keg and barrel quantities. Other than that, exactly the same. I guess I was expecting to be bottling in the 750mL bottles with a cork and possibly a cage but the 22oz size is much more convenient for all present.
I am looking forward to trying these beers out in about a month when they’re been able to bottle condition. When I first tried this beer, it was right out of the barrel and flat. Should be interesting to see how my tasting notes will compare after the introduction of a little carbonation.
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