OK, so I haven't brewed in awhile. It's a long story, but the short version is this - once you buy a rototiller, every available patch of your lawn that gets sun during the day looks like it needs to be turned into a garden patch. Gardens, in turn, need to be tended. Hence, I haven't brewed in awhile. But, with Labor Day on Monday, it's a three-day weekend. Time to knock out a couple batches of beer.

First off, I'm brewing a pale ale with a new variety of hops - Nelson Sauvin. This is a New Zealand hop I first tasted recently on a press tour of Anheuser-Busch's Elk Mountain Farm, which grows Saaz and Hallertau hops. At a dinner during the event, the brewer at their R and D plant in St. Louis served some pale ales. Each was made with the same malt bill, but hopped with a different single hop, including Santiam, Safir and Nelson Sauvin. I really liked the Nelson Sauvin and the brewer (Florian Kuplent) gave me a bag of pellets (and also some whole Safir and Santiam).

To me, Nelson Sauvin was very reminiscent of Amarillo, which I love. I hope to have this beer ready to serve at the next Austin ZEALOTS meeting. (By the way, in a similar vein, I thought John Brack's (JB's) Newahtarillo Pale Ale - which he brewed with Newport, Ahtanum and Amarillo hops and brought to one of the last ZEALOTS meetings - was great. I also liked Kerry Martin's watermelon ale that he brought to the picnic. It actually gave me an idea that I'll blog about later if I actually do it. The basic idea is this: in the spring, I'll be growing a variety of watermelon (Black Diamond) that can reach 70 pounds (32 kg). In a recent BYO, we featured a guy who fermented some beer in a pumpkin. From the size of the pumpkin, he must have fermented about a gallon of beer; I'm wondering if I can't ferment 5 gallons inside a giant hollowed-out watermelon. (Also, I wonder if I could mash inside a melon? Hmm. But I digress.)

For the pale ale, I'm going with the malt bill from my APA (which appeared in the March-April 2006 BYO as Patrick Henry Pale Ale) and Nelson Sauvin at 60 minutes, 15 minutes and at knockout. I'm going to shoot for around 40 IBUs, and use around 0.75 ounces (21 g) for the 15-minute and 0-minute additions. Nice and hoppy, but not over-the-top. I also want to see how the hop works with the malt.

I'll probably brew the pale ale on Sunday. On Monday, I'm thinking Vienna lager. For one thing, I love Vienna lager. For another, I want to impress Ashton Lewis, our technical editor and Mr. Wizard columnist, who will be speaking at the Dixie Cup this year. Last time he was in Texas, I didn't have any homebrews bottled up to give him.

And, I think Vienna lager is a style that is not only awesome, but one for which you can really show your skill as a brewer. I'll also be bringing some BYO's 10^thAnniversary Ale, which I brewed last year around this time and turned out great, to the Cup.

So, I'll need to make a yeast starter tonight for the Vienna lager. I'm making 5 gallons, so I'll probably go with a 3 quart (~3 L) starter at a specific gravity around 1.030-1.040. For the pale ale, I'm going for a quick brewday. I'm doing a 2-gallon (7.6-L) partial mash and using DME for the rest of the extract. I'll do a full-wort boil out on my porch, cool it down and pitch a couple packets of dried yeast (US-56). For the pale ale, I'll just use my swamp cooler; the lager will go in my chest freezer. (I'll also be using my new 7-gallon (26-L) stainless steel cylindro-conical fermenter for the first time. I'm psyched.)

This afternoon, I'm going to run into Austin to get my CO²tanks filled, then back to Bastrop to get my wife, then back into Austin later to watch the movie Beerfest with some of the ZEALOTS. And OK, maybe I'll sneak a little gardening in this weekend as well.