As of my last blog entry, I was very much undecided as to which way I would change the way I brew. The new machines that I was researching all seemed to do what I wanted to do but the Zymatic seemed the most interesting in terms of space and size and just sheer ease of use. The Grainfather still needed more of an outdoor setup and I didn't feel comfortable with the thought of that thing sitting in the middle of a kitchen. I ended up buying the Zymatic about a year ago and I really haven't looked back to the way I used to brew.
When the Zymatic arrived from Picobrew my initial thought was this thing is huge! It has to be somewhat large due to the size of the batches that you can make. Typically I make 2.5-3 gallon batches. Now, I have been brewing for many years so the setup of the machine and the general thought processes were second nature when getting going. Pico provides a starter pack of what they call Pico Pale ale to get started with. I brewed this batch first and let it ferment out. The results were mediocre at best. I just think my taste for Pale Ales hasn't been there lately so it seemed watery and very flavor-less. Wasn't that great a start to brewing on this machine but I understand why that's the recipe they chose to include. Maybe adding some options when ordering the Zymatic of different recipes would have been a better option.
Next up I had to try a replication of Bell's 2 Hearted Ale. I love this beer and it's a go-to at the pool in the summer as they make it in cans. My first attempt really wasn't too bad. I was a little low on gravity points but in the end produced a drinkable beer. That started to make me think about how I can tweak the recipe and my process to make this beer better. I ended up brewing it four times and the fourth time in this case was a charm. I brewed a batch for a 90th birthday party and ended up bottling the batch and making a cool label to go along with it.
Next up I made some recipes from the Pico recipe site that others have posted or Pico themselves have made. I make a Kolsch, a brown ale, a porter, and a few IPA's. All in all, I have made a total of 11 beers on the Zymatic since August last year (9 months). Now, when I was brewing outside if I was able to do a batch every 3 months I was lucky! So all in all, the Zymatic hit the spot with doing the one thing I really wanted - get back to making good beer. The side effect is that I am brewing like a maniac and always thinking of how to tweak a recipe and what needs to get in the pipeline to brew. For the brews, the Kolsch turned out not so great, the brown ale was really good (thanks Tom M!), the porter is on tap still and very delicious, and the few IPA's I have made have actually turned out pretty well.
The latest brew I did was a Juicy NEIPA. I used El Dorado, Mosaic, and Citra hops in this not only in the boil but did some 170 degree whirlpool additions and I dry hopped the hell out of it too. This beer turned out fantastic and as some friends told me may be my best beer to date. It's not much to look at, it's hazy like all other NEIPA's but it's really muddy looking vs that yellowish hue you get from a traditional NEIPA. I can't help but think this is due to how I added the dry hops. I threw a batch of hops in straight to the fermenter on day 4 before I realized what I was doing. I think it sort of has a very tiny hint of green color in the right light. The taste is spot on though, great aroma once it warms slightly and the hops really burst in flavor when you sip it.
Enter the Pico C:
As I have been watching the world unfold in Picobrew-land they have a new smaller homebrew appliance called a Pico C. Yes, this is the Keurig for homebrew (as many of my brew club likes to state). The idea here is you brew a small batch (12 beers) and it's all grain and you get somewhat involved with the process. It's much simpler than the Zymatic in that you get a pack from Pico that someone else designed, mainly other breweries trying to get their beer out there. Many of the packs they have in the marketplace are beers I would never have the opportunity to try here at home because beer laws are dumb and distribution is a racket. (cue rant on InBev and the like).
I ended up getting one of these from the love of my life for my upcoming 40th birthday this week. This machine won't replace the Zymatic, to me it augments it. I still have the strong desire to create my own recipes and brew a case of good brew on the Zymatic often. I also have the desire to taste beers from places I've never been or don't have access to so the Pico C allows me to do that. I received the machine last weekend and couldn't wait to brew. I chose the Denny Conn Little RIPA as my first beer naturally as I have brewed the real thing back when I did my blue cooler mash tun/kettle combination and I loved the beer then. This was as easy as it looks. Run a quick cleaning program with some water, then add some distilled water where it tells you, hook up the hoses, insert the pack into the step filter, push brew. After about 3 hours I had wort and the OG was quite higher than expected. I measured 18.8 brix after it cooled to 75.
The instructions tell you to leave the beer overnight before pitching so you don't have to cool the wort. I ended up following the instructions and I plan to natural carbonate the beer in the little serving keg they gave me too. Eventually I think I will switch to torpedo kegs for easy of use in the kegerator but I figure if this turns out ok, I will take it to work and get some opinions. I have 2 more recipes and am itching to brew them but since the keg acts as a fermenter also, I need to wait until I keg up this first beer before I start another one. One interesting tidbit is that I could easily brew this in an evening after work with little to no stress. It really was set it and forget it. I watched the O's game and took a nap while this thing brewed the other day.
I can say for sure both of these machines got me 100% back into brewing and for the most part I am producing decent to good quality brews with each batch. I will be interested to see where I end up in the coming months as to how many Zymatic vs C batches I produce. Even with the C fermenting the Denny beer right now, I am already tweaking my NEIPA recipe and thinking about brewing it again next weekend during the holiday weekend. Maybe I can knock out a double batch weekend - one Zymatic and one C?
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