Well, there's a reason I haven't written for six months, and I mean a reason other than my enviable ability to procrastinate like a bored 16 year old standing at an open fridge moaning "I'm bored".
Me and my beautiful ladies have moved further Northside, to let's say North Northside. Or, as some people call it, Bendigo. A new job, a new house (comes with free kangaroos in the yard!), new everything. So the brewing kinda got put on hold there for a while.
But where was I before all that went down - ah, I'd just bottled the Land of Chocolate Porter and the Splash Brothers Steam Ale. The Steam Ale was a fine brew, nowhere near the same league as its inspiration; Mountain Goat Steam Ale, but a drinkable beer no doubt, with hints of straw that I loved.
The Land of Chocolate Porter was a smashing success; a little lighter on the chocolate than I'd probably hoped, but given we used a 70% dark chocolate rather than the called for pure cocoa that was no surprise. What was the surprise was the beer was still nicely balanced, with a dark roasted coffee backbone and just a hint of sweetness. Watching the Tour de France late at night with a pint of this in the hand, and a block of dark chocolate on the couch next to me was heaven.
I also managed to get one last brew out before we moved, an extract pale ale built on lashings of Tasmanian Galaxy hops, mingled with a handful of Cascade hops. PAFT Pale Ale. What a Banger!
Here up north, the brewing set-up at the new house is still being sorted out. But the exciting thing is - kegs. Keeeegggsss! I bought a couple of kegs off a mate, and have been going about the wonderful job of converting a chest freezer into a keg fridge. Or keezer, as they're known, but I hate that name. Yet to come up with anything better though.
So, bought an old chest freezer on gumtree for $50. Bought an old piece of oregon timber from a reclaimed timber place. Enlisted the help of a mate with DIY skills, as the extent of my DIY knowledge is limited to changing the channel on the TV, and my only DIY tool is a roll of electrical tape, and you're lucky I've even got that.
Got to sanding back the timber....
Cut it to size (with some sweet mitre cuts thanks to Nath and his manly drop-saw), another light sanding and screwed it together...
Then drilled some holes through the front for the taps...
Took the lid off the freezer, and made sure my kids could fit in there....
Then put a varnish on the timber.....
Siliconed up the inside, and glued the lid on the timber. The timber is hinged to the freezer body, so when the freezer is opened the timber collar goes with it. Helps get the taps out of the way when lifting kegs in and out, and means my puny arms don't have to lift full kegs quite so high to get 'em in. Score!
Then got to painting. Chalkboard paint on the lid....
And duck egg blue for the body. Doing my best to make this not look like a chest freezer. I'm keen for this thing to live in our lounge room, so it's gotta look the part.
Then pack up the house and move the whole shebang up North...
It's set up in the new house, but is currently a few days away from having the first keg put in there, so still a bit of work to do on the inside....
But I'm pretty damn stoked with how it's turned out so far. All things going to plan, I'll have a batch of PAFT Pale Ale (What a Banger!TM) on tap for New Year's Eve.
Happy days!
