Talisheek Brewing

Big things are brewing

2012-07-25T22:54:00.001-05:00

It has been a while, eh? There are rumblings of big things afoot.......

The Trifecta Arriveth!

2012-03-15T17:53:00.000-05:00

Three beers, one glorious day. March 24th, 2012: Baton Rouge.

Zapps Beer Festival may be your only chance to try these 3 specialty brews, unless you happen to be a judge at the Louisiana Homebrewers Competition on March 31st in Lafayette, in which case you will be seeing Pierre's Brew and Ostentatious Ale, you handsome, dashing, well dressed and highly intelligent person you. Did I mention Handsome?

Zapps Beer Fest 2012: "The Trifecta" cometh

2012-03-01T20:18:00.000-06:00

This Saturday, we will be brewing the third and final beer for Zapps Beer Fest 2012, an English Pub Ale that is thus far known as "Ostentatious Ale." We are currently finishing the fermentation for "Pierre's Brew", a Belgian Witbier, and the aptly named "Blueberry ESB".

We hope to see everyone out in Baton Rouge on March 24 for the beer fest. You can find Talisheek under the MKOB banner.

http://www.zappsbeerfest.com/

P.S. The new website for The Mystic Krewe of Brew is coming along and should be operational soon. The Pub Crawl along the St.Tammany Trace will be this Saturday, starting at Heiner Brau brewery at the Covington trail-head, moving to the Abita Brewery, and ending at Main Grain in Abita Springs. I wish I could make it, but Ostentatious Ale awaits.

UPDATE!!!

2012-02-10T21:16:00.000-06:00

My apologies good people of the beer world, for neglecting my duties in disseminating didactic doctrines in unaccountably random ways. I have been hard at work constructing the new website for the Mystic Krewe of Brew. The Northshore's first and only home brew club and probably the most happening group of fellas you'd ever want to hang with on February 15, in Slidell at Bistro De Lareine, http://www.bistrodelareine.com/.

Pugilists IPA is quite a smack in the jaw, at 7% abv. Having fermented for a month, the abv should have been around 8.5%, we think temperature control may have played a part. But the malty flavors are very pronounced, it is a strong Imperial IPA, but well balanced with great caramel flavor.

Tomorrow, we are revisiting an old friend, "Bayou Moon", a Belgian Whit Bier, in a slightly different fashion. Instead of orange peel as the finish, we will be adding 3oz of fresh kumquat peel, grown right at White Oaks Manor. We shall give it the moniker "Pierre's Brew", after the Patriarch of these misty grounds, Norris Pierre, who's vision of this place has made a small patch of woodland in sleepy Talisheek, LA, into the birthplace of a brewing revolution.

Talisheek ESB!

2011-12-30T17:02:00.000-06:00

Another impressive addition to the Talisheek lineup

Mildly malty, and full flavored. TASTY!!!

Pugilists IPA

2011-12-18T21:36:00.000-06:00

In this corner weighing in at 180 pounds, the congressman from Minnesota, and propagator of provocative proclamations, Andrew Volstead. His trainer, Carrie Nation, appears to be sharpening her hatchet, this could be a heated exchange,

And in the other corner, weighing in at 10 gallons, a dark amber complexion, full body, and a bitter disposition is the newcomer: Talisheek Brewing's very own Pugilists IPA! With 20 ounces of hops, twice dry hopped, this introductory IPA is coming out swinging.

It appears the early rounds went to the the congressman with a series of devastating blows, but back on their feet, these craft brewers have proponents of prohibition and on the ropes with a solid rap on the Jack Johnson.

Now they prepare for their next opponent, a Goliath that produces overly carbonated pale water that is marketed as beer. For shame, this behemoth brew is not suitable to use as dog water, let alone to quench a respectable gentleman's palate. So, onward you home-brewers, onward you micro-brewers, The word must go forth, that we are at last liberated from mediocrity, from thin pale tasteless libations and astronomical advertizing budgets. Raise your eyes aloft! Any man can brew a better beer, and there on the horizon is Pugilists IPA to deliver the knockout blow!

Of course the recipe is posted on our Hopville page, just saunter on over and enjoy.

UPDATE!

2011-12-06T22:21:00.001-06:00

By way of an update, the ESB is fermenting nicely, and should be on tap soon. At next weeks MKOB meeting, Chad will be presenting Talisheek Sweet Tater' Stout for its inaugural showcase. I for one cannot wait to try it, I believe this special reserve brew will be one that will pop it's head up again soon. But in the mean time we await the unveiling of the Extra Strong Bitter, and next weekend we will be tackling an Imperial IPA that will be sure leave a mark on your face buds.

Talisheek Coffee Porter

2011-12-05T19:33:00.001-06:00

Delicious

Lessons

2011-11-28T18:14:00.001-06:00

      The life of a home brewer is full of joy and disappointment, regret and jubilation. It would be amiss if I did not state some of the hard lessons learned while framing the perfect beer. Fancy labels and clever alliteration cannot compensate if the beer is sub par. I was reminded of this by a friend who is NOT Talisheek, but knows a thing or two about beer nonetheless. While I must say that I am quite proud of the line up of beers we have presented thus far, there are always areas of improvement.
      For instance, our first attempt at Bayou Moon, while the finished product tasted perfectly fine initially, upon further scrutiny, the back end is a little weak. We decided that next time, we will take necessary steps to draw more flavors from the grains, namely, a step mash.
      Most recently, while we added the 8 pounds of roasted sweet potatoes to the mash for our Sweet Tater' Stout, we did not put them in a boil bag, so needless to say our filters were clogged and our sparge took much longer than expected, and we had to filter out all of those fibers that passed into our boil as we filled our fermenting chambers. It took much too long to transfer to the fermenters. So the next brew we adapt and the operation goes smoother.
      As I sit here typing this, (enjoying a cold Talisheek Coffee Porter in one of my Spiegelau tulip glasses) I cannot help but be satisfied with our accomplishments thus far. I would put this Porter next to any I have ever tried, yep its that good. Soon we will have the Stout on tap and bottle, and a new addition that is currently fermenting Talisheek ESB! In 2 more weeks we will also be brewing our first Imperial IPA- Talisheek Pugilists IPA!

     So as we go forward of course there will be frustration and reward, heck, no one said this would be easy, but the rewards are more than just a quality beer in your hand, it's a touchstone to our history as humanity. Beer has been used as currency, as a way to survive during the seasons when nothing grew. It is a testament to mans ingenuity, that, even when we didn't know anything about sanitation, the Egyptians had a thriving beer industry. An excellent beer in our hands and the ability to grasp where those flavors come from make us all a little more thankful for the tradition and ingenuity that have led us to this point in brewing history. Maybe it's just me, but I can't wait to see where the coming years take Talisheek Brewing. Cue the music:

Sweet Tater' Stout!

2011-11-14T22:05:00.001-06:00

Yes, you read correctly, an oatmeal cream stout infused at every step with the sweet flavors of oven roasted sweet potatoes. Potatoes that had only days earlier been firmly rooted in the very ground of White Oaks Manor. Eight pounds of roasted skinned and mashed sweet potatoes were mixed in the mash and its sweet sugars released along with eight more pounds added to the 90 minute boil along with 3 infusions of hops!

You can follow the link below to a place where the beer flows like wine, where beautiful women instinctively flock like the salmon of Capistrano. I’m talking about a little place called Hopville. That is also where you will find the recipe for this exceptional beer.

SWEET TATER' STOUT!!!!

Main Grain!

2011-11-09T15:33:00.000-06:00

In the sometimes frustrating world of home brewing, a helping hand is always welcome. I remember my first attempt at a gallon batch of blonde ale being disastrously diluted with sanitizer, when I was trying to siphon into my fermenter. Had I an ally during those first timid steps, it would have been a different story.
That is why I am especially excited about the Grand Opening of "Main Grain", a new home brew supplier in Abita Springs, and the first ever on the North Shore. The gentleman behind the reins at Main Grain is Ron Guzman, hailing from the mecca of home brew: Portland Oregon. If you have ever had the privilege of visiting Portland, you know what a great beer town it is. The Grand Opening is Saturday, November 12th 9am-3pm. There will be free t-shirts to the first 150 people, and FREE BEER!( Home Brew and local) I was able to stop into the shop today and have a look around. The prices on everything are very low, and the quality is top notch. His website should be operational soon, but he said that he wanted to focus on the physical store first, a wise choice considering all of the hop-heads on the North Shore.

                                Grand Opening Nov 12th, 9am-3pm!
                                                   Main Grain
                                                          70271 Hwy 59 Suite C
                                                        Abita Springs, LA 70420
                                                               (985)875-1ALE
                                                                maingrain.com
                                                         facebook.com/maingrain

Hope to see everyone there.

Bayou Moon

2011-11-01T15:45:00.000-05:00

ALAS! From the first conception of Talisheek Brewing, all of our speculation and conjecture concerning copious concoctions will have been in vain, had we not the determination and sheer will to forge ahead into this strange and foreign world of zealous zymurgy.

But upon this evening in the crisp October air our mission to convert whole grains taken from this good earth and convert it's precious sugars into alcohol has commenced! A Belgian Witbier that shall go by the moniker “Bayou Moon”; and this is how we did it...

GRAINS

10 lbs- 2 row pils

6lbs- Flaked Wheat

2lbs Flaked Oats

2lbs Wheat Malt

HOPS

Saas pellets-2oz-full boil

FLAVORING

Crushed Coriander seed- .5oz-last 20 minutes

Bitter Orange peel- .5oz-last 20 minutes

YEAST

Safbrew T-58

Finished brew amount 10 gallons.

Talisheek water was heated to a temperature of 175 for our mash-in, which brought our grains to the temperature of 154. Which we steeped for 60 minutes before our sparging, till be reached a pre boil volume of 11 gallons. At the beginning of the boil we added the hops, and after a quite vigorous hot break, added the coriander and orange peel for the last 20 mins of the boil. Then after an ice bath cooling the wert to 70 degrees F, we siphoned into 2- 5 gallon containers, one, a clear glass carboy, and the other a food grade 5 gallon bucket. After pitching the yeast, the glass carboy was placed in an experimental chamber inside White Oaks Manor, the other in a water bath to theoretically regulate the temperature more efficiently.We will keep you posted on progress as things.......progress.

So It Begins

2011-10-18T16:30:00.001-05:00

Being Sunday, in that lazy October air in Southern Louisiana, four gentlemen gathered to commence action concerning a plan that had required considerable collusion and therefore had taken place under the utmost of secrecy. A plan that only ninety some years ago would have put them on a collision course with the law, and of course Carrie Nation. Not to be dismayed, these aforementioned gentlemen assembled with the express intent to craft a better beer from the purest of water drawn from a Talisheek well. Now you say a tailed tuxedo and top hat is no suitable attire to be brewing better beer? Nay! It is the only way for mustachioed and monocled gentleman to approach such an esteemed task!

Upon completion of a three-tiered brewing stand, having been welded by an artisan in the swamps of Morgan City, at a capacity to brew 10 gallons in an afternoon, the scene is set for a bold journey into the future of home brewing. Kinsmen, brethren, cast off these chains of beer mediocrity and follow us bravely as we strive to go where frankly thousands have gone before, only in a much more interesting and irreverent way! To the Mash Tun!