This last summer I brewed an Indian Pale Ale that my friends loved. It had a very distinct taste since I had combined many hope varieties. The Goldings helped give the beer an earthy flavor while the Cascade and other American style hops gave it a nice citrusy smell and aroma. My friend Cole, who had previously not liked IPAs now loves them due to this beer. Between me, Cole and another friend, Ian, we were able to finish 5 gallons of this beer in 2 weeks. The recipe is as follows.

12 lbs of US Pale Malt 1 lb of 60L US Crystal Malt 0.5 oz of Pacific Gem (60 minutes) 0.5 oz of Pacific Gem (30 minutes) 1 oz of US Simcoe (at turnoff) 2 oz of Cascade (dry hopped) 1 oz of Kent Goldings (dry hopped) 1 package of Nottingham dry yeast

This beer unfortunately did not have a very good efficiency and ended up having a starting gravity of 1.047. This did not seem to matter though since it ended up being a very refreshing summer IPA. The Pacific Gem I got as a christmas present so I decided to use it in a recipe. You may notice that I used Simcoe, a hop that is generally used as a bittering hop as a finishing hop. This is because I read in a BYO magazine that hops that are used as bittering hops often also have more flavor and aroma. Simcoe would help give a nice pine like flavor to the beer. I recently tried to replicate this beer. Unfortunately, Austinhomebrew does not sell Pacific Gem so I had to get a substitute. I chose instead to use US Warrior and Simcoe for bittering, flavor and finishing hops. I also changed the 12 lbs of Pale Malt to Maris Otter malt and I changed the crystal malt to 20l since I thought the beer was too dark for an IPA last time. I kept the Cascade but used whole hops instead of pellets and substituted Yakima Goldings for the Kent Golding since austinhomebrew sells them in whole hop form. The revised recipe is as follows.

12 lbs of Maris Otter Malt 1 lb of 20L US Crystal Malt 0.5 oz of US Warrior (60 minutes) 0.5 oz of US Simcoe (30 minutes) 0.5 oz of US Warrior (15 minutes) 0.5 oz of US Simcoe (at turnoff) 2 oz of Cascade (dry hopped) 2 oz of Yakima Goldings (dry hopped) 1 package of Nottingham dry yeast

I have only sampled hydrometer readings, but they seem promising. As soon as I kick the Irish Red in the keg, I will keg the IPA. This beer hit the gravity of 1.060 so it will be a bit sweeter/alcoholic. As much as I love my Irish Red, I cannot wait to keg this beer.

Yesterday I attempted to brew an imperial stout. I love imperial stouts and had too much beer to justify brewing a beer that would be ready in less than a month and a half. It, like many of the recipes I do were pulled directly from my ass. I essentially used beer alchemy so I stayed somewhat within the parameters of the style. The recipe is as follows.

6 lbs of US Pale Ale Malt 5 lbs of Flaked Barley 4 lbs of US 6-Row Malt 1 lb of Roasted Barley 3oz of Special B 1 oz of Chinook (60 minutes) 2 oz of Yakima Goldings (30 minutes) 1 packet of Wyeast Scottish Ale 1728

I chose this much Flaked Barley because I wanted an Imperial Stout that was a bit on the dry side since they have a tendency to be a bit syrupy. Unfortunately, due to the large level of flaked barley I ended up getting a stuck sparge. I was only able to collect about 7 gallons of wort. For this style it would have been better if I collected 10 and than boiled down to 5. The starting gravity ended up being 1.060. I mashed for 1.5 hours at 151 degrees. The next time I attempt this I probably will use 7 lbs of 6 row and 2 lbs of flaked barley to prevent the stuck sparge. Alternatively I could attempt to use rice hulls. Fortunately, the beer still falls into the parameters for an foreign extra stout.

Since I was planning on having a higher starting gravity, I decided to make a starter. I started it on thursday night hoping for it the reach full krausen by saturday. I smacked the pack on wednesday but think I probably should of smacked it thursday morning. I think it may have reached full krausen and dropped down while I was sleeping but since I did not use a clear bottle (I used your average growler), I could not tell. I will probably purchase a 2000ml beaker from Northern Brewer for the next time I do this. The beer started bubbling the day after I brewed it so I’m assuming I had a decent pitching level.

I previously ran across some code that used import_request_variables to set all post, get and cookie parameters to global variable. This saved time since you would not need to explicitly call:

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if(isset($_GET['some_param']) and $_GET['some_param']){
  $some_var = $_GET['some_param'];
}

It was called using:

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import_request_variables('GPC','_') ;

This code was called on every page of the site. The first parameter ‘GPC’ tells import_request_variables to import get, post and cookie parameters. The second parameter ‘_’ tells import_request_variables to add a underscore to the variable name. For example, passing $_GET[‘foo’] will create a variable called $_foo. If the second parameter is passed, there will be a E_NOTICE warning since this would allow any user to create or modify any variable. In this code, the underscore was provided as a prefix but this does not mean we are in the clear security wise. Before I show the example, lets draw up some example code for index.php.

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<?
#the following code is example code 
#and should not be used as an example
#of the "right" way of doing things. 
#There may even be syntax errors.

#starts the session, connects to db, 
#and calls import_request_variables
function begin(){
  session_start();
  mysql_connect('localhost',
     'mysql_user',
     'mysql_password');
  import_request_variables('GPC', '_');
}

#checks username and password with db
#and sets $_SESSION['user_id'] if they authenticate successfully. 
function login($username, $password){
  $username = mysql_real_escape_string($username);
  $password = mysql_real_escape_string($password);

  #as stated above, this code is only an example,
  #for a real site you would want a hash/salt, not plaintext
  #password.
  $query = "SELECT * FROM users WHERE username = 
     '$username' and password = '$password' LIMIT 1";
  $result = mysql_query($query);
  $user = mysql_fetch_assoc($result);
  if($user){
    $_SESSION['user_id'] = $user['user_id'];
  }
}

#destroys session
function logout(){
  session_destroy();
}

#will return true if $_SESSION['user_id'] is set and belongs to a user
function isLoggedIn(){
  if(isset($_SESSION['user_id'])){
    $user_id = $_SESSION['user_id'];
    $query = "SELECT * FROM users WHERE user_id = '$user_id' LIMIT 1";
    $result = mysql_query($query);
    $user = mysql_fetch_assoc($query);
    if($user){
      return true;
    }else{
      return false;
    }
  }else{
    return false;
  }
}

begin();

#note that variables starting with 
#$_ where set above with import_request_variables
if(isset($_logout)){
  logout();
}
if(isset($_username) && isset($_password)){
  login($_username, $_password);
}

if(isLoggedIn()){
  ?>
  You are an authorized user! <a href='index.php?logout=true'>Logout</a>.
  <?
}else{
  ?>
  You are not authorized, use the form below to log in.
   <form action='index.php'>
      Username: <input type='text' name='username' /><br />
      Password: <input type='password' name='password' />
   </form>
  <?
}
?>

This is a simple page which will tell you if you are authorized, or give the login form if not. If the user successfully logs in, the $_SESSION[‘user_id’] is set. $_username and $_password are set by import_request_variables if the username and password get, post or cookie variables are set. Now on to the attack. Any variable starting with $_ can be set by passing a get, post or cookie with the appropriate parameters. If a user sent the request http://www.example.com/?SESSION[user_id]=1 would overwrite the $_SESSION[‘user_id’] variable to 1. Since database ids are often sequential, it would not be that hard to use a script to run through each number and find ids that belong to users. It would essentially allow a hacker to log in as any user. Make sure if using the import_request_variables function, make sure to choose a prefix that will not be used by any other variables.

So they other day I was thought to mysel: “why don’t I add one of those annoying scrolling advertising thingies at the side of my page so that all my users are forced to see adds wherever they are on my page?” Than I realized, those things are really annoying. It’s not so much that they follow you wherever they scroll, it’s more that they don’t scroll really smoothly (or at least that’s why I hate them). Most of these scrolling ads use javascript to observe when you scroll and change the position. Why not just use the css position attribute and set it to fixed. Fixed makes the div position relative to the browser window, and not any other elements. I added the following css.

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#ads{
   position: fixed;
   top: 10px;
   left: 1100px;
}

This worked out really well, the ads were right where they should be. When I scrolled, the element moved with the window smoothly instead jittering about while scrolling. Everything was great … until I resized the window. When I made the window smaller, the ad div would move away from the content div. When I made the window bigger, the ad div would overlap the content div (though that might increase ad revenue by making people click on it by accident. What I really wanted was for the top attribute to be fixed to the browser window and the left attribute absolute to the content. Unfortunately css only has the position property which effects both top and bottom (if I’m wrong, please let me know).

After a bit of thinking, I decided, instead of observing when people scroll, why not observe when people resize their windows? You would think resizing the window happens a lot less often. The code below was written using the prototype 1.6.0.3. Got to prototype to download the latest version.

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var ScrollingElm = Class.create({

  initialize: function(target_div, parent_div, options){
    this.target = $(target_div);
    this.parent = $(parent_div);
    this.handleOptions(options);
    this.setStyle();
  },

  handleOptions: function(options){
    this.options = Object.extend({
      top: 20,
      left: 800
    }, options || {});
  },

  setStyle: function(){
    leftOffset = this.parent.positionedOffset()[0] + parseInt(this.options.left);
    leftPos = leftOffset + "px";
    topPos = this.options.top + "px";
    this.target.setStyle({
      position: 'fixed',
      left: leftPos,
      top: topPos
    });
    this.target.show()
  },
});

Essentially I pass a target element, which is the element we want to adjust the position to, and the parent element which we want to use as the anchor for the left attribute. The default values I set to top 20 and left 800, I figured they would work well for many website. These can be overridden by passing the appropriate options. The top attribute is relative to the browser since the position is set to fixed. Technically left is also relative to the browser window, but the offset is dynamically calculated with prototypes Element.positionedOffset method. You may think that I would be able to use Prototypes Event.observe to detect when the window is resized. Unfortunately, the resize event seems to not be supported by prototype. I got around this by creating a ScrollingElm object and than manually setting the onresize attribute in the body tag.

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var scroller = new ScrollingElm('ads', 'container', {top: '10', left: '750'});

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<body onresize="scroller.setStyle()">
    <div id='ads' style='display: none;'>
         add content
    </div>
   ... content
</body>

Unfortunately this relies on creating a global variable named scroller but it gets the job done. I may explore further why Prototype does not support the resize event but this works for now. I set display to none because the javascript will show the element and this way the ad div will not mess up the layout before the js loads. I’ve tested this script in Firefox 3.5.6, Chrome 4.0.249.43, and Internet Explorer 7. Let me know if you find a browser it does not work with and I may look into it.

I have almost finished all the stout I have brewed. In the end I really enjoyed the flavor. I could not get nearly as roasty as some of the commercial stouts I’ve tried so I may have to give this another shot and increase the roasted barley a tad. I may also lower the hop content a bit. It was not overly bitter but I think it would have tasted a bit more smooth with a bit lower hops. If I increase the roasted barley a bit it may compensate for reducing the hops.

Tomorrow I’m keeping it Irish and brewing my version of an Irish Red. The recipe is as follow:

12 lbs of Maris Otter 4 oz of Roasted Barley 4 oz of Special B 2 oz of Yakima Goldings 2 packets of Nottingham Dry Yeast

The gravity may be a tad high for an Irish Red but I like all my beers to have a bit of kick. If anybody is interested in joining, I will begin brewing at 11:00 AM tomorrow.

So yesterday, me and Sean bottled up the stout. As I always do when bottling, I tasted a small sample of the beer. It’s still pretty young, only three weeks old but it is a bit to harsh and sweet at the same time. From experience I can tell that it will mellow out though. I will try to wait till the 16th before cracking open the first beer. This will be my first all grain stout which makes me exited. Any ideas for my next beer?

So after months of not brewing, I finally broke down and ordered a few ingredients and decided to whip out a stout. I did not consult any recipe books and pretty much pulled the recipe out of my ass. It consists of:

10lbs of Marris Otter 10 oz of Roasted Barley 7 oz of Chocolate Malt 1 ounce of Nugget (60 minutes) a packet of WYeast 1084 Irish Yeast

Everything went smoothly for the most part. I did get attacked by bees a few times since they seemed to admire the malty smell from the mash tun. I completely forgot to do a gravity check but I would guesstimate that it is around 1.050. This is the first real stout that I have done an all grain of (I did make a stout like beer without roasted barley, using instead dehusked black grain, it was good, but not roasty enough to be a stout). I’m hoping I will have this beer rolled out by November.

Yesterday me and some friends who brew had a get together and got to sample each others beer. All in all we had 4 brewers total hanging out. I let people sample my coffee brown ale and my German oat ale. I’m afraid the oat ale has gone sour and I will probably be dumping it (though my housemate likes it, I may let him drink it). The coffee brown came out really well, but still needs a bit of carbonation. The aroma definitely smells like coffee. I feel the next time around I will add 2 ounces of roasted barley to give it a bit more bitterness and roastiness. I will probably try mashing it at a higher temperature too to make it a more full beer.

Joe and Meg brought over a blood orange Hefeweizen. The orange really helped compliment the wheat portion of the beer. The color was a nice light orange. There were little bits of orange zest which I thought was really cool (though may scare the wimpier beer drinkers out there). I am tempted to brew a wheat beer soon since summer is around the corner but since I already have three beers in the fermentors, I will probably wait till I’m down to one beer (not including beers that take forever to age). I’m trying to get in the habit of brewing in accordance to how much I drink. I have found that I go through long periods of not brewing and than brew several batches in a row.

Logan brought over his coffee stout and two of his ciders. Logan’s coffee stout, just like my coffee brown, does not use actual coffee but has grains that are malted and kilned to have coffee like aroma and flavor. His beer is well aged and tastes very interesting though it is hard to taste the coffee portion of the beer. It is a testament to his sanitation skills that the beer is still good considering it was brewed some time in October. The first cider we tried from Logan had a very sweet taste to it and had a bit of a spicyness to it. I found the cider very enjoyable but I seemed to be in the minority since Joe and Logan liked a drier cider. The second cider we tried was a more well aged cider. Logan had put oak in the secondary while brewing it. This gave it a somewhat strong oak taste. Though I enjoyed the first cider more, this one was definitely more drinkable and better for a summer cider.

We also tried some Berkshire Brewing Company bourbon barrel aged porter. The best way to describe this beer is a less sour version of a sour brown which is also much more oaky. Between this beer and Logan’s cider, we were given a lesson on how oak imparts flavor in booze. I think it may be fun to do an authentic barrel aged beer but for the average homebrewer, adding oak chips will probably do the job (and maybe a bit of lactic bacteria if you wanna bit of a sour tinge).

During the process of the brewfest, I brewed an all-grain batch of the Northern Brewers American Amber Ale. I was hoping to get more non brewers who were interested in the hobby but not many showed up. The brew process went smoothly and I have brewed this kit before. It makes a nice summer ale and tastes great if you like hops but is still palatable for people who are afraid of IPAs.

So the spontaneous fermentation of the sour brown seems to have started. I discovered this by accident while bringing the bucket back outside (It was going to rain and I did not want to water down the beer). As I opened up the bucket (I closed it with an air so the beer would not get infected with whatever nastiness was in my room) I noticed a krausen had formed. It has only been out 2 days before the krausen formed. I was very excited since I have heard it can take up to a week before fermentation even begins when using spontaneous fermentation. It seems to be fermenting a tad slower than usual when using cultivated yeast. I cannot wait to transfer to a secondary and get to taste a hydrometer sample of how the wild yeast of Sunderland tastes.

As guys may know, I’ve been brewing a sour brown. It finally started bubbling! No matter how many batches I do, no moment is as exciting as when the beer starts bubbling. This time I was especially giddy since it was starting to look like the yeast was dead. I went crazy overboard with oxygenation. I finally figured out how to use the oxygen tank thing to aerate the wort. I cannot wait to try this beer (even though it takes a year to brew). The one using wild yeast has not started yet but eventually it will.