Saturday, November 7th, the Wichita Homebrewer's Organization (in cooperation with the American Homebrewers Association) hosted the 2nd annual Learn to Homebrew Day at our store on West 13th.  Between 4 local home brewers, we brewed everything from a Citra Pale Ale, a couple of Porters, an IPA and an Imperial American Indian Brown Ale.  Hopefully at an upcoming DOTA there will be some to share for all.

A Drinks on the Acre, or DOTA as we like to call it, regular and frequent go-to JGC brewing class instructor, Randy Sommerfeldt, demonstrated our latest product, the GrainFather, an all-in-one grain brewing system. This electric brewing system makes the brewing process so much easier as there's no more going after propane, ice or burners. And, with it's electronic controls, it makes brewing consistently easy, taking much of the guess work out of it.  

The Grainfather is an all inclusive, all-grain brewing system. This system allows you to mash at high extract efficiency by utilizing a pump for easy recirculating of the wort through the mashing process. The grain bed is then easily raised out of the kettle to provide for sparging and draining of the grain. Your mash tun then becomes an electric boil kettle.

The mash temperature and boil are all controlled precisely with an electric heating element. The system comes with a digital temperature controller so you can adjust temperature of your mash with in a degree. This allows for step mashing.

The included pump allows for easy recirculating of your wort during the mash, and also allows for quick cooling at the end of the boil by allowing you to pump through the included counterflow chiller. This whole 8 gallon system is extremely compact so it makes for easy indoor or outdoor brewing.

I hope you have saved the date of Monday, December 14 for DOTA. We'll be enjoying, judging and crowning the 'Best in Class' at the first annual DOTA Brewing Competition. If you haven't started, there's still time to join. Just brew a beer that contains orange, cranberry and pecan in some quantity or fashion.  Everyone in attendance will get to blind taste all of the beers. It's going to be epic.