last saturday I managed to keg my kolsch and on sunday I hit up port bottle shop.

• FYI, when I keg, I just toss in 3 oz. of bottling sugar straight into the keg (no boiling) and rack the beer on top.
• I use my portable keg charger and a single canister to push PBW and sanitizer through my dip tube, and I use what’s left in the cartridge to seal the top of the keg after filling it.
• the above method makes for quick and easy keg filling, and I have had great results with secondary fermentation in the keg.  it sure beats force carbing too (if you have the patience to wait another week or so).
• when I was down at port, the bottle shop was slammed when I went in, as it was the annual carlsbad fair and over 100,000 people were milling around outside.
• I slipped in and managed to score a bottle of ’10 angel’s share bourbon barrel (anyone up for a 3 year flight?) and a bottle of good ol’ fantome.
• also, I just picked up a grain mill and the ingredients for my first all-grain batch.  tune in next week for the results (hint: it’s a kolsch rival).

last weekend I kegged the steam beer that was in primary.

• I use about 3g of corn sugar, which I just dump in a sanitized keg before racking my beer into it (I used to boil it w/some water, but I found no negative effects after making the switch).
• I keg condition using secondary fermentation instead of force carbonating for a few reasons – I believe it adds some tangible “character” to my beers, it is easy to do (not that force carbing isn’t), and it saves a ton of CO2.
• I don’t secondary before kegging since all my sediment/trub collects near the dip tube anyway.  once I hook up my keg i just dump the first pint or two and then my beer is clear as day.
• I checked out the results of primary fermentation, and was stoked – great color and no discernible off flavors!  looks like my SF shed did its job keeping temps reasonable.
• the keg is carbing up in the shed as we speak, and I will likely lager it in my kegerator for a week or two before serving.