So...I went to the store yesteday, picked up some dried Ancho chilis from the produce dept, but since they were just laying out, i figured I needed to sterilize them first. I also wanted to add in some more cocoa powder. It was evident by looking at the fermenting bucket that most of what I put in during the boil was lon longer there. So I boiled up some water and added in the cocoa powder so that it wouldn't clump when I added it to the beer. I poured this over the chilis in a mixing bowl and let it sit for a while. I put all that into the secondary and then racked in on top of that. I had enough beer i was all the way up to the neck of the secondary. MISTAKE. I remember reading that when you rack into the secondary you will see a little bit of fermentation action because it kind of reacitvates the yeast a bit. Well...when i was taking the dogs out this morning I noticed it smelled like beer in the man cave so I decided to check on the brew. Definitely had beer coming out of the air lock and a nice puddle siting on the floor. Its going to be some good beer I think. I wonder if the cocoa powder or the Ancho chilies had extra fermentable sugars that boosted this. (The cocoa powder shouldn') I'll bottle this when I get back from Christmas and I'm betting its going to be a fantastic beer.
On a secondary note, I had, prematurely I might add, pulled one of my holiday spiced ales and put it in the fridge. It had only been in the bottle a week at that point. I tasted it last night and let me say that it is definitely an interesting beer. It almost taste like a ginger beer, which is weird considering there's no ginger in it. I believe it was the nutmeg coming through, and I wished it was a bit more subdued in that regard. You can tell it is a high alcohol beer too! It wasn't very well carbed but that might be a result of prematurely opening it. I think with a bit of aging, this beer could be good. As it is, its drinkable, in small doses.
Merry Christmas!
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