The "Doctor" Is In

While perusing Twitter one day I stumbled upon a re-tweet about a gypsy brewer coming to Oklahoma. Naturally intrigued by new beers being brewed in our state I dug through Twitter to find out @DocBuckmans. He hails from the Yuengling state of Pennsylvania with professional brewing experience at The Church Brew Works in Pittsburgh. He certainly has a passion and you can get his full story by reading his blog: Doc Buckman's Beer. There you will get his line up of beers like Snake Oil IPA and Lazy Bully Lager.

Ethan works his craft. (Photo by D'Wain Carthen)

In the meantime Ethan has taken a job with Mustang providing sales support for the Tulsa area and developing recipes. Sounds pretty amazing for someone that's only 22. I had a big passion for drinking quality beer but Ethan certainly took it to a whole new level at that age. After meeting through Twitter we met several times to enjoy local craft beer like Prairie Standard at R Bar over poutine and at home with an eclectic beer collection while dining on Andolini's pizza. (Do you see a trend forming?) We went through a bit of our reserves that day so we decided why not do a home brew to replenish our stock.

With three extract brews under my belt I was chomping at the bit to brew again. We brought in fellow blog contributor D'Wain Carthen as well and commandeered his home in the process. (Thanks Jess!) D'Wain was new to the whole brewing process and this time so was I as we used the brew-in-a-bag method. 

But what did you brew you may ask? Well the Fall season is upon us so we kicked around the idea of a pumpkin ale. While pumpkins are highly favored; what was once unusual and unheard of seemed mainstream, so Ethan suggested a sweet potato porter. It sounds complex but it couldn't be simpler by adding sweet potato to your wort and boil up those starches and create a dark and malty porter.

Brew day went well thanks to High Gravity always having an amazing stock of grains, hops and yeast to choose from. The brew-in-a-bag method was a mystery but after witnessing first hand and squeezing out the wort I think I found a new method. Naturally we imbibed on Oklahoma Craft beer like Marshall's 5, Prairie Puncheon and Choc's Gratzer and consumed Siegi's fine German food. Awww Schnitzel! 

After imbibing and catching up on TV shows we need to watch Ethan made note of the new Unbridled Series that Mustang Brewery will soon release. "They will all be very hop forward for the styles and the hops we'll be using wont just be the typical west coast citra and cascade combo," Ethan said. They are developing a Tripple, India Red Ale and a Black Lager for some time this winter.

This is just part one of the home brew saga so stay tuned to hear how it turns out and you may even be able to sample our first Beer Is OK beer!