First Botlle of First Brew

The process that I used is:

I made a 2.5 gallon batch cutting the recipe in half and it is an extract brew.

I fermented at near 70 degrees, yeast was good from 68 to 74 so I am well within limits. I assume this took two weeks.

I let it sit after fermentation for 2 additional weeks.

All said it sat for 4 weeks before I bottled it.

I bottled it and then let it set for 3 weeks at about 71 degrees.

Then I put a bottle in the refrigerator for 4 days.

The beer is light in flavor, I asked about this before.

The color is as I would expect.

No carbonation, No head Not a mans beer. I now only have 23 bottles to deal with.

Any comments would be appreciated.

How much priming sugar did you use?

Your fermenting temp is to high. Room may have been at 70, but fermentation creates heat and I'll bet it was "cooking" at 80 for the first day or two. Get a big plastic tub/muck bucket and put your fermenter in it w/water and frozen bottles of water. Try changing the ice 2 x a day and cover w/a wet towel as evaporation cools.

Let the bottles sit a little longer. At this point there's nothing more you can do.
Post the recipe and maybe we can see if you did something you could fix next time.

C-Rider said:

How much priming sugar did you use?

Your fermenting temp is to high. Room may have been at 70, but fermentation creates heat and I'll bet it was "cooking" at 80 for the first day or two. Get a big plastic tub/muck bucket and put your fermenter in it w/water and frozen bottles of water. Try changing the ice 2 x a day and cover w/a wet towel as evaporation cools.

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Just trying to learn cause and effect here so I cam make different choices in the future. What did I say that made you think the temperature was too high? I thought too high temp left off flavors, the flavor tastes good, it is just light. In fact my temperatures are measured by a thermometer that is taped to the outside of the carboy that measures temperature in 1/16 degree C. When the temperature of the fermenting wort went up, I lowered the temperature of the space the wort was in to keep the temperature within about 3 degrees.

SoonerDoc said:

Let the bottles sit a little longer. At this point there's nothing more you can do.
Post the recipe and maybe we can see if you did something you could fix next time.

Click to expand...

Its a recipe from my LHBS that others have used in successful brews. I will also check with them to see what might have gone wrong with the flavor

3.3/2 Lbs Light Malt Extract
3/1 Lbs Amber Dry Malt Extract

8/4 oz Crystal 40L
12/6 oz Crystal 135-165L

.5/.25 oz Chinook @ boil
1/.5 oz Willamette @ 30
1/.5 0z Willamette @ 55

Wyeast 1056 American Ale

For bottling, I used a bottling bucket and 6 tbsp of bottling sugar that I bought from the LHBS.

there are 16 Tbsp per cup and the recipe called for 3/4 cup which is 12 tbsp. So I used half of that. I'm thinking maybe I lost count or something if there is no other reason for no gas.

During active fermentation, heat is produced. Your beer will usually be anywhere from 5-10 degrees warmer than the ambient temp.

Three weeks at 70 degrees is the baseline for most beers. I'm surprised that you got ZERO carb.

How did you prime? Did you boil your priming sugar in a little water and add that to the bucket? Or did you just dump sugar in?

If you didn't boil first, you likely have a mixing issue... some bottles got virtually no sugar, some got too much.

The only real thing to do now is to wait. Some beers just take longer to carb than others.

If you added the correct amount of sugar, the beer WILL carb.

How about your caps, sure theyr'e sealed nice & tight ?...........

I would think that this should give you an amber ale or american pale ale. I wouldnt worry too much about the ferm. temp, you are in the ballpark there for good beer.

Assuming you did dissolve the sugar in water as somebody else suggested and not put it straight in the bucket dry, I would try another bottle...maybe you just picked a bad bottle.

Your numbers are all fine from what I can tell.

raymadigan said:

The process that I used is:

I made a 2.5 gallon batch cutting the recipe in half and it is an extract brew.

I fermented at near 70 degrees, yeast was good from 68 to 74 so I am well within limits. I assume this took two weeks.

I let it sit after fermentation for 2 additional weeks.

All said it sat for 4 weeks before I bottled it.

I bottled it and then let it set for 3 weeks at about 71 degrees.

Then I put a bottle in the refrigerator for 4 days.

The beer is light in flavor, I asked about this before.

The color is as I would expect.

No carbonation, No head Not a mans beer. I now only have 23 bottles to deal with.

Any comments would be appreciated.

Click to expand...

So, I am new at this, but you are right in style for an american amber from what I could tell:
OG: 1.047
IBU: 40.4
ABV: 4.6%
color: 13.2 SRM

so if you get the carbonation thing right, you should have a good beer.

Thank you all for your responses. I went to my LHBS and we figure the light taste is probably because I did't get all the flavor from my grains. I use an 8 gallon pot and 2.5 gallons isn't a lot of liquid to steep in. They suggested that I either add another gallon or pull the grains and pour cups of the wort over the grains to extract the rest of the flavor.

As for the no carbonation, I must have been sleeping or I read a different set of instructions because I didn't boil them first. As was mentioned by a few here, I will end up with some with more carbonation, some with less, and some with none.

All problems easily fixable for next brew which is done fermenting and is now conditioning.

Thank you all for your guidance.

Live and learn, do better next time, right?

Here's to hoping you get a couple good beers out of the bunch at least.

brokebucket said:

Live and learn, do better next time, right?

Here's to hoping you get a couple good beers out of the bunch at least.

Click to expand...

Yup, its all one big learning curve with some tasty benefits along the road.

Thanks again for your help.