MyAlement
Active Member
Hello everyone! I've been digging around this site for weeks after buying a basic kit from a local home brewer store. I've got a glass 6.5 gal carboy and a bottling bucket, along with the basics. A buddy of mine bought a stainless steel 5 gallon pot for boiling the wort over a propane fryer.
My first brew has been an interesting trek, full of oops, errs, and umms...
I started with an amber ale kit from the store. At this point, I didn't know the difference between an extract kit, partial mash, all grain, etc. I bought a partial mash kit without understanding the partial mash process. To my defense, I followed the directions to the letter for the wort boil. The only problem was that the directions had me boil the grain bag for 20 minutes, which I later found out to be a big no-no. Ok, mistake number 1...Everything was going well until I got mixed up between reading a brewing book and the instructions and added the 4 oz of corn sugar to the boiling wort along with the extract. Mistake number 2 and I'm not even done boiling. All along the while, I kept my lid on the boiling pot, which I later found out may not have let some funky chemicals escape. Oops...#3.
After finishing the boil, we cooled it in the sink with an ice bath. No big deal there. We began to siphon the wort into the carboy. We came to the conclusion that we needed to siphon as much wort as possible and ended up siphoning up some of the leftover solids...ok, a lot of the solids. Wow, mistake number 4 (that I know of). Having not even considered the effects of aerating the wort, we did not perform any additional efforts in that department. Yup, mistake 5. We topped off the carboy with tap water, slapped on the air lock and had a beer. I don't mind the taste of our water, so I didn't bother boiling/filtering. Hmm...some would say mistake #6.
My house is set between 76-78 degrees, which is more than a few degrees higher than the upper temp suggested by the yeast manufacturer. After reading more about fermentation temperatures, I figured I've done enough damage to be charged with assault and battery of the yeast.
Well, wouldn't you know, the next morning, we had a vigorous fermentation. Something is going right! After day 3, a 2-3 inch layer of sediment rested peacefully on the bottom of the carboy. Man, I'm thinking, this beer is going to taste like pond water. After day 7, I decided to check the gravity and taste the beer. 1.013, while the starting gravity was 1.058 (+/- 25% newb error factor). Ok, that sounded good, though the kit never discussed what the gravities should be. Next, the taste test.
Well...not bad! Flat beer! Better than I was expecting. Another gravity test and sample at day 14, and we have 1.012 and a very slightly carbonated darker than amber amber ale.
Well, I just ordered my bottling equipment (and another bag of corn sugar) and will be bottling soon. I'm excited to try this frankenbrew, what ever it tastes like.
Sorry for the long intro, but I thought I'd share some of the adventures of a new brewer. I'm already planning a partial mash set up and building a fermentation chamber. I've identified about 100 improvements for batch #2, which will probably be a Belguim Dubbel for the November timeframe.
Cheers!
Mike
My first brew has been an interesting trek, full of oops, errs, and umms...
I started with an amber ale kit from the store. At this point, I didn't know the difference between an extract kit, partial mash, all grain, etc. I bought a partial mash kit without understanding the partial mash process. To my defense, I followed the directions to the letter for the wort boil. The only problem was that the directions had me boil the grain bag for 20 minutes, which I later found out to be a big no-no. Ok, mistake number 1...Everything was going well until I got mixed up between reading a brewing book and the instructions and added the 4 oz of corn sugar to the boiling wort along with the extract. Mistake number 2 and I'm not even done boiling. All along the while, I kept my lid on the boiling pot, which I later found out may not have let some funky chemicals escape. Oops...#3.
After finishing the boil, we cooled it in the sink with an ice bath. No big deal there. We began to siphon the wort into the carboy. We came to the conclusion that we needed to siphon as much wort as possible and ended up siphoning up some of the leftover solids...ok, a lot of the solids. Wow, mistake number 4 (that I know of). Having not even considered the effects of aerating the wort, we did not perform any additional efforts in that department. Yup, mistake 5. We topped off the carboy with tap water, slapped on the air lock and had a beer. I don't mind the taste of our water, so I didn't bother boiling/filtering. Hmm...some would say mistake #6.
My house is set between 76-78 degrees, which is more than a few degrees higher than the upper temp suggested by the yeast manufacturer. After reading more about fermentation temperatures, I figured I've done enough damage to be charged with assault and battery of the yeast.
Well, wouldn't you know, the next morning, we had a vigorous fermentation. Something is going right! After day 3, a 2-3 inch layer of sediment rested peacefully on the bottom of the carboy. Man, I'm thinking, this beer is going to taste like pond water. After day 7, I decided to check the gravity and taste the beer. 1.013, while the starting gravity was 1.058 (+/- 25% newb error factor). Ok, that sounded good, though the kit never discussed what the gravities should be. Next, the taste test.
Well...not bad! Flat beer! Better than I was expecting. Another gravity test and sample at day 14, and we have 1.012 and a very slightly carbonated darker than amber amber ale.
Well, I just ordered my bottling equipment (and another bag of corn sugar) and will be bottling soon. I'm excited to try this frankenbrew, what ever it tastes like.
Sorry for the long intro, but I thought I'd share some of the adventures of a new brewer. I'm already planning a partial mash set up and building a fermentation chamber. I've identified about 100 improvements for batch #2, which will probably be a Belguim Dubbel for the November timeframe.
Cheers!
Mike
