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For a few years now I’ve purchased a gallon sized glass jug of organic apple juice at Whole Foods each year at the holidays and fermented it right in the jug with a pack of red star. I’d like to give some of these as gifts this year but the bottle carbonating is a mess for such small amounts...

The compressor on our fridge just went out and we're looking to buy a new one (sticker shock :eek: ). This led me to wonder if it would be more reliable to buy an upright freezer and put a Johnson temp controller on it vs. a standard refrigerator. Does using an external controller like...

When I went to pitch the yeast on my first lager Sunday night, I accidently dropped my home made temp controller on the garage floor. It didn't look broken, but the relay must be damaged/stuck because it won't turn off now. I hear the click, but no dice. Needless to say I was piznissed. To...

Yesterday, I pitched my lager starter(WLP820) straight from a 35F fridge into 3.5 gallons of 40F degree wort. I set my fridge temp controller to 55F. My plan was to allow the temp to creep up throughout the course of fermentation as I do with ales, ending at around 60F, and then do a DR at the...

I just brewed a Marzen and ended up with 2 better bottles with exactly 3.5 gallons of wort each. This seems like a great opportunity for an experiment. Stats: OG: 1.048 IBU: 20.1 Grain: 5lb. Pilsen 4lb. Munich 3lb. Vienna 2lb. 2-row...

Just calculated my effic. From yesterday's brew. I got 75.6% (6 gallons @ 1.070 - 15 pounds of Munich 10L). What I did was strike 26 quarts for a 154F initial temp. This was around lunch time. Then, I just left it in the cooler until the kids went to bed at 9:00. The temp had dropped to...

Just pitched the starter into a batch of Helles Bells. This is my first lager AND my first attempt at BIAB, so gimme some HBT karma.

I just pitched an activator pack into my starter. When I opened the pack it smelled like rotten eggs. Is this normal for a lager yeast strain? The pack is about 2 months old and has been kept in my brew fridge at 37F the whole time.

Bradford's Prudence - Thanksgiving Table Beer Profile: Batch Size: 5.25 gallons Boil: 90 minutes OG: 1.055 FG: 1.014 Color: 13 IBU: 18 ABV: 5.3% Malt Bill: -9 lbs. of Pale Ale Malt (US 2-row) -2 lbs. of Caramel Wheat -1 lb. of Flaked Corn -1 lb. of Crushed Walnuts Hop...

My lag times seem to always be about 48 hours, no matter what I do. I used a starter this time and aerated the wort in the primary. I got the lag down to about 36 hours. :ban::ban::ban: I'm not really concerned about it because all 4 batches have turned out great so far, but I'm interested...

Plan on trying a SA Harvest Pumpkin clone this weekend. This is what I've come up with as a first stab after reading the recipe components from their site... and drinking a few. :drunk: Grain: 7.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) UK (3.0 SRM) Grain 58.33 % 4.00 lb Smoked Malt (2.8 SRM) Grain 29.17 %...

I've been shooting for 5.25 gallons in the kettle post-boil on my batches so far. That means around 6.75 gallons pre-boil. My kettle is 7.5 gallons. When I got Brewing Classic Styles, all the recipes are set up for 6 gallons post-boil, which would mean about 8 gallons in the kettle pre-boil...

I brewed BM's OktoberFAST a month ago. When tasting it on bottling day, it tasted fantastic. Very clean fermentation with S-04. That was two weeks ago. Now, after carbonating at 75F for two weeks, it has a very bubblegummy/estery taste. Is this typical, or am I just crazy?

Bradford's Prudence - Thanksgiving Table Beer Batch Size: 5.25 gallons OG: 1.055 FG: 1.014 Color: 13 IBU: 18 ABV: 5.3% Malt Bill: -9 lbs. of Pale Ale Malt (US 2-row) -2 lbs. of Caramel Wheat -1 lb. of Flaked Corn -1 lb. of Crushed Walnuts Adjuncts: -1 Whole Pumpkin, diced and boiled for an...

I've seen a few different methods for batch sparging. The method I have been using seems to work well, but I was hoping someone could double-check me and see if there is any glaring problems that I haven't realized. Here's what I do: Equipment: 52 qt. Igloo Cooler with SS braid and ball...

I made a 1.5 liter version of Edwort's apfelwein with some white labls wine/mead yeast. The recipe says it should take about 4 weeks to ferment, but after 1 week, the yeast dropped out and it's starting to clear. Airlock is dead. I'm assuming that's normal since I used a ton of yeast for such...

Just popped cap on my first ever beer. Big Basin Amber Ale - all grain. It tastes superb and I'm very pleased with how it turned out. Just wanted to share the love. Onward to more beer!

When people reference "big starters", like in the 3.5 liter to 1 gallon+ range, does that mean that you have to actually use a gallon sized jug for your starter vessel? I'd rather use my 1.5 liter cider jug and just step up twice, decanting between each step up. Would that work just as well...

The fermentation of my first batch is done. It seemed to take about a week(stable at 1.016). The yeast was Wyeast 1332 which has a range of 65-75. The cooler started off at 57F and never got above 63F during the fermentation. I know that a warm ferm. is bad, but what about fermenting on the...

Well, my first ever beer is in the primary. I pitched my starter straight out of the fridge(37F) into the primary after cooling it down to 57F. I was aiming for 60F on the primary for pitching, but figured 3 degrees was acceptable. This morning I checked the ferm. cooler and the temp in there...