Been tossing the idea around of brewing beer as I really like to drink beer and we have a lot of micro breweries around to try different flavors and varieties.
My wife got me a home brew kit from one of our favorite spots to eat, Shoreline Brewery, for Christmas. Decided that I needed to start before the box just got buried. Went there for dinner and a few brews Friday night and ended up talking with the brewer. I could tell it was hard for him to talk about brewing on my level, but he was patient and talked me through a few things and sold me the ingredients needed for a simple Pale brew. Total cost was $40.13. He apologized for the high price and told me a couple of places that I should check out if I want to buy more. Even gave me his cell phone in case I had any other questions. Super cool guy.
So here is what I used from the basic kit today, one of our stockpots we use for canning and ingredients.
So being a complete noob, I watched various YouTube vids, read the kit instructions, listened to the brewer who sold me the ingredients and a whole lot of reading on this forum Saturday. I settled on my procedure and started early afternoon.
I began by mixing sterilization solution in the carboy and swishing around. Then dumped into the brew bucket and cleaned every utensil I was planning on using, rinsed with hot water and placed on the sanitized counter. Cleaned the bucket and placed the solution in a 2 gallon bucket off to the side for sanitation use later on. The can of malt extract had the paper wrapper removed, then can and can opener was put in the bucket of solution to sterilize and warm up the syrup. Every time I used anything, it was put back into the solution.
I ended up using 5 1/2 gallons water total to account for the 1/2 gallon that is suppose to evaporate away. We have city water, so I use a whole house municipal treatment filter and then through another city water specific filter for chlorinates and chlorimines. Last time I remember testing, the 2 stage filtered water had a PH of about 6.8 and 230-280 TDS. I filled the brew bucket with the 5 1/2 gallons and then dumped 3 gallons into the stock pot ready to boil into wort.
My recipe was pretty straight forward:
1 60 oz (4lb) can Pale malt extract
2 lbs of Mutons light dried extract
1.5 oz of cascade hops
1 vial Whitelab WLP001 California ale yeast
Once the water showed a strong simmer I added and stirred the extract until it simmered again. I added the 2 lbs of DME and waited for a strong boil. I added 1 oz of hops and set the timer for 60 minuets. Looked like this.
After 30 minuets passed, I added 1/4 oz of hops and with 5 min left to go, I added the last 1/4 oz of hops. When 60 minuets hit, I pulled the wort off the stove and put into an ice bath as shown.
Once the wort cooled down around 80 degrees, i dumped in in the brew bucket with the other 2 1/2 gallons with an estimated 5 gallons or wort. Stirred well and aerated as shown from the counter to the carboy. Yes, the funnel has been sanitized. I should note, 80 degree's wasn't cool enough as the wort remained around 78 degrees when mixed, still to warm for adding the yeast. Took about 1/2 hour outside to cool. So I had to re-aerate by shaking 40lbs of wort around. I am physically able to do so, but my wife couldn't stop laughing while watching me dance around in the kitchen with a full carboy. Lesson learned... wait!
Ok, so now the carboy is 75 degrees and I'm ready to add the yeast, which has been sitting at room temperature for a good 5 hours. I take a hydrometer reading before adding the yeast and come up with a SPG of 1.040 - at this point it seems to high, but I guess I could have mis-read it since I was in a hurry to add the yeast. I read everywhere to smack the packs "like they owe you money". So I shook the hell out of that vial. slightly twisted the cap and a mini explosion was starting to happen in my hands. I would say I managed to get between 80%-90% of the yeast in the carboy. It was a mess. Again lesson learned. Shake less I guess.
I had been taking ambient air temps on different steps going to the basement and the last step read 65 degree's. Perfect place to store. I have a spare frig in the garage that I think I'll use during the summer. Here is what it looked like after I added the yeast, and again, shook the carboy.
After 18 hours sitting in the basement, I noticed some action. Around 20 hours, there was plenty of foam, air bleeder is going a a pretty good rate and the wort looks like there is a tornado inside, lots and lots of swirling around. Air temperature is 65 degrees. Wort temperature is between 66-68 degrees. This is what we see Sunday night, less than 24 hours of adding the yeast.
I have the neighbors saving bud lite bottle for me now. They drink alot and the labels remove easily enough, are brown and long neck. Found bottle caps at $4 per 100 shipped on ebay so I am good to go as some as I pick up some corn sugar when I'm ready to rack.
Originally I was going to do the same brew back to back to check consistency, but after reading about washing yeast, I'm considering a totally different batch so I can have two different yeasts on hand. I think I probably will pick up another carboy or food grade bucket and do another batch in 2 weeks. Now I have to figure out what my second brew is going to be.
Man is it going to be hard to wait 2-3 weeks then another 2 weeks when bottled, but I keep reading patience is a virtue.
My wife got me a home brew kit from one of our favorite spots to eat, Shoreline Brewery, for Christmas. Decided that I needed to start before the box just got buried. Went there for dinner and a few brews Friday night and ended up talking with the brewer. I could tell it was hard for him to talk about brewing on my level, but he was patient and talked me through a few things and sold me the ingredients needed for a simple Pale brew. Total cost was $40.13. He apologized for the high price and told me a couple of places that I should check out if I want to buy more. Even gave me his cell phone in case I had any other questions. Super cool guy.
So here is what I used from the basic kit today, one of our stockpots we use for canning and ingredients.
So being a complete noob, I watched various YouTube vids, read the kit instructions, listened to the brewer who sold me the ingredients and a whole lot of reading on this forum Saturday. I settled on my procedure and started early afternoon.
I began by mixing sterilization solution in the carboy and swishing around. Then dumped into the brew bucket and cleaned every utensil I was planning on using, rinsed with hot water and placed on the sanitized counter. Cleaned the bucket and placed the solution in a 2 gallon bucket off to the side for sanitation use later on. The can of malt extract had the paper wrapper removed, then can and can opener was put in the bucket of solution to sterilize and warm up the syrup. Every time I used anything, it was put back into the solution.
I ended up using 5 1/2 gallons water total to account for the 1/2 gallon that is suppose to evaporate away. We have city water, so I use a whole house municipal treatment filter and then through another city water specific filter for chlorinates and chlorimines. Last time I remember testing, the 2 stage filtered water had a PH of about 6.8 and 230-280 TDS. I filled the brew bucket with the 5 1/2 gallons and then dumped 3 gallons into the stock pot ready to boil into wort.
My recipe was pretty straight forward:
1 60 oz (4lb) can Pale malt extract
2 lbs of Mutons light dried extract
1.5 oz of cascade hops
1 vial Whitelab WLP001 California ale yeast
Once the water showed a strong simmer I added and stirred the extract until it simmered again. I added the 2 lbs of DME and waited for a strong boil. I added 1 oz of hops and set the timer for 60 minuets. Looked like this.
After 30 minuets passed, I added 1/4 oz of hops and with 5 min left to go, I added the last 1/4 oz of hops. When 60 minuets hit, I pulled the wort off the stove and put into an ice bath as shown.
Once the wort cooled down around 80 degrees, i dumped in in the brew bucket with the other 2 1/2 gallons with an estimated 5 gallons or wort. Stirred well and aerated as shown from the counter to the carboy. Yes, the funnel has been sanitized. I should note, 80 degree's wasn't cool enough as the wort remained around 78 degrees when mixed, still to warm for adding the yeast. Took about 1/2 hour outside to cool. So I had to re-aerate by shaking 40lbs of wort around. I am physically able to do so, but my wife couldn't stop laughing while watching me dance around in the kitchen with a full carboy. Lesson learned... wait!
Ok, so now the carboy is 75 degrees and I'm ready to add the yeast, which has been sitting at room temperature for a good 5 hours. I take a hydrometer reading before adding the yeast and come up with a SPG of 1.040 - at this point it seems to high, but I guess I could have mis-read it since I was in a hurry to add the yeast. I read everywhere to smack the packs "like they owe you money". So I shook the hell out of that vial. slightly twisted the cap and a mini explosion was starting to happen in my hands. I would say I managed to get between 80%-90% of the yeast in the carboy. It was a mess. Again lesson learned. Shake less I guess.
I had been taking ambient air temps on different steps going to the basement and the last step read 65 degree's. Perfect place to store. I have a spare frig in the garage that I think I'll use during the summer. Here is what it looked like after I added the yeast, and again, shook the carboy.
After 18 hours sitting in the basement, I noticed some action. Around 20 hours, there was plenty of foam, air bleeder is going a a pretty good rate and the wort looks like there is a tornado inside, lots and lots of swirling around. Air temperature is 65 degrees. Wort temperature is between 66-68 degrees. This is what we see Sunday night, less than 24 hours of adding the yeast.
I have the neighbors saving bud lite bottle for me now. They drink alot and the labels remove easily enough, are brown and long neck. Found bottle caps at $4 per 100 shipped on ebay so I am good to go as some as I pick up some corn sugar when I'm ready to rack.
Originally I was going to do the same brew back to back to check consistency, but after reading about washing yeast, I'm considering a totally different batch so I can have two different yeasts on hand. I think I probably will pick up another carboy or food grade bucket and do another batch in 2 weeks. Now I have to figure out what my second brew is going to be.
Man is it going to be hard to wait 2-3 weeks then another 2 weeks when bottled, but I keep reading patience is a virtue.
