Newbie questions?

[Deon Botha]

Hi all. I just put my first batch of homebrew up. It was a kit for a pale ale. Came with liquid malt extract, glucose and yeast. I followed the instructions on the tin and all seemed to go well. Fermentation stopped after 4 days. The instructions then said to add something called finnings that is supposed to let all the unwanted stuff in the beer sink to the bottom, which I did. It said to leave it for 2 more days and the bottle. So that is only 6 days till botteling, does that sound right? Also, I have read comments that says not to add the sugar that you get in the kits to your beer, why?? And what is does the term 'raking' reffer to? Thanks

 

[IslandLizard]

Welcome to homebrewing! And HBT!

It's very well possible the beer is done fermenting after 4 days. Leaving it an extra 2-7 days are for making sure it's really done. Although you don't see any action, it's conditioning, cleaning up fermentation byproducts during that time, making the beer taste better in the end. It's an important part of the process.

"Racking" refers to transferring beer from one container to another, such as from your fermenter to a bottling bucket. Preventing, or at least limiting air exposure while doing so is encouraged. Air will oxidize beer.

If the instructions mention to rack the beer to a "secondary," just disregard that, simply leaving it where it is, is best.

To carbonate the beer you need to add some "priming" sugar to the beer in the bottling bucket, right before you're bottling. Is there any priming sugar included with the kit?

How big is your batch of beer? Do you have bottles?

 

[Deon Botha]

The sugar I am talking about is about 1kg of sugar added into the wort, not the priming solution. It's a 23 litre batch and yes, I do have bottles. So can I bottle it from the primary fermenting bucket, without racking it to a botteling bucket? Also, how do I get rid of the cloudiness in the beer?

 

[RM-MN]

The sugar I am talking about is about 1kg of sugar added into the wort, not the priming solution. It's a 23 litre batch and yes, I do have bottles. So can I bottle it from the primary fermenting bucket, without racking it to a botteling bucket? Also, how do I get rid of the cloudiness in the beer?

Yeast create alcohol and CO2 by eating sugar. By leaving out the sugar you are making beer with lower ABV. Some people say that adding the sugar will get you a "cider" flavor but many add it with no problem.

The cloudiness comes from the unfermetable parts of the wort/beer and since it is nearly the same density of the beer it gets well stirred by the activity of the yeast and will take time to settle out. The longer you leave it in the fermenter, the more of it settles. Throw out the instructions that came with the kit. While your beer may be done fermenting at day 4 and you could bottle on day 6 your beer will be much better if you be patient and let it have 2 to 3 weeks so that it settles out mostly clear.

You can bottle directly from the fermenter but to keep from stirring up the sediment that has settled you cannot mix in the priming sugar and will need to prime each bottle. I'd suggest that you rack it a bottling bucket and use a spigot with a short piece of tubing to connect a bottling wand. It will allow you to bulk prime (dissolve the priming sugar in a little hot water and pour it into the bottling bucket just after starting to rack the beer to it). I like to ensure mixing by gently and slowly stirring the beer and priming solution with a sanitized spoon.

 

[davidabcd]

I agree with the above. Leaving the beer in the fermenter for two weeks (or more) is safer. Next batch it will be time to learn about a "hydrometer," a tool for measuring the density of your beer and, among other things, lets you know for certain if it's finished fermenting.
I've not read much on this site about priming the fermenting vessel directly with sugar water (priming solution) but it's an extremely well-discussed topic on the UK sister-site. Some/many there write that adding priming sugar solution to the FV is fine to do and then stir it gently without disturbing the stuff on the bottom ("trub"). It seems 100% counter-intuitive to me to do that as I've seen the trub swirl up easily even upon a slight jiggle of the FV. But it is a thing brewers do.
In any case, if I were to bottle directly from the FV, I would use the siphon (racking cane) and prime each bottle (as mentioned above).

 

[Kirkwooder]

If you are in a hurry, like most first time brewer always are, you can also cold crash your beer to help it clear. Simply chilling the beer to near freezing will speed up the settling process and quite often produces very clear beer in just a day or two of what brewers refer to as "cold crashing". However, patients would be the better bet. Give the beer a week or so more, it is likely not clear because the yeast is not yet done doing their jobs completely. You will be glad you did as the beer will benefit from the extra time.

Welcome to the obsesion!

 

[Jag75]

Welcome to the forum and the hobby! I put patience up there on importantance list right with cleanliness and fermentation temp. I leave my beer in the fermenter for 3 weeks. You could cold crash but I would bypass that for now because you could oxidize due to suck back . If you choose to cold crash research here in the search box.

 

[IslandLizard]

The sugar I am talking about is about 1kg of sugar added into the wort, not the priming solution. It's a 23 litre batch and yes, I do have bottles. So can I bottle it from the primary fermenting bucket, without racking it to a botteling bucket? Also, how do I get rid of the cloudiness in the beer?

The 1 kg of sugar is indeed considered an alcohol "booster," it adds no flavor just alcohol, while making your beer thinner, yielding less body and thus less mouthfeel.

Many beginners kits are called "kit and kilo," exactly describing what you have: A kit with a) pre-hopped malt plus b) a kilo of sugar.

All-malt beers, using no sugar or only a relatively small amount, typically end with a higher gravity than when sugar was used and tend to be tastier, maltier, and have better mouthfeel.

There's no need to rack beer to a "secondary" after all signs of fermentation have ceased. Many instructions still include this arcane and unnecessary step. That's what I was referring to earlier. Nothing to do with bottling.

But when your beer is ready to be bottled, after 2-3 weeks or longer, you should rack your cleared beer to a bottling bucket, leaving the yeast and trub cake behind on the bottom of the fermenter. The (pre-dissolved) priming sugar is mixed into the beer in the bottling bucket. Then you fill your bottles from there. Most bottling buckets have a spigot on the bottom for ease of working with a bottling wand.

Q:
Did you add that kilo of sugar when you brewed the beer?

 

[Deon Botha]

Thank you for the info. Yes, I did add the sugar. I will leave the beer for another week or so before I bottle

 

[Deon Botha]

Welcome to homebrewing! And HBT!

It's very well possible the beer is done fermenting after 4 days. Leaving it an extra 2-7 days are for making sure it's really done. Although you don't see any action, it's conditioning, cleaning up fermentation byproducts during that time, making the beer taste better in the end. It's an important part of the process.

"Racking" refers to transferring beer from one container to another, such as from your fermenter to a bottling bucket. Preventing, or at least limiting air exposure while doing so is encouraged. Air will oxidize beer.

If the instruction mention to rack the beer to a "secondary," just disregard that, simply leaving it where it is, is best.

To carbonate the beer you need to add some "priming" sugar to the beer in the bottling bucket, right before you're bottling. Is there any priming sugar included with the kit?

How big is your batch of beer? Do you have bottles?

Thank you

 

[Deon Botha]

Welcome to the forum and the hobby! I put patience up there on importantance list right with cleanliness and fermentation temp. I leave my beer in the fermenter for 3 weeks. You could cold crash but I would bypass that for now because you could oxidize due to suck back . If you choose to cold crash research here in the search box.

Thanks for the info

 

[bleme]

Pay special attention to the threads that have been sticky'd. They are at the top of every forum and have been chosen because they are the best summary of a topic. One of the most useful of these for me was this thread on bottling:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/bottling-tips-for-the-homebrewer.94812/