Super beginner here and I just brewed my first 5gal batch and here are the mistakes I know I've made so far:
-Dropped the thermometer into the hot wart while it was chilling, used metal tongs to get it out of the bottom of the pot (sanitized them first, but not sure how well they were sanitized as it was kind of an "oh ****!" operation)
-Accidentally dipped a unsanitized cup into the chilled wort to take OG.
-Wasnt able to get an OG since the cup wasnt even tall enough to get the hydrometer to float.
-Not sure if I aerated enough before pitching the yeast. I poured from the pot to the fermenting bucket and it foamed up pretty nice, so I assumed that was good enough and pitched the yeast then.
Now I just have to wait a while to see how the batch turns out. Hoping for the best but now I'm worried! :/
Hey sounds, exactly like my first partial mash (and first home brew ever outside of pre-hopped extract Mr. Beer, which I boiled the extract, even though the instructions didnt tell me too and managed to boil over and cook a ton of it onto the stove top, which turned out to be a great beer and the 2 gallons I bottled barely lasted two weeks).
Things I learned on my first partial mash.
-5 Gallon pot is not enough to brew a 5 gallon batch of beer (ended up using the 5 gallon pot which was filled to 4.5ish gallons and watched it like a hawk during the boil, and another 2 gallon pot I normally use for cooking spaghetti)
-It's ok to top off your fermenter with spring water, because you were a moron and put 1 oz of Hallertau and 1 oz of Cascade in at 60 minutes and (according to some calculators) I basically doubled my IBUs on a scotch ale
-Don't forget to actually sparge, I have no clue what my OG is since you need a very tall glass to hold a hydrometer
-Dont be a lazy ass and go buy a couple bags of ice to cool your wort in your sink, ended up dumping my wort into primary at about 90F
-Finally don't brew on a weekday, rushed home on my bicycle and broke a good many traffic laws running through red lights and stop signs, and set a new personal record for my ride home, only to still not have enough time to cool and pitch my yeast before going and drinking beer and eating wings with some friends, ended up pitching my yeast 2 hours after dumping it in the brew bucket (on the bright side it cooled down a lot while I was off drinking)
I should've read this thread before I read anything else about home brewing. It's on day 3 now in primary happily bubbling away, since I screwed up all my numbers because of the whole 5 gallon pot debacle I may have a super sweet scotch ale, or a super bitter scotch ale, I have no clue.