|
kitten smoothie posted:Is it safe to leave a blowoff in place for the entirety of primary fermentation or should I replace it with a standard airlock once things have slowed down a little? I do this all the time (because I am lazy as hell) with no issues.
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 03:02
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 17, 2024 18:38 |
|
|
Cpt.Wacky posted:Fill up the tube with starsan, cap it with your thumb, put the cane into the carboy, remove thumb with the end over a spare bowl until it's all beer flowing out, the put the tip into the bottom of the bottling bucket. I have found that you have to fill the racking cane up as well, but this definitely works...
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 03:06
|
|
|
Autosiphon supremacy  Get Your Dirty Thumbs Off My Hose
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 03:13
|
|
|
chiz posted:What about you guys? What are your stories as far as going from LME kits to grain and carboys and kegs and all that? 1. Northern Brewer starter kit with saved up bottles 2. Turkey fryer and Igloo cooler mash tun 3. 2 keg setup from Midwest and a mini fridge 4. Son of Fermentation Chamber for temperature control 5. 10 gallon Polarware kettle w/ball valve (turkey fryer pot got a hole in it) Still fermenting in my plastic Northern Brewer bucket 
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 03:34
|
|
|
chiz posted:
1. Kit with a friend 2. Igloo cooler mash tun, propane burner 3. Chest freezer with external thermostat 4. Plate chiller 5. Keg setup 6. Dedicated mash tun, hlt, and kettle.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 03:46
|
|
|
digitalhifi posted:Hey Rage-Saq (or anyone else really) I'm going to be brewing your "The Muse" 100% Brett L beer this weekend and was wondering if you had any advise or anything you would change about the beer. I saw your note on HBT that you would add a bit more Caravienna to get a bit more residual sweetness in the final beer, so I was considering bumping that up from .25 to .5 lbs. Nah, for what it is the Muse was pretty much perfect. Though my latest trip on the Brett side, The Flower is drinking pretty loving awesome right now. You could do a 10g batch of either and then treat it with yeast as either of them are and have two great kick rear end beers. The only thing I'd change about the flower is to drop the saaz hops and double it up with Styrian goldings. I hate saaz and its now dead to me, but my batch of The Flower has pretty much faded the saaz character out to where I don't mind anymore. Making a starter from a White Labs brett tube takes a lot longer as there are a lot less cells, give it at least a week. However brett doesn't go through the same kind of stresses-related-bad-flavor-and-poor-health under this kind of lengthy reproduction cycle that normal sacc would.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 04:18
|
|
|
chiz posted:What about you guys? What are your stories as far as going from LME kits to grain and carboys and kegs and all that? To join the dogpile: 1) Brewed an extract kit batch with a buddy and immediately got hooked. I did about 10 batches on your super basic stovetop extract/steeping grain, bottled setup. 2) Got a cheap chest freezer off Craiglist and a temp controller as my first upgrades. That summer was a record setting heat wave and I had no A/C, so this made brewing physically possible. Even in the absence of heat waves, this is a great first or second step once you decide to invest in the hobby. 3) Bought a stir plate and flask to make yeast starters. This is the other early upgrade I'd really suggest. Also accumulated a few more fermenters (plastic carboys, or "Better Bottles"). 4) Got a turkey fryer and a couple corny kegs with a picnic tap, as both came up at great prices on Craigslist at the same time. Friend gave me a giant CO2 tank his roommate inexplicably left behind when he moved out. So my first ever full-volume, outdoor brew was also my first keg brew. 5) Converted a 10 gallon Igloo cooler to a mash tun and went all grain. This is where I'm at now. Near term I want to pimp out my kegerator, get to about 6 faucets and make it look all nice. Right now I just have a couple picnic taps and you have to open the lid to get at them. Long term I want a baller brew stand and recirculating mash system, but that is like years off with my current (lack of) funds. vvv edit: autosiphons are some kind of black magic, definitely get one if your starter kit didn't come with one. Docjowles fucked around with this message at 06:15 on Jan 25, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:10
|
|
|
indigi posted:Autosiphon supremacy Seriously. I had one friend denounce auto siphons but I've since determined that person to be a total homebrewing quack. Auto siphons rule.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:12
|
|
|
crazyfish posted:Auto siphons rule. Yup. I was happy without one for a long time, but I finally gave in and picked one up. Oh my god what a fool I have been.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:25
|
|
|
crazyfish posted:Auto siphons rule. There isn't enough room in this post to hold all of the truth that is literally in this statement.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:29
|
|
|
Docjowles posted:2) Got a cheap chest freezer off Craiglist and a temp controller as my first upgrades. That summer was a record setting heat wave and I had no A/C, so this made brewing physically possible. Even in the absence of heat waves, this is a great first or second step once you decide to invest in the hobby. What size chest freezer do people recommend? I've been meaning to pick one up, for homebrewing purposes and cellaring. Granted, I obviously can't do both at the same time, but does anybody have any idea what dimensions can hold 2-3 fermenting buckets/carboys?
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:31
|
|
|
Ah, that makes sense. Thanks for the demystification! edit: jeez, you guys are fast. I didn't realize there was a new page with ten new posts... I've filed away in my brain that auto siphons are cool. I'll invest in one when I'm at the brew supply next. Ratbones fucked around with this message at 06:35 on Jan 25, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:31
|
|
|
Corbet posted:What size chest freezer do people recommend? I've been meaning to pick one up, for homebrewing purposes and cellaring. Granted, I obviously can't do both at the same time, but does anybody have any idea what dimensions can hold 2-3 fermenting buckets/carboys? 7 cu ft holds two buckets or carboys without modifying it.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:38
|
|
|
chiz posted:What are your stories as far as going from LME kits to grain and carboys and kegs and all that? Oh, jeez, I have been brewing a long time. - My dad brewed when I was a kid, about the time it became legal. I think this planted something in my brain. - When I started drinking beer later in life, I always tended toward higher-end stuff and turned up my nose at the crap my friends drank. I'm a little more tolerant now. - Stopped at a mini-mart one day on my way home from work. Picked up a six of Red Hook ESB. Got home and opened one, and the smell that hit me was so perfect for that time and place. - Another day, another stop on the way home, this time at at a homebrew store. Again, the smell of the place told me this was something I had to do. - My first batch was an amber ale. A few months after brewing it, I met my girlfriend for lunch at a deli, and grabbed a McTarnahan's amber ale out of the cooler. It was exactly the same as my batch. It hit me then that I could actually make beer people would enjoy drinking. - Brewed a bunch from the New Complete Joy of Home Brewing, extract plus specialty grain. This was before the Internet got big, so the level of information available was much smaller. - My girlfriend started a BBS in our spare bedroom. I got her to subscribe to the FIDONet Zymurgy topic. - The Internet finally happened, and I read a lot of rec.crafts.brewing, but I still didn't really know people who brewed aside from one crazy friend of my brother's. - Got some cornies, but didn't have a fridge. Scrounged up a fridge, which broke. Went back to bottling for a while. - It took me a long time, but I finally scrounged together an all-grain rig, which I have been gradually improving ever since. - Worked with a guy who wanted to see the process. He came by and started brewing the next week I think. Another couple people got into it and formed a group of local guys that still get together and brew a few times a year. - Today, the rig is getting really good and I have both cornies and a working fridge to serve from. My quality is way up and my costs are way down thanks to bulk purchases. - I think RIMS is next.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:42
|
|
|
Corbet posted:What size chest freezer do people recommend? I've been meaning to pick one up, for homebrewing purposes and cellaring. Granted, I obviously can't do both at the same time, but does anybody have any idea what dimensions can hold 2-3 fermenting buckets/carboys? Don't have a tape measure handy but eyeballing it, mine's like... 3' x 3' x 4' exterior dimensions? Not accounting for the big compressor hump. It would hold five 6 gallon carboys comfortably (not that I have that many), for reference.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:43
|
|
|
Thanks for the info guys, keep sharing if you haven't already.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:49
|
|
|
Corbet posted:What size chest freezer do people recommend? I've been meaning to pick one up, for homebrewing purposes and cellaring. Granted, I obviously can't do both at the same time, but does anybody have any idea what dimensions can hold 2-3 fermenting buckets/carboys? I use a standard kitchen fridge for fermenting. It holds three buckets nicely. Freezer on bottom, fridge on top, which makes it very easy to siphon into kegs - I don't have to move the fermenters onto a table or whatever, so nothing gets stirred up. I also use a (different) kitchen fridge for serving. It holds five cornies and a bottle of CO2, plus bottled beer in the crisper drawers and the door pockets. Hops get stored in the freezer. Of course, fridges will vary in size. My suggestion is to find a fridge or freezer that works for you on the cheap (both of the above fridges were free to me) and then work within the limits of what that gives you.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 06:52
|
|
|
So tonight is my usual bar night with my friends, and the place where I go has had Ommegang's Aphrodite on tap for the past few weeks. Anyone have a clone recipe or any ideas on how to make a similar sour? This is probably the first sour that has really caught my palate as something I could drink all the time. The issue is that it's relatively new, and the data released by Ommegang is pretty vague. I can probably culture their house yeast from their Abby Ale or something, so that's not really a concern, and I can buy Brett at the LHBS. It's just trying to figure out the malts and hops I guess.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 07:06
|
|
|
^^I always feel dirty linking threads from HBT (possibly because they will redact any URLs for other brewing forums posted on their forums) but here is a thread with some pertinent information at least. http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f127/aphrodite-ommegang-limited-edition-ale-269984/ It looks like its a pretty simply grain bill with just pilsner malt and carapils malt for some body and a little residual sweetness. I've never heard of the hops they list, Celeia, but google says its related to Styrian Golding and Aurora. Also they apparently add grains of paradise as well as raspberry and pear juice to it. Sounds interesting. I'd be careful with the mash temp, maybe a little higher than usual to leave something for the Brett to munch on in secondary.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 16:51
|
|
|
For those of you who don't have an autosiphon, but do have a CO2 setup already you can use CO2 to rack your beers! (assuming you are using carboys, not buckets) Just get one of those carboy caps for racking canes (if you don't have one already) and then jam your CO2 line over the other end of the carboy cap. Keep the pressure on the low-ish end of things as better bottles can balloon outwards under enough pressure - it should only take 15-30 seconds of CO2 to get a full-strength siphon going - just get the CO2 line off the carboy cap to allow airflow. Surprisingly enough this technique worked for us not only when we just had gas tubing (the tubing would squeeze over the "air in" tube), but also when we upgraded to plastic quick disconnects (the male end of the disconnect just perfectly fits into the inner diameter of the "air in" tube).
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 17:49
|
|
|
1) December 2010Received Mr. Beer kit for Christmas 2010 2) January 2011: Made 5 Mr. Beer batches, all came out horrible (high fermenting temps) but I got hooked on the process. 3) February 2011: Made a couple simple extract batches, came out horrible (see above) 4) March 2011: Discovered BIAB method and brewed a couple stove top all grain 5 gal batches. Bought fermenting buckets, stopped using mr. beer equipment (too small). Used a swamp cooler, hese were the first batches that were actually palatable. 5) April 2011: Bought chest freezer and Ranco temp controller. Fermentation temps are finally under control and every beer I'm making now is delicious. 6) May 2011: Bought kegging equipment on craigslist, ordered some stuff from kegconnection. 4 cornies, 4 way manifold, co2 tank, lines, disconnects, also got wort chiller. 7) June 2011: Kegs are full, now I'm comfortable brewing all grain on the stove and proud to share my beer with anyone. 8) July-September 2011: Kept brewing to keep kegs full. 9) October 2011: Purchased 20 gal pot and turkey burner for outdoor brewing. Wow! So much cleaner and less smelly in the apartment. 10) November 2011: Bought $150 in hops for the next year. Brewed a couple 150 IBU IPAs. 11) December 2011: Broke up with ex-gf, realized I brewed just to keep myself occupied and as a 25 yr old single guy my interest in brewing is severely diminished. Anyone want to buy a whole bunch of poo poo? tesilential fucked around with this message at 18:45 on Jan 25, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 18:42
|
|
|
Woo. I am brewing with my Christmas gift kit this weekend (finally, a busy Jan has delayed me a lot). So I got this: brew kit (although with out the glass bottle, carboy?, thing) and this Amber ale kit I figure the beer is pretty boring, but a) it was a gift, b) this is my first batch. But I was trying to figure out what other prep I need to do/get and this is what I thought of: -Buy large pot to boil it all in -Sanitize everything -Find method to cool after boil is done Does that sound about right? For the step after that, bottling/conditioning, I should buy something like a big water cooler (5gal cooler) to take the beer out of the fermentation jug and bottle from the spigot, right? Oh yeah, also because it is supposed to be ~65° I was going to just keep it in the corner of my kitchen...Does the bubbling from fermentation bubble out of the lock (meaning I should have towels or something under it)? Thanks guys
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 18:52
|
|
|
tesilential posted:Terribly, terribly sad timeline
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 18:54
|
|
|
Garanimals4Seniors posted:What sort of wort chiller is it? Copper immersion chiller with pre chiller, which is basically a shorter length copper immersion chiller to drop in ice water.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 18:56
|
|
|
What diameter tubing, and how long is each coil? Does it have hose connections or is it secured with band clamps? I'd be interested if you can wait a week before you sell. Otherwise, are there any homebrew clubs around that you could join? Quitting this hobby just seems so terrible.  I haven't brewed in 6 years, but only because of space issues.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 19:03
|
|
|
ChiTownEddie posted:Woo. I am brewing with my Christmas gift kit this weekend (finally, a busy Jan has delayed me a lot). - You can boil in a smaller vessel, then add top-off water that's sterile, if that's a concern. - Buy some star-san, a gallon of distilled water, and a spray bottle. Follow the directions to make the distilled water into sanitizer, and use the spray bottle to sanitize. - The liquid in general stays inside of the airlock; but it is possible for crap to come out of a fermentor while it's fermenting, so I would put something down if you are worried. I keep mine in the basement or an unused bathroom, depending on the temps in each.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 19:18
|
|
|
tesilential posted:Anyone want to buy a whole bunch of poo poo? Sorry to hear it, man. I'd suggest holding onto things for at least a little while just in case you decide later on a hobby sounds like a nice idea again.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 19:21
|
|
|
TenjouUtena posted:- You can boil in a smaller vessel, then add top-off water that's sterile, if that's a concern. Okay cool. I thought I had read that you can basically boil 3gallons and have 2 gallons of boiled (then cooled) water waiting in the fermenter. Star-san, got it. I'll stop at the brew stuff shop on the way home.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 20:09
|
|
|
I have 3 extract batches under my belt, but I've only tasted the first one, and it was awful. I'm thinking because I sanitized stuff with bleach, but I'm not positive. Anyway, I've moved on to star-san. I read How to Brew cover to cover, and decided that all-grain doesn't actually seem as scary or difficult as I had originally thought. Made this sucker last night:  Now I just need to wait until my next pay check to get a big rear end kettle and a propane burner. Then wait for another paycheck to get some ingredients together for my first all-grain batch. Ha, I told my wife this would be cheaper than buying my fancy beers, but this is turning into a money leeching obsession... Still have to get a fermentation fridge, kegging equipment, wort-chiller, more fermentation buckets, etc.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 20:26
|
|
|
U.S. Barryl posted:Ha, I told my wife this would be cheaper than buying my fancy beers, but this is turning into a money leeching obsession... HA! I have a coworker who is starting to get interested in brewing. He was asking about kit costs (both hardware and ingredients) and such, as well as my costs (all-grain, buy mostly in bulk, etc.). I laid it out for him what it costs to make beer. Then I told him, that although the startup costs and ingredient costs make it look really attractive, he's not actually going to save any money in the long run. He's still selling it to his wife as a cost savings, though - good beer at retail costs ~$9/six-pack for him, and I guess he's looking at a couple-three bucks in ingredients for the same amount of homebrew. He hasn't even ordered a stater kit yet, and he's asking me about propane burners, kegging rigs, ferment coolers, etc. You have to brew (and drink) a lot of beer to break even when the capital is flowing out like that. Not that it's not toally worth it, but to think that you will save money is Congressional levels of fudging the truth.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 20:44
|
|
|
Jo3sh posted:Then I told him, that although the startup costs and ingredient costs make it look really attractive, he's not actually going to save any money in the long run. i've stayed pretty modest and have made 6 extract batches. doing some conservative number crunching including starter kit and the equipment i've bought, i'm looking at like $335 vs $600 if i bought the beer at retail prices
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 20:51
|
|
|
mewse posted:i've stayed pretty modest and have made 6 extract batches. doing some conservative number crunching including starter kit and the equipment i've bought, i'm looking at like $335 vs $600 if i bought the beer at retail prices If I were staying extract, I wouldn't need to upgrade any gear, and I would probably actually save a ton of money on beer.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 20:53
|
|
|
mewse posted:i've stayed pretty modest and have made 6 extract batches. doing some conservative number crunching including starter kit and the equipment i've bought, i'm looking at like $335 vs $600 if i bought the beer at retail prices That's how it starts. And I'm not saying you can't stay that way forever, but I started the same way and there's always a next thing. Sure would be nice not to bottle anymore. Now I need a fridge for these kegs. I don't want to mash in this cooler I took fishing, it smells weird. Man, it's a pain waiting so long for the water to boil. This thermometer sucks. poo poo, I dropped my hydrometer AGAIN. ... and a million more. But you're right. You CAN brew at reasonable cost. My coworker though is jumping right in with both feet. I like to encourage people to brew and do the next thing in pursuit of the hobby, but I feel like I am telling this guy to slow down. If he decides he hates it six batches and $350 in, he'll hate me a lot less than if he's $1000 in.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:08
|
|
|
Jo3sh posted:HA! I have a coworker who is starting to get interested in brewing. He was asking about kit costs (both hardware and ingredients) and such, as well as my costs (all-grain, buy mostly in bulk, etc.). So I pitched my dry yeast into the carboy and had a pretty vigorous fermentation going for like a day and a half, and now it's not doing anything? How long is fermentation generally visually obvious and when should I start taking gravity readings?
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:10
|
|
|
Jo3sh posted:buy mostly in bulk A grain mill is high on my "upgrades" list for this reason. At my LHBS' price of $1.75/lb (for non-bulk purchases) I figure it would pay for itself within the first few sacks depending on what I can get for bulk buys. Plus I'm 99% sure my awful efficiency is due to the shop's broke-rear end mill, so I'd save a pound or two on every batch.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:30
|
|
|
Angry Grimace posted:Brewing the beer so far seems pretty fun, but I'm concerned how the gently caress I'm going to drink all this beer, particularly the first few batches where I'm anticipating that I won't really want to give it to someone else. A beer after work and maybe a couple on the weekends adds up pretty fast. If you drank 12 ounces a day on average, five gallons will last you about seven weeks. If you brewed five gallons once a month, drank one a day on average yourself, and shared a few a week with friends, your production would keep pace with demand. I like to share beer, though, so although I have a glass after work and all that, I take a lot to gatherings and such and I am happy to pour for friends who come by. I'm taking at least six gallons of homebrew plus miscellaneous commercial beer to Vegas this weekend for the guys I will be hanging out with. Ferments can die down pretty quickly, as you observed. A couple days for the really active part of the ferment is not unusual. It's probably still doing something, though - cleaning up if not actually fermenting. I'd let it go another few days to let it settle and clear before I even thought about checking it. My very lazy approach is usually just to leave it alone for two weeks and then check the gravity with the virtual certainty that it's finished. You could start checking now if you were itchy about it, but I'd probably wait until it had been in the fermenter for a week or so.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:32
|
|
|
1) Did assload of reading about brewing. Picked up a Brewers Best Belgian Tripel kit and starter equipment pack, along with swamp cooler and aluminum brewpot. 2) Bought glass carboy for secondary and had no idea that secondaries were not considered necessary anymore outside of long conditioning periods or post-fermentation flavour additions. 3) Tasted tripel. Hot, alcoholic mess. Made vanilla porter. 4) Left porter in the secondary too long. Almost zero vanilla flavour. 5) Designed own recipe for key lime wit. Insanely delicious. 6) Porter not so bad anymore. 7) Tripel has mellowed a lot and is drinkable! 8) Getting gear together for 5 gallon batches of kitchen-based all-grain, currently brewing partial mash kits from Northern Brewer. Still obsessed with brewing.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:34
|
|
|
Jo3sh posted:HA! I have a coworker who is starting to get interested in brewing. He was asking about kit costs (both hardware and ingredients) and such, as well as my costs (all-grain, buy mostly in bulk, etc.). Really? I thought that was half the reason that people homebrewed, because it's making good craft beer cheaper than buying it at the store. Forget the start-up costs with equipment kits and whatnot. If you buy an ingredient kit for $25 and get five gallons or two cases of beer out of it, that's $6.25 for a twelve pack (given that a case is 24 beers), no?
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:40
|
|
|
chiz posted:Really? I thought that was half the reason that people homebrewed, because it's making good craft beer cheaper than buying it at the store. You have to make a lot of batches before you catch up to your initial costs if you buy things like kegging rigs, megapot kettles, fermentation fridge, keg fridge, wort chillers, and all the crazy equipment that you will eventually want if you get bit by the homebrewing bug.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:49
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 17, 2024 18:38 |
|
|
chiz posted:If you buy an ingredient kit for $25 and get five gallons or two cases of beer out of it, that's $6.25 for a twelve pack (given that a case is 24 beers), no? Right, we agree that far. But then, just like any other hobby on the face of the earth, you want to do the next thing. All grain, kegging, whatever. These are purely optional and no one is making you do them, but there's always something interesting out there. I have two beer fridges which cost something to run even though I got them for free. I have five keg slots in my serving fridge - that's a couple hundred bucks worth of Cornies alone, not counting the CO2 bottle, the regulator, or the three stainless faucets. I buy malt in bulk, which means I have a mill. And hell, not everyone wants to brew the $25 kit all the time. Ooh, that one looks tasty, but it's $40. Or $60. But you absolutely can brew inexpensively, and save money doing it. It's even possible I have saved money myself, when you spread out all my equipment purchases over the last 18 or 19 years. When I think about it, I buy a few sacks of bulk malt and a few pounds of bulk hops each year, then supplement with specialty grains and yeast from the FLHBS. It's possible my ingredient costs for a year's worth of brewing are about three or four hundred dollars, I haven't tried to keep track. 125 gallons of craft beer at retail is minimum $600, and that's buying it by the case at the club store. But if I bought it at retail, I would probably not give so much away. Jo3sh fucked around with this message at 22:02 on Jan 25, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2012 21:58
|
|