Man, that is the truth!Don't waste good craft beer on people that prefer Miller Lite.
Man, that is the truth!Don't waste good craft beer on people that prefer Miller Lite.
Here’s a thread from someone with a similar brew ethic...North Carolina - Unibrau Pro All in One 100L 240V SystemA good amount of people go through the stages of brewing: 1) Mr Beer or similar, 2) Extract Brewing, 3) Partial Mash, 4) Turkey fryer, 5) Grainfather or other coffee urn style All-in-one units and finally 6) a top-notch, top quality Brewing system (I wont mention names in order to eliminate arguments). What I would like to have known when I first started brewing? After I for sure I liked this hobby..... I wish I would have bought the top system and forgone the fermenting buckets, carboys and cheap fermenters. While a top of the line equipment does not make the brewer, it may help and certainly not hurt...
Partly due to the lockdown and not having an office of coworkers to give my product to, I have the opposite problem. My friends, neighbors, wife, and I can't drink my beer fast enough to keep up with my production, so my house is filling with beer. I only started brewing in August 2020, but since then have become completely obsessed with it, to the point that I'm cooking up a new batch almost every weekend and running out of places to put all the bottles.If you tell your friends and relatives you brew, then you will not have any or you will have very little for yourself. Best advice, when asked "How did your homebrewing turn out?". Reply, "It was awful. I had to dump it!" (laughing to oneself).
Recently I visit relatives and relative says to me "I thought maybe you'd bring some of your beer.". I replied, "This is your house. It's up to you to supply the beer. Visit me and I have my beer." Nothing like being taken for granted...
Excellent! I live in SoCal, and we have a neighborhood happy hour every Tuesday at which I supply the refreshments. Are you close?@hamachi, I've had my shots and am open to reasonable travel distances. Where do you live? I can bring a lawn chair and my own pint glass. If you can't handle visitors, my car has a good sized truck. Always glad to help out a fellow home brewer.
Not at all close. I live in suburb of St. Louis. But tomorrow at 4 PM I'll drink a home brew in honor of your kind invitation.Excellent! I live in SoCal, and we have a neighborhood happy hour every Tuesday at which I supply the refreshments. Are you close?
1) Using simple sanitizers like Starsan and Iodophor. Didn’t know anything about those at first, so I used bleach to sanitize. On a related note, I also didn’t realize that anything that would be used before flameout didn’t need to be sanitized, so I was spending unnecessary time and energy sanitizing everything.
2) Using a wort chiller. Didn’t know anything about those, so I was relying on an ice bath to chill my wort post-boil. I was really worried my first batch was going to be ruined because it took so long to cool it. I ran out of ice in the freezer and had to leave the house to go buy more while the wort sat there exposed to the elements. Turned out ok, though.
So while brewing that year with a lid on, where you happy with the taste of your beers? Can you taste the difference without the lid?I brewed beer for a year with the lid on the boil kettle-- simply because nobody ever told me not to. My recipe book didn't mention it; none of the how-to's on the internet mentioned it. I figured it's like stew -- lower the heat and keep a lid on. So I'm reading some thread on HBT and learn about Dimethyl sulfide (DMS), which will boil off if you DON'T use a lid, but can skunk your wort if you do. Also, boilovers...
Look into SMaSH or brewing on the ones.
Patience.
In all things.
And sour in even smaller quantities.When you’re brewing all-grain, taste each malt. Malts are surprisingly snackable, and it’s a great way to figure out what each one may be bringing to your beer. (This goes for black malts, too, but try those in small quantities.)
#3 Night before bottle day, load the dishwasher with 48 bottles (nothing else) and run the sanitize cycle. Next day, just take them out and give them a squirt of sanitizer (likely overkill) and they are good to go. Put the bottling bucket (once filled) on the counter above the dishwasher and put the bottles on the open dishwasher lid to fill. Any spillage simply drains into the dishwasher when you close the door).....
beside all the things mentioned, things I wished I had done immediately.
Buy a decen "coffeeurn" style ebiab instead of messing with stovetop multikettle setups.
Get basic steel fermenters like the chapman ones in US or brewland ones in europe...so much nicer to use than plastic and safer than glass, also just dumping the wort hot in the fermenter and closing it, then cooling in a icebath is so much easier.
I, too, think cleaning bottles is a pain. I rinse them well are emptying them, let them dry, then seal with a 2x2 inch square piece of aluminum foil and put them in cardboard 6 pack holders. When I have enough, I load a cool oven with the 6 packs, bring the temp up to 180° F, hold for 15 minutes, turn off and let cool down with the door closed. They will stay sanitized as long as the foil is in place.Hi,
Thanks for the reply!
Bottles. Cleaning them is getting a little annoying but I don’t think I’m ready for kegs just jet, I feel the bottles are simple enough.
I don’t mind additional fermentation time for the fruit.
also I didn’t know that that’s a good sign of healthy yeast, thanks!
6+ hours to bottle!? What, are you bottling 20 gallons? I keg everything but my stouts, but when I bottle 5 gallons into 22 once bottles, it only takes around 1 hour.I wish I had known how much I was going to hate bottling so I could have gone straight to kegging my beer. 6 +hrs to bottle, god I dont miss that.
I'm pretty OCD about my sanitation, pbw soak the bottles (sink will only hold about 8 at a time) then I hit them with a bottle brush then rinse 3 times then sanitize and rack on the dishwasher, repeat till I get 50 + bottles plus the hr or so to clean the kitchen before I start, bottling then takes 60 to 90 min ( transfer to bottling bucket, bottle, cap and store) then clean everything up6+ hours to bottle!? What, are you bottling 20 gallons? I keg everything but my stouts, but when I bottle 5 gallons into 22 once bottles, it only takes around 1 hour.
I'm pretty OCD about my sanitation, pbw soak the bottles (sink will only hold about 8 at a time) then I hit them with a bottle brush then rinse 3 times then sanitize and rack on the dishwasher, repeat till I get 50 + bottles plus the hr or so to clean the kitchen before I start, bottling then takes 60 to 90 min ( transfer to bottling bucket, bottle, cap and store) then clean everything up
I would love that, but my bottling day is 5 hours for a 5 gallon batch. It's 1.5 hours before beer goes into a bottle (set-up, gathering materials, priming sugar prep, racking to bottling bucket), and clean-up is 1.5 hours. So bottling takes 2 hours.I keg everything but my stouts, but when I bottle 5 gallons into 22 once bottles, it only takes around 1 hour.
You seem to be spending more time than needed on all of those stages. But specifically, why does the bottling itself take 2 full hours? A 5 gallon batch gives you roughly 50 12 ounce bottles, so two hours means 2.4 minutes for each bottle. This seems extraordinarily slow.I would love that, but my bottling day is 5 hours for a 5 gallon batch. It's 1.5 hours before beer goes into a bottle (set-up, gathering materials, priming sugar prep, racking to bottling bucket), and clean-up is 1.5 hours. So bottling takes 2 hours.
Do smaller batches....more flavours, less work, less to storePartly due to the lockdown and not having an office of coworkers to give my product to, I have the opposite problem. My friends, neighbors, wife, and I can't drink my beer fast enough to keep up with my production, so my house is filling with beer. I only started brewing in August 2020, but since then have become completely obsessed with it, to the point that I'm cooking up a new batch almost every weekend and running out of places to put all the bottles.
6 hours seem really long. Yo brew day is 4 hours from initial set up to pots clean/ beer in ferment or.I wish I had known how much I was going to hate bottling so I could have gone straight to kegging my beer. 6 +hrs to bottle, god I dont miss that.
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