Homebrew Beer Howto

Saruman

gaz wac wrote: »

( i drink alot and I wouldnt have the patience for bottles )

cheers

Beer nut explained the yeast question so I will add to this...

Sounds like you need to forget about bottles and Keg like me. The fact you have a spare fridge is perfect as you can build one quite easily if its big enough to take kegs.

Here is mine sitting behind the bar.

I currently have two wheat's on tap. An Appleweisse and a chocolate Dunkelweisse.

gaz wac

wow, pretty impressive my fridge is in the shed so prob not that handy unless i presuad Mrs Wac to allow me to start boring holes into the new kitchen ha . I remebered someone found a site for larger bottles..hold on.... yea,here it is

cyborg wrote: »

Found a source of swing top bottles,anybody used them?
http://www.alpack.ie/Beer_BottlesSwing_topGrolsch_Bottles/Default.292.html

Maybe these would suit me more ?Wonder if cyborg could come back to us and let us know how he got on with them? Went home last night ( after running out of petrol and phone batt was dead ) to find my beer fermenting away....ahhh great sound:)

BaZmO*

The only problem with those bottles is that they are 750ml.
Handy when you're bottling because you have to bottle less but they're a pain to fit standing up in the fridge, and it's not really ideal to leave them on the side.
500ml swingtop bottles are the best imo.

Wallacebiy

or 5L minikegs , like the party kegs in lidl ( I have a few of these , I've replaced the bungs that are in them with re-usable ones )

or these http://www.thehomebrewcompany.ie/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2_95&products_id=293

( I don't use these ones by the way , as I don't want to have to use CO2 , Just cause I'm like that )

YourName

I have washed the drum that had the beer fermenting in it for the last 3 weeks twice now and sanitized it for about a half hour, but I still can't get the smell out or it, is this normal???

slayerking

YourName wrote: »

I have washed the drum that had the beer fermenting in it for the last 3 weeks twice now and sanitized it for about a half hour, but I still can't get the smell out or it, is this normal???

Dont worry about it. My fermenter always smells of beer. Its almost impossible to get rid of the smell. I suppose the plastic has to absorb something!!

Once its spick and span you should be ok. Rinse with lots of water and sanitise as normal just before your next beer and it should be ok.

BaZmO*

Yeah the smell doesn't go away. As slayerking has already said, just make sure it's sanitised before each use and don't be tempted to take anything abrasive to it's surface in an effort to get rid of the smell.

knightmare

Wallacebiy wrote: »

or 5L minikegs , like the party kegs in lidl ( I have a few of these , I've replaced the bungs that are in them with re-usable ones )

or these http://www.thehomebrewcompany.ie/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2_95&products_id=293

( I don't use these ones by the way , as I don't want to have to use CO2 , Just cause I'm like that )

Hey Wallacebiy,
I'm intrigued by the minikeg suggestion, been bottling myself for a few years & its getting to be a pain. Could you explain how you do it, do you find yourself with a lot of sediment gets pours into the glass as I assume you are carbonating with a bit of sugar? Can the lidl minikeg bung be reused?

Wallacebiy

knightmare wrote: »

Hey Wallacebiy,
I'm intrigued by the minikeg suggestion, been bottling myself for a few years & its getting to be a pain. Could you explain how you do it, do you find yourself with a lot of sediment gets pours into the glass as I assume you are carbonating with a bit of sugar? Can the lidl minikeg bung be reused?

I haven't had any problems with them , Treat them exactly like a big bottle even use a bottling wand to fill them , no real issues with sediment , ( although I generally have a fairly clear beer by the time I keg , as I leave the beer long in Primary ) I either siphon with a simple siphon or most recently I fitted my fermenting bucket with a ball valve and spigot that I was able to put the tubing onto , and the bottling wand on the other end.


I don't think the bung in the lidl keg an be reused , it's hard plastic and a bit of a pain to get out and I normally do a bit of damage to them ,
I think brouwland sells the reusable bungs , but I got a shot of about ten of them with the first 6 minikegs I bought from the Franciscan well, and I have about 4 or 5 that I'm using ( I've never had to fill all 8 minikegs yet , but once my new brewing shed is built I hope to be upping production )

I would suggest that Aluminium keggies probably wouldn't be great for say putting a high gravity beer down in for a year before drinking , glass is your man there ,
But for stuff you're gonna be drinking inside 3 months of kegging , perfect .

I've found the beer keeps in mine for at least a week after opening , you have to fiddle about a bit to get a perfect head , as it can gush , then dribble , but I find the pints to be nicer than my bottled stuff .

BaZmO*

And is natural carbonation enough to get it to pour?

Actually, how do you pour from it? Is there a tap at the bottom? The one from HBC is on the top but it uses C02 to pour.

Saruman

I used to use minikegs myself. I had one of the lidl mini keg chillers.


Natural carb is enough to get it to pour for a time, same with a corny keg but you need to top it up with co2 unless you are just dispensing from a bottom tap.

I was never happy with the quality of the beer from the minikegs. It was usually under carbonated though I reckon if I had kept at it until I got the levels right it would have been fine. I am far happier with my current set up though.

knightmare

Wallacebiy wrote: »

I haven't had any problems with them , Treat them exactly like a big bottle even use a bottling wand to fill them , no real issues with sediment , ( although I generally have a fairly clear beer by the time I keg , as I leave the beer long in Primary ) I either siphon with a simple siphon or most recently I fitted my fermenting bucket with a ball valve and spigot that I was able to put the tubing onto , and the bottling wand on the other end.


I don't think the bung in the lidl keg an be reused , it's hard plastic and a bit of a pain to get out and I normally do a bit of damage to them ,
I think brouwland sells the reusable bungs , but I got a shot of about ten of them with the first 6 minikegs I bought from the Franciscan well, and I have about 4 or 5 that I'm using ( I've never had to fill all 8 minikegs yet , but once my new brewing shed is built I hope to be upping production )

I would suggest that Aluminium keggies probably wouldn't be great for say putting a high gravity beer down in for a year before drinking , glass is your man there ,
But for stuff you're gonna be drinking inside 3 months of kegging , perfect .

I've found the beer keeps in mine for at least a week after opening , you have to fiddle about a bit to get a perfect head , as it can gush , then dribble , but I find the pints to be nicer than my bottled stuff .

Thanks for the info Wallacebiy. Definetly gonna look into this. As a matter of interest- home much sugar do you use to prime these 5 litre kegs?

ManFromAtlantis

brewed for first time this year. made super cider from homegrown apples.

cant believe how well it turned out. any how, i dont know waht teh % aclohol is but even with 2-3 small bottles i've abit of a hangover the next day. not usual for me.

my q is this:

is the hangover related just to the alcohol % content or is there something else i could have done during brewing? maybe got rid of more sediment or left in bottles for longer (bottled 1 month ago) or anthing
ta.

Saruman

Alcohol is what gives you a hangover, nothing more.

When people say mixing drinks makes you feel worse, it is because if you have a load of shots on top of beer, it is more alcohol. The type of alcoholic drink should not matter.

There may some something to the likes of red wine due to tannins and stuff.

I am probably completely wrong though.

I know mythbusters did something on it and contrary to popular belief they found that using the same amount of alcohol, just drinking beer alone was worse than mixing beer with shots of vodka.
However I feel this result was flawed since they started their bender one night, had a hangover and then the following night did it again with the mixed drinks and I would imagine their body is less likely to get a hangover the second night than the first.

Wallacebiy

knightmare wrote: »

Thanks for the info Wallacebiy. Definetly gonna look into this. As a matter of interest- home much sugar do you use to prime these 5 litre kegs?

Same as I would use for bottling , teaspoon per litre ( Up or down then depending on beer style )

BaZmO* wrote: »

And is natural carbonation enough to get it to pour?

Actually, how do you pour from it? Is there a tap at the bottom? The one from HBC is on the top but it uses C02 to pour.

The ones I have have a little Pull out tap at the bottom , natural carbonation gushes it out at first and then the vacuum stops it , there's a valve in the bung on top you open to let it out then . I love it .
You want to leave it at least two weeks though to carb up properly ( that said I cracked a four day old minikeg the night before last and I'm enjoying a glass right now . It's very drinkable . but it'll be great in a week or two when I open the next one .

vinylbomb

Saruman wrote: »

Alcohol is what gives you a hangover, nothing more.

When people say mixing drinks makes you feel worse, it is because if you have a load of shots on top of beer, it is more alcohol. The type of alcoholic drink should not matter.

It does matter actually.

Congeners are byproducts of fermentation, and when you mix different congeners from different alcohols you can get a real whopper hangover

http://www.drinkfocus.com/articles/hangovers/hangover-causes.php

guildofevil

vinylbomb: the word "Congeners" in and of itself doesn't mean a lot. Congeners are not "toxic substances created during the alcohol fermentation process" and the fact that that article defines them as such would lead me to conclude that the author it talking b*ll*x.

All congeners are, is a variation on any given chemical and not all congeners are toxic, or have anything to do with fermentation. Most congeners have nothing to do with alcohol at all, as they are very common in the world of chemistry. It is likely that congeners of some kind are present in every food you eat and every beverage you drink. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congeners

What the author is probably driving at, but understands imperfectly, is that there are congeners of ethanol called fusel alcohols or higher alcohols http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusel_alcohol but they are just variations on the theme of ethanol and, like ethanol itself, they are indeed toxic.

Fusel alcohols do indeed cause many of the symptoms of your hangover and at higher concentrations can cause a headache within minutes, not just the next day. They exists in many alcoholic drinks, in various concentrations, but not even the author of the suspect article you linked to claimed that mixing them has any effect beyond the sum of their individual effects.

Hangovers are caused by alcohol.
If you drink a lot of alcohol you will get a hangover.
Higher alcohols will give you a worse hangover than pure ethanol.
If you drink a lot of higher alcohol you will have a worse hangover.
Mixing your drinks is a red herring. If you mix a drink with lots of higher alcohols and one with few higher alcohols you will not have as bad a hangover as if you had just drunk more of the one with lots of higher alcohols.

ManFromAtlantis: It does indeed sound like you have formed some higher alcohols in your cider and the only thing you can do at this stage is try to limit your consumption.

For future reference, these higher alcohols are produced when the fermentation temperature rises. How high the temperature has to be before that becomes a problem depends on the yeast strain, but I usually find that most ale yeasts, if kept to the low 20s, will not produce noticeable levels of higher alcohols.

In cider things are a little more complicated though. Yeast cells also then to produce higher alcohols if they are in a low nitrogen environment, which is a feature of cider must. If you want to add nitrogen to your cider must you can buy a yeast nutrient from your homebrew supplier, but you may end up with a dryer cider, as you will have healthier yeast, which will be able to ferment sugars nitrogen starved yeast may have left behind.

BeerNut

guildofevil wrote: »

the only thing you can do at this stage is try to limit your consumption.

Or there's the James Bond approach. Fusel alcohol being less dense than the other sort (allegedly -- Fleming's grasp on physics isn't always great), Bond sprinkles black pepper on the surface of his dodgy Soviet bathtub vodka to absorb it and drag it to the bottom. Peppery cider, anyone?

bennyob

After 13 days in fermentor, I went to take my 1st gravity reading. When I opened the lid and looked in, there was a very thin film on top of the beer, kinda like a thin oil slick. There were also small dark things floating on top.

I drank a small sample, it didn't revolt me but i have to say that I tasted better in my time.

Does this sound like lost cause?

Btw im using woodfordes wherry bitter kit.

If needs be, I can put a picture up tomorrow after work.....bit late now.

Tks

BeerNut

bennyob wrote: »

a very thin film on top of the beer, kinda like a thin oil slick.

Hop oils, I'm guessing; perfectly normal.

bennyob wrote: »

I drank a small sample, it didn't revolt me but i have to say that I tasted better in my time.

That's green beer for you: there's a reason why brewers put all that effort into conditioning rather than serving straight from the fermentor after 13 days.

bennyob wrote: »

Does this sound like lost cause?

No. Finish the beermaking process first, then worry about how it tastes.

guildofevil

The film could simply be from normal fermentation. You get quite a variation in what ends up floating on top of your fermentor.

I wouldn't expect it to taste great at this stage; it's not ready yet. The fact that it doesn't taste or smell bad would reassure me that it probably isn't infected.

Don't panic. It's probably fine. Just continue as normal and with any luck you will end up with tasty beer.

monkeypants

Just found this thread! I used to brew back in the mid nineties, back when you could buy this stuff in Eason's and I'd like to do so again. Cheers for all the info and links.

BeerNut

There's never been a better time to pick it up again -- there are plenty of high quality ingredients available in Ireland, and lots of skilled brewers offering advice for free *cough*sig*cough*.

Hopefully the days of flying blind with kit, kilo and hotpress are behind us for good.

bennyob

Thanks for your advise guys. It has put my mind at rest. I was a little bit concerned last night as i didn't know what to expect at this stage.

I'll keep the brew on the go!

oblivious

monkeypants wrote: »

Just found this thread! I used to brew back in the mid nineties, back when you could buy this stuff in Eason's and I'd like to do so again. Cheers for all the info and links.

Welcome back, things have really improved since the 90's

cuculainn

Hey guys,

I am looking for a big stock pot to do a partial mash. Any body know a place to pick one up cheap?

Dont want to use an aluminium one but want sometiing about 25 litres in capacity.

ANy help appreiciated

Saruman

You will be hard pressed to find a stock pot that size for cheap to be honest. It would be far cheaper to actually buy a ready made picnic cooler mash tun. You could probably get a plastic bucket boiler as well for the same price as a 25 litre stock pot.

Here is a list of online suppliers. Some of them like Athlone have a shop you can go to and take a look.

I personally recomend hop and grape in the UK as even with shipping, the price they charge, low vat and excellent exchange rate are hard to beat.

BeerNut

Best place in Dublin is Living Island on Talbot Street, though I think 19L is their biggest.

cuculainn

Saruman wrote: »

You will be hard pressed to find a stock pot that size for cheap to be honest. It would be far cheaper to actually buy a ready made picnic cooler mash tun. You could probably get a plastic bucket boiler as well for the same price as a 25 litre stock pot.

Here is a list of online suppliers. Some of them like Athlone have a shop you can go to and take a look.

I personally recomend hop and grape in the UK as even with shipping, the price they charge, low vat and excellent exchange rate are hard to beat.

Thanks for the replies guys, Not familar with the picnic cooler mash tun, what are they.

I think I have two options, to buy the plastic bucket boiler, or use a smaller stock pot - say 15 litre and do two runs.


BTW while I am on here, what are peoples favourite home brew recipes?

BeerNut

cuculainn wrote: »

picnic cooler mash tun, what are they.

A picnic cooler with a manifold and tap fitted. Not worth the bother if you're using extract.

cuculainn wrote: »

to buy the plastic bucket boiler

Dunno how that's going to help your mashing. What do you mean?

cuculainn wrote: »

say 15 litre and do two runs.

How partial do you want your partial mash to be? I'm planning one in a 10L stock pot and reckon it'll have plenty of capacity.