HOME MADE BEER

[Webbo]

I only tried making beer  once and it was fookin awful stuff .The house stunk yeasty and musty

 

I've stuck to buying it at  bargain booze shop  ever since.

 

Kronenbourg 1664  is  wonderful stuff , I'd never be able to recreate the beauty of it. I'll leave making beer and stuff  to the experts  

Cantona is brilliant in the ad for that stuff.

[The People's Hero]

I've done beer and wine. Biggest success probably a blackberry and cherry wine. Lovely. Extremely strong though. Nearly finished me.

[walkerleeds]

Anyone done this recently? 

 

Want to try it but nobody has given their efforts particularly good reviews judging from this thread...

[Webbo]

On 10/10/2013 at 21:08, I am Rod Hull said:

It aint beer, but this is the thread for it.

 

My uncle in law told me about this so I thought i`d give it a go - Blackberry Vodka. Its been a good year for blackberries and they`re free.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZZI5aPi2Rc

 

Its been on the go for 3 weeks now and should be ready for Christmas. The mother in law gave me a bottle of Smirnoff to make more but I might try doing it with peaches.

 

We have a shit load of blackthorn trees at the back of us so i`m going to make Sloe Gin this weekend.

Funnily enough me and the missus had a drop of this at the weekend. She told me it was Sloe Gin and we didn't realise until afterwards and she looked at the bottle. It was quite nice.

[Detroit Blues]

3 hours ago, walkerleeds said:

Anyone done this recently? 

 

Want to try it but nobody has given their efforts particularly good reviews judging from this thread...

From my experience, if you buy decent equipment, clean very thoroughly, and follow the directions you'll make pretty good beer 90% of the time. The beer you'll make at first will be at least better than the cheap macro brewed stuff. Once you get good at it, you can get it as good as "craft beer." 

 

The initial investment for extract brewing, kettle, burner, glass carboy, etc was like $200 (in the US). Some people buy the cheap brewing kits but i'd advise against it. After that it costs me like $30-50 of ingredients to make a 5 gallon batch.

 

It can feel daunting when you get into it at first. If you have friends that homebrew id start off by just helping them on a brew day. If not, watch a lot of videos on YouTube so you understand the basics and ask questions at your local Homebrew supply shop. The kit with the ingredients will provide the step by step directions.

 

When it comes to the brew day make sure you have help. For me it's usually my brother or a couple friends. We sit out on my patio, drink some beer and brew on a Saturday/Sunday afternoon. It will take like 4-6 hours from when you startup until you're done cleaning up. 

 

After you go through 4-5 batches you'll really start to get the hang of it. Then you can start experimenting with different ingredients, maybe try kegging instead of bottling, etc. 

 

If you like beer, it can be a fun hobby. However for a lot of people can be a money sink. Some people over do it and spend thousands on commercial equipment. Others get in for a few hundred and it sits in the garage unused. So I'd just caution you. But personally I like it a lot. 

 

That was kind of a lot. I hope that helps.

[Milo]

9 hours ago, walkerleeds said:

Anyone done this recently? 

 

Want to try it but nobody has given their efforts particularly good reviews judging from this thread...

I brew every month or so.

 

There are 3 of us that put money into a pot for the equipment (£60 each to start with). We already had a few bits but bought a kettle/fermenter and extra barrels.

 

We started with the kit beers, (just add water) but this is a bit limiting, tbh and we soon moved on to do our own full mash brews. 

 

Good learning experience, and quite technical, but loads of support from home brew shops and forums. Full mash is definitely the way to go. We have now invested in Grainfather, with another one on the way. Expensive, but takes out the stress and minimises the errors and fluctuations you can sometimes get with the boils. Bearing in mind we are usually a bit pissed by the end of a brew day, minimising mistakes was a bit of a priority for us.

 

We brew a batch of beer at, say, my house. Then let it ferment and barrel it and transport it to one of the other houses. The next brew day will then be held at that house - we drink the brew we made previously whilst brewing a new batch...and so on. From experience, I highly recommend that you write everything down as you go along...as the brew days can get quite messy  

 

The beer is spectacular and the whole experience came about because our local serves shit, expensive beer...we thought we could do better! The beer we make is spectacular and works out between 60p and £1 per pint. Obviously there is the huge expense of the Grainfathers on top of that, but you can still brew well without them.

 

If we are in a pub and have a beer that we like, or someone finds one in the supermarket that is good - we will look at the profile and try and clone it.

 

We have just had an order for 9 barrels for a local festival in July and I'm trying to convince the other two to invest in setting up a craft bar! 

 

In between our organised brew days, we also do our own individual brews - but it really is much more fun when its done as collective - best hobby I've ever had, by far.

 

Check out Brewdog's Craft Beer for the People book...

[walkerleeds]

17 hours ago, Detroit Blues said:

From my experience, if you buy decent equipment, clean very thoroughly, and follow the directions you'll make pretty good beer 90% of the time. The beer you'll make at first will be at least better than the cheap macro brewed stuff. Once you get good at it, you can get it as good as "craft beer." 

 

The initial investment for extract brewing, kettle, burner, glass carboy, etc was like $200 (in the US). Some people buy the cheap brewing kits but i'd advise against it. After that it costs me like $30-50 of ingredients to make a 5 gallon batch.

 

It can feel daunting when you get into it at first. If you have friends that homebrew id start off by just helping them on a brew day. If not, watch a lot of videos on YouTube so you understand the basics and ask questions at your local Homebrew supply shop. The kit with the ingredients will provide the step by step directions.

 

When it comes to the brew day make sure you have help. For me it's usually my brother or a couple friends. We sit out on my patio, drink some beer and brew on a Saturday/Sunday afternoon. It will take like 4-6 hours from when you startup until you're done cleaning up. 

 

After you go through 4-5 batches you'll really start to get the hang of it. Then you can start experimenting with different ingredients, maybe try kegging instead of bottling, etc. 

 

If you like beer, it can be a fun hobby. However for a lot of people can be a money sink. Some people over do it and spend thousands on commercial equipment. Others get in for a few hundred and it sits in the garage unused. So I'd just caution you. But personally I like it a lot. 

 

That was kind of a lot. I hope that helps.

 

11 hours ago, Milo said:

I brew every month or so.

 

There are 3 of us that put money into a pot for the equipment (£60 each to start with). We already had a few bits but bought a kettle/fermenter and extra barrels.

 

We started with the kit beers, (just add water) but this is a bit limiting, tbh and we soon moved on to do our own full mash brews. 

 

Good learning experience, and quite technical, but loads of support from home brew shops and forums. Full mash is definitely the way to go. We have now invested in Grainfather, with another one on the way. Expensive, but takes out the stress and minimises the errors and fluctuations you can sometimes get with the boils. Bearing in mind we are usually a bit pissed by the end of a brew day, minimising mistakes was a bit of a priority for us.

 

We brew a batch of beer at, say, my house. Then let it ferment and barrel it and transport it to one of the other houses. The next brew day will then be held at that house - we drink the brew we made previously whilst brewing a new batch...and so on. From experience, I highly recommend that you write everything down as you go along...as the brew days can get quite messy  

 

The beer is spectacular and the whole experience came about because our local serves shit, expensive beer...we thought we could do better! The beer we make is spectacular and works out between 60p and £1 per pint. Obviously there is the huge expense of the Grainfathers on top of that, but you can still brew well without them.

 

If we are in a pub and have a beer that we like, or someone finds one in the supermarket that is good - we will look at the profile and try and clone it.

 

We have just had an order for 9 barrels for a local festival in July and I'm trying to convince the other two to invest in setting up a craft bar! 

 

In between our organised brew days, we also do our own individual brews - but it really is much more fun when its done as collective - best hobby I've ever had, by far.

 

Check out Brewdog's Craft Beer for the People book...

 

Appreciate the advice and will be taking it on board.

 

Think I will try and spend as little as possible early on, just to try and get the hang of it more than anything. If that goes well / I enjoy it / can get a couple of mates on the bandwagon, I will invest a little more. 

 

Cheers again, I will let you both know how it goes, in case you're interested! 

[Detroit Blues]

16 hours ago, walkerleeds said:

 

 

Appreciate the advice and will be taking it on board.

 

Think I will try and spend as little as possible early on, just to try and get the hang of it more than anything. If that goes well / I enjoy it / can get a couple of mates on the bandwagon, I will invest a little more. 

 

Cheers again, I will let you both know how it goes, in case you're interested! 

 

Here's the first thing I read about brewing:  http://howtobrew.com/book/introduction

John Palmer's book is on the website, free to read. He'll go over the basics and take you through a brew day. 

 

Required Equipment (in my opinion)- 

Brew kettle (stainless steel). If you're going to do a 5 gallon batch, you need a 6 gallon or more kettle. 

Carboy (glass preferred). This is where you store the beer as it ferments. Glass is better than plastic because plastic can get micro-cuts on the inside where bacteria can hide. Glass is more expensive though. 

Carboy brush - Long L-shaped brush used to clean out the carboy

You'll need a long stirring spoon, you might already own of them. 

PBW - brewing detergent to clean with

Starsan - brewing sanitizer

Funnel - don't use the same one you use to change your oil.

Auto siphon + hose - Used to transfer beer from kettle into carboy, and you could use it to bottle (though it's more difficult).

Bottles. You can re-claim bottles of beer you buy at the store. Rinse them out as soon as you drink them, then before bottling, let them soak, scub the labels off, clean the hell out of the inside of the bottle with the PBW + sanatizer. 12 oz's work, but 5 gallons fills a lot of 12oz bottles. I have a bunch of the 750ml bottles for homebrewing. You're going to have to pour your beer into a glass one way or another because of the yeast anyway, so it won't matter.

Bottle brush - tiny version of the carboy brush for bottles.

Air Lock - plug that goes into the carboy that let's foam out, but keeps air from getting in. Once your beer starts rapidly fermenting, it stops your beer from becoming a bomb from all the expanding gasses. After that it's done fermenting, any carboy plug will do to stop it up. Just measure the opening of the carboy and get the size that fits.

Hydrometer - Technically optional, but really recommended. It tests the gravity of the beer after you brew and after you ferment. It's the only way, truly, to know when the beer is done. It also will tell you the final ABV of your beer.

 

Optional 

Turkey burner (the kind that uses the propane gas) so that I could do it outside. Some people use their range in the kitchen, but it will take a lot longer to heat the water and may make a mess inside your home vs outside. But both ways are fine.

Bottling bucket - plastic bucket to put fermented beer in, and then it has a nozzle/tap to pour into the bottles

Beer thief - Little device that makes taking samples out of the carboy easier (than the auto-siphon).

Carboy/bottle sprayer - an attachment to any sink/faucet to spray water at a high pressure upwards. You push the carboy/bottle onto it and it sprays the hell out of the inside to clean it out after you use the brush.

Hop bags - used so you can pull out the hops after 

 

A lot of brewing equipment is perfectly fine to buy second hand. A lot of hobby brewers end up getting out, or upgrading their equipment so they're willing to sell their old stuff for very cheap. So I would look around on your local classifieds (craigslist here, as long as you do it saftely), maybe there is a local homebrewers group/guild/association in your area, etc. I did buy most of my stuff on amazon, however.

 

This should be enough to do your first extract brew. Buy a kit from your homebrew store or online for your first brew. Something easy like an Ale with good directions. The homebrew store might offer to put something together for you, that's fine as long as there's good directions. The kit usually contains:

Liquid Malt extract (and maybe some grains to steep)

Hops

Yeast - either dry or liquid

Bottle caps

Priming sugar - to put in the bottles to carbonate them

 

This is not the same as one of the kits that includes the equipment (like "mr.beer"). That's something that usually makes 1 gallon of beer that's little better than piss. A lot of people have their first brewing experience with these kits and never go back.

 

I am by no means an expert (i've maybe brewed 10 batches), but let me know if you have any questions.

 

 

 

[Milo]

Just finished first commercial brew...3 x 50 litres (300 pints) of spectacular-ness in a bottle!

 

Bit nervous, as its a lot of beer to waste if it's crap 

 

 

 

 

[Kopic]

My father tried to brew beer in our airing cupboard. We ended up with a brown sludge on our floor. Wasn't a particularly nice bear, however, the sludge was like a next level Haribo. 

[Buce]

30 minutes ago, Kopic said:

My father tried to brew beer in our airing cupboard. We ended up with a brown sludge on our floor. Wasn't a particularly nice bear, however, the sludge was like a next level Haribo. 

 

[Kopic]

3 minutes ago, Buce said:

Yes, but not quite as friendly. We  are talking full scale salmonella-level vomit. I genuinely wouldve rather be eaten by that cute bear than the stomach pain I experienced. And yes, I have had salmonella.

[DANGEROUS TIGER]

On ‎28‎/‎05‎/‎2018 at 19:38, Buce said:

 

[DANGEROUS TIGER]

I have just finished drinking my Xmas brew. Pretty good this year. Added extra green hops.