Homebrewer from New Zealand

Hey guys and girls.

I'm from New Zealand in the South Pacific, I don't know if anyone else here is from my part of the world but it would be great if you could say 'hi'

I'm more of a cider drinker than a beer drinker. Been doing some cheap cider brews in a bottle for the last couple of months but a few weeks ago I upgraded to a proper fermenter. My first brew from the fermenter was a Brigalow lager kit (Australian I think?) and then I realised I overprimed all my bottles, so I've probably lost that brew haha. Hopefully if they don't explode I can refridgerate them and then re-cap them.

My second brew is fermenting as I type, a Black Rock Cider kit. On a friends advice I doubled the sugar so it should hopefully turn out ok and with about 6 - 7 %.

Cheers,

Glen

welcome to the party, Glen. I think you might be the only representative from New Zealand. We've got a few Aussies and a guy in Japan, but most of the people here (at least the chatty ones) are from the US and the UK.

-walker

Gidday Mite, Welcome to the club, I'm in Oz, and brew a bit of cider , how do you find the black rock? I've done a couple and they're not too bad eh?
Cheers Alx

Hey guys,

Black Rock is what's in the fermenter at the moment, I hear good things about it so I'm looking forward to trying it. Never had it before though. Next up on the list of stuff to make is hard lemonade, sounds interesting, or maybe a lager, I'm not too sure yet, decisions decisions hehe.

Well, i am in japan and Black rock is the best kit available in the local department store. With the weather heating up it looks like it may be time to start brewing again. Since most houses in Japan don't have central heating it is pretty much a non-winter hobby for me. I haven't gone down the heater route purely due to fears of astronomical electricity bills.

Howdy. I'm on my way to NZ if that's any use. If you need someone to help drink your beer, seeya in September
Ken

Greetings and welcome aboard! I guess we have two folks in Japan now (なまず being the other) and a few in Oz land.

Also, everybody either lives in or around Raleigh, North Carolina, or eventually visits!

How has the cider worked out? I just started one today using a kilo of honey rather than sugar.

Something wierd happened at the bottling process. Only about 1/3 of them are carbonated, the other 2/3's are still and not sweet. The bottles I used weren't the greatest and I had some trouble capping them so I'm putting that down to having a bad seal on most of them.

But for the kit itself - it's definately drinkable but I think with the next one I'd use a secondary and/or let it age for a while. With this one it was in the fermenter for a bit over a week, into the bottles for two and then I started drinking it. I've gone through half it so far (well I should say 'my girlfriend has') and I think it would improve a lot with a month or two of aging.

I'm gonna give it another try later with maybe some spices or something to see how it comes about.

Good luck for yours :rockin:

Thanks for the reply. You have answered what I have been thinking about today, it seems like a secondary is a good idea. It looks like it will be drinkable once the height of summer has hit us.Perfect.

Glad to help