Recent content by fozzie14

+1 on beerlabelizer.com. If you pay the author $5.00, you are given access to additional label templates that you can add your own images to. I've created custom labels for my sister's trivial pursuit group, one special label with a friend's photo on it, fishing photos, and more. Very easy to...

If you are heating your wort on an electric or gas stove, you may not get a rolling boil with a batch greater than 4 or 5 gallons. I brew on a gas stove, and if I have more than 3 gallons going, it barely reaches a rolling boil. I'm happy with the results I've been getting from boiling 3...

I'm moving from stovetop to outdoor propane burner, and have been looking at simple propane burners. The SP10 gets a lot of good reviews, but it sits low to the ground, and I would think a tall cooker would be more my preference. Lowe's also carries the Bayou Classic Outdoor Fish Fryer /...

I too thought that milk was a crazy idea, but I tried it and it worked fine. I used 2% milk. I poured some milk in a bowl, dipped my finger in, wiped the milk all over the back of the label, then smoothed it onto the bottle. The label looked blotchy for a day or so, but the blotchiness went...

A friend and I were drinking a commercial belgian white while bottling a batch of weizenbier, and after closing the lid on the fermenter, we got to thinking about how to add a hint of orange to our brew. It was too late to do it during the boil, and I'm not into secondary fermentation. After...

After reading several posts, I decided to make a "marinade" of McCormick Pure Orange Extract and ground coriander seed, let it marinate for a week, then add a little of the liquid to the racked batch of Brewer's Best Weizenbier before bottling. After one week of bottle conditioning, we tried...

How about Triple Sec to add orange flavor? I'm sure there is sugar in it, so probably wouldn't add when bottling, since it could increase carbonation more than you'd want. Could you add it at the end of the boil?

Congrats on your first batch! Your bucket appears to be at least a 6.5 gallon bucket, leaving enough space for the foaming during fermentation, so unless you have a leak in the spigot, I would think that you're fine using that bucket for fermenting. I've thought about fermenting in my bottling...

Thanks for the suggestion. Should I strain the vodka/coriander so that only the liquid goes into the bottling bucket, or just dump it all in and wait until the solids settle in the bottom of the bucket?

I realize now that McCormick Valencia Orange Peel is dried orange peel, so I wouldn't want to put it in the brew just before bottling. McCormick also makes Orange Extract that is mostly alcohol and contains orange oil. This sounds like something I could add to the bottling bucket to get the...

One recipe on this site calls for soaking orange zest in vodka then adding it to the bottling bucket on bottling day. Another mentions using McCormick's Valencia orange peel (1.5 oz McCormick bottle) at the end of the boil, but I would think you could add this to the bottling bucket instead of...

My friend and I just brewed a batch of Brewer's Best Weizenbier. It's been in primary fermentation for 14 hours, and it's chugging away. Got to thinking about Blue Moon, and thought it would be nice to add the hint of orange, so I looked at recipes, which call for the addition orange...

Just bought a Ferrari vinator sulfiter bottle rinser for my bottle sanitizing. Works great! After we finished bottling, I took it apart to rinse it and allow it to dry out, and noticed that the spring is now a little bent. It worked fine, but I'm concerned about taking it apart each time. Is...

Bottled a 5 gallon batch of True Brew Nut Brown Ale today. I boiled 1.5 cups of water, stirred in the 5 oz. of priming sugar, and boiled for 5 minutes. Turned off heat and let it sit for about 20-30 minutes with the pot lid on. After carefully siphoning a few inches of brew into the bottling...

My first ever batch (Mr. Beer Porter) came out looking OK, decent carbonation, but tastes kinda blah. It's drinkable, but lacks flavor. I know, it's Mr. Beer, but if it wasn't for Mr. Beer, I wouldn't have taken the leap into brewing (now brewing 5 gallons in "real" equipment). I've tried...