Recent content by hopsy

i just scoop it into the bucket with a pot. pretty simple and a lot more simple than using a large grain bag.

so, its been a minute since the last post. ive been mashing in my brewpot then transferring into my primary bucket in which i built a false bottom out of a fine screen splatter guard thing and the frame from a big colander. if i had a camera id post pics. long story short, its been working...

looks pretty good. should be pretty damn bitter. it seems like a lot of carapils. did you want more body than is typical of most IPA's?

i woul d say your not going to have any problems regardless of your technique, whether its only gathering 6.25 gals of wort or gathering less, upping your grain bill and adding water, or what i would probably do is what wilserbrewer suggested, collect what appears to be the capacity of your...

update: so i read somewhere that beta-amylase doesnt get denatured until 160*. not sure if this is true or not. also found out that alpha-amylase needs to be activated in order for beta to work, thus the standard single mash temp of 152*, which is a comfortable area for both amylases's to work...

thanks! thats basically what i was thinking. i didnt want too much esters and whatnot from the belgian so i didnt want to pitch that first. the beer i bottled that i talked about in the original post had a real smooth clean taste that the others of the same batch didnt. im geussing that the...

so, i was inspired by a previous homebrew experiment where i bottled a euro-amber into the dregs of a freshly poured new belgium triple, essentially adding a bit of their belgian strain to my amber, for which i used an english ale yeast. it came out great, probably the best out of the whole...

the term "bright" is referring to a "bright beer tank" aka a conditioning tank for clarifying the beer. as for the original post thread i personally would try agitating the fermenter a little, i mean just give it a little shake or spin to try to "wake" the yeast up. you could also try to...

thanks! so i didnt do as bad as i thought. especially since i was supposed to collect like 6 gallons of runoff or something and only collected 5 or so. anyways, thanks for plugging the #s into your computer for me!

i figured it out, 67% efficiency. i think this is due to my to my low volume of sparge water and over all wort collected.

so i brewed a stout today, my first all grain brew.i have an unorthodox set up, i only have a 5 gallon brew kettle and im using my primary as my MLT, which i built a false bottom into. i am reading "designing great beers" which lists efficiencies for different grains but the math makes my eyes...

i would say just pitch it. leave the yeast out of the fridge for a half hour or so, or however long you think it will take for it to get to around 50 degrees, and pitch it. when it gets into the right zone it will start doing what it was born to do. a lot of trappist breweries pitch at pretty...

i still add the sugar, stirring gently not too far down in the carboy which doesnt disturb anything in my experience.if it does, the i let it sit for a bit to settle out again. i do very little stirring and ive always been happy with my carbonation levels. besides, usually all thats in the...

or you could say f*** the bottling bucket and bottle out of your secondary. all the bottling bucket does is add a new opportunity for contamination. if you do like was previously mentioned and dont drag the bottom of the siphon around in the yeast you shouldnt get too much s*** at all. even if...

wait, you added ice to your wort? if so this is never a good idea since ice is full of dormant bacteria waiting to breed in something like say, sugary nutritious water. you could boil it again to get the volume down and kill bugs, but of course then you will have to cool it again, but maybe add...