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Sorry, I don't know. I would imagine that the flowers are similar to hop cones in their structure, so maybe the flowers do work. There's a Scottish brewery that makes ales in the tradition of ancient methods (sometimes with no hops) and they have a delicious elderberry black ale.

Buds from elderberry bushes can be used for bittering. They have a nice and unique aroma. Use the big spear-shaped buds and crush them a little first before putting them into the boil.

I've floated it in the secondary before. Wait until everything on the surface of the beer settles down before you put it in. A small amount of foam will form around the hydrometer, so it can be tough when you need to check the single-digits.

Unfortunately they don't serve Guinness as real ale, even in Ireland. I lived there for a year, and I had some great times with pints of Guinness or Beamish or Murphy's in hand. The best Guinness available is Foreign Stout, I don't know if it's available in North America but they have it in...

You won't be disappointed with the rauchbier. Make sure you open it with a barbecued steak on the table and you'll grin for a week.

I just received a free 25L glass carboy from a friend that I want to use as a secondary. My beer, after evaporation during the boil and racking from primary to secondary, ends up with about 17L in the secondary. Would this be too much headspace in the new 25L secondary? Thanks.

Has anyone had experience with filtering cider? I'm going to give away a bunch of bottles of my still cider that's fermenting right now, and most people aren't as understanding when it comes to cloudy drinks as we here are. What I'd like to know is....... -- any change in shelf life -- change...

My Dad still makes dump-and-stir beer, straight from the "instructions" on the side of the can of LME. It tastes awful, but his taste in beer can be described as prohibitionesque.

It's easy to make a really good porter or stout with extract and steeping grains. Steep some chocolate malt or roasted barley, boil pale extract, toss in hops at the start, and you're good to go.

Geeze good thing I found out before it's too late. Thanks.

I'm planning to add cinnamon to my bottling bucket just for flavour, not priming. Does anyone know if cinnamon is fermentable? This could lead to a fizzy mess or grenades if the cinnamon primes along with the regular dextrose.

What kind of yeast are you using?

A lot of homebrew shops sell Turbo Yeast, which will ferment corn sugar to 17/18/19% in 10 days at room temperature. I've always seen them advertised as fermenting clean and tasty, but I can't say from experience whether this is true or not.

These are my favourite Canadian beers. Pale Ale - Mill Street Tankhouse Stout - St. Ambroise Oatmeal Stout Barleywine - Granite Gin Lane Ale Lager -King Dark Lager Wheat - Denison's Weissbier For a session - Niagara Gritstone Ale OR Black Oak Nut Brown For non-craft beer lovers - King...

Don't use a sanitizer on your caps if they have those special o-rings that inhibit oxygen from getting in. The sanitizer damages the rings. If you buy them in a sealed bag then they will be clean enough to use.

When you sanitize with bleach it's best to mix an equal amount of bleach and vinegar into the water you're sanitizing with. Bleach on its own won't kill certain bacteria unless the water has some acidity to it (hence the vinegar.) It's important not to mix the vinegar and bleach directly, or...

Yeah that looks like a smart way to do it. I want to be careful not to end up with an overly spiced beer.

Hefeweizens, including any variance in spelling, are pretty bad to me. If I want a glass of banana I'll whip up a smoothie.

When using spices, does it make a difference at what point they go into the boil? Or has anyone added them to the primary/secondary fermentor? I have a slightly strong porter with cinnamon and nutmeg planned.