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Hey All- So, it has been almost two months since I brewed a Rochefort 8 clone (Belgian strong dark ale). I threw a bottle in the fridge for a few hours and then cracked it open. Upon tasting, it was very good, flavor wise. Could make out some strong estery and banana scents. However, it...

Hi All- Have an AG Belgain Strong Dark ale I want to bottle Sunday. I am pitching rehydrated dry yeast (Safale US-05) in about 1 hr. Is 48 hours from repitch to bottle too short of a time? It seems like everything I have read says "3 days before bottling". The FG was very low when I...

I just racked my Rochefort 8 clone to a secondary this weekend. It had been in the primary for 2 weeks. The OG was 1.072, which is a little inaccurate since I forgot to measure the OG before I pitched a 2L starter of the Wyeast 3787 that had been growing for two days (OG of starter was 1.080...

Alright, my first time using my homemade CFC went a bit haywire. I was using hop pellets and leafs in the full wort boil. I learned a bunch of things to improve upon for next time. For one, the standard tubing I am sure everybody uses for siphoning and transferring doesn't hold shape at...

Did my first, solo all-grain brew on Saturday with my new, homemade wort chiller. Everything was working great, the beer was coming out cool, couldn't have been more happy. Then, all of a sudden, no flow. I was using both pellet and leaf hops, and it turns out a leaf hop got caught in the...

Question- I know I have read this but I need to know before I go to the LHBS today and I don't have the book with me. How many pounds of grain (and consequently, water) will fit into a 5 gallon Igloo cooler (orange ones) for a single-step mash infusion? I want to say 10lbs, but not sure...

Just bought and almost fully assembled a homemade counterflow chiller. Looks pretty good, 20ft of 3/8" copper, compression fittings were sottered on each end where the three-way tee meets the copper. My question is about sanitizing one of these bad boys. It sounds like the best/easiest way is...

Going to be embarking down my first belgian recipe. Found a recipe for the Rochefort 8 clone, but I have a few questions for you all-knowers. I am planning on making a 500mL yeast starter tomorrow evening from a Wyeast or White Labs Abbey strain. I have made a starter before, but it was from...

So, I am new to the yeast starter techniques. All my past brews have been with White Lab vials or Wyeast Starter Packs. I have had success with these, but I see soo much about yeast starters and having the right cell count at pitching that I am deciding to do this with my amber ale on...

Starting down the AG path and am curious on some things regarding the wort chiller. I am unsure if I should go the route of an immersion style or a counter flow. My question with the immersion style, I see a lot of directions say to add the immersion chiller to the last 20 minutes of the wort...

Hi All- I am bottling a stout tonight that I have had sitting in the primary then secondary for about 4 weeks now. The OG was 1.050 and the FG was 1.015. I am wondering if to aid in natural carbonation, should I spike the beer prior to bottling with some dry Nottingham yeast? Is there enough...

Hey All- So, I have been pondering my next brew and am curious of something. Up till now, I have been using bottled water from the grocery store. I use either filtered or spring water, generally spring, bottled water. Normally, I will add gypsum to the wort boil, with the additon of chalk or...

So, I attempted my first minimash using a 5 gal. Igloo cooler rig (thanks to all who posted the parts and pics of a setup). I was making a Chocolate oatmeal stout (kinda an original recipe) using 2lbs of american 2-row pale ale malt, 1lb crystal malt (60L), 1lb of caramunich malt and then some...

So, I have a Dogfish clone that was in the primary for a week and then the secondary since Monday. I added some reserved hops to it Tuesday, but my question is should I add all of the hops I reserved for dry hopping at one time or spread it out over the course of 3-5 days? My other question...

So, here is my dilema. There is a stout contest in my area in 3 weeks, starting this weekend. I really would like to make a chocolate-vanilla stout I have drawn up (partial grain/DME). I know stouts will get better with age, but time is not of the essence for the contest and I have heard of...

As I mentioned in another section, I finished up a Dogfish IPA clone using White Labs California V Ale yeast. I would like to salvage some of the yeast for another IPA I will be making in a few months. My question is can I save some of the trub from the primary fermenter? I have never...

Hey all- Just finished up brewing a Dogfish Head 90 minute IPA clone. I only wanted to do a half batch (2.5 gals) for various reasons. I used DME and the OG was lower than expected. The recipe I dug up gave an OG of 1.088 and mine was 1.060. I think I added a little too much water during...

What's better for priming/conditioning of bottled beer, corn sugar or powdered malt extract? I imagine the corn sugar gives a slightly sweeter taste, does the malt extract give a more "beer" taste? Would the ratios be the same (i.e. would 125g of malt extract be equivalent to 125g of corn...

So, I started my first batch (5 gal) of beer (Badger Amber Ale) on Saturday. Everything seemed to go perfect, and easier than expected. I didn't notice active fermentation (fermentation lock bubbling) until Sunday evening (about 26 hours after pitching the yeast), and when it started, it was...

Just want to say hi to everybody and that I am fairly new to brewing, but am anxious to learn. Have been doing a lot of reading and just got started my first batch of beer (amber ale from a kit). Looking forward to bottling and drinking in a few weeks.