Brooklyn Brew Shop Everyday IPA Kit Tips

Hello all,

First off thanks for all the awesome advice as a new and first time brewer this has been great. I brewed my first batch and am now waiting. I may start a second batch but to take all the awesome advice into one post. Here are my questions:

1. Since the strainer was small and before I buy a bigger one. Can BBS kit be used in a BIAB (brew in bag) style If so what or how does it change?

2. I like the idea of honey in water and then adding the bottle. What is the best level for honey and water to use? Or sugar?

3. How would one know if the bear has bacteria and the sterilization went off.

4. What is the best way to clean the bottling bottles?

5. I have seen very little bubbles in the airlock but I do seem them in the bottle although very small

Sorry for all the newbie questions but I appreciate all the great advice.

Thanks
George

georgevct said:

Hello all,

First off thanks for all the awesome advice as a new and first time brewer this has been great. I brewed my first batch and am now waiting. I may start a second batch but to take all the awesome advice into one post. Here are my questions:

1. Since the strainer was small and before I buy a bigger one. Can BBS kit be used in a BIAB (brew in bag) style If so what or how does it change?

2. I like the idea of honey in water and then adding the bottle. What is the best level for honey and water to use? Or sugar?

3. How would one know if the bear has bacteria and the sterilization went off.

4. What is the best way to clean the bottling bottles?

5. I have seen very little bubbles in the airlock but I do seem them in the bottle although very small

Sorry for all the newbie questions but I appreciate all the great advice.

Thanks
George

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1. Yes....I actually got a cheap strainer that matches the diameters of my pots, holds up to 3 pounds of grain but a bag is easy.

2. I add 2 tablespoons of honey now (about 1 oz) and get a nice carb. The kits call for 3 but unless you get a full gallon to bottle with, you will end up with a pretty high carb level, something I used to like but now moved away from

3. There is an infected thread on this board, post pics of anything you think is unusual but its probably not infected

4. There are also several posts, including Revvy's bottling tips thread on how to clean the bottles. Many ways to skin a cat...you can do it by hand, soak them all in a bucket or use a dishwasher

5. You have bubbles in the bottled beer? Sorry, I don't get you last question...hope this all helped

Calichusetts said:

1. Yes....I actually got a cheap strainer that matches the diameters of my pots, holds up to 3 pounds of grain but a bag is easy.

2. I add 2 tablespoons of honey now (about 1 oz) and get a nice carb. The kits call for 3 but unless you get a full gallon to bottle with, you will end up with a pretty high carb level, something I used to like but now moved away from

3. There is an infected thread on this board, post pics of anything you think is unusual but its probably not infected

4. There are also several posts, including Revvy's bottling tips thread on how to clean the bottles. Many ways to skin a cat...you can do it by hand, soak them all in a bucket or use a dishwasher

5. You have bubbles in the bottled beer? Sorry, I don't get you last question...hope this all helped

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Hi thanks again

1. So a bag is easier and I will do that on the next brew. Had trouble with the strainer

2. Thanks

3. Found it thanks

4. Thanks

5. Sorry for the confusion. I see bubbles in the 1 gallon glass container but very little in the airlock.

Thanks again

George

don't worry about lack of bubbles in the airlock. you probably either have a leak (i.e. the gas is escaping elsewhere) or you've already passed the point where you'll see lots of active bubbling. Bubbles in the fermenting vessel are normal.

I just opened the first bottle of my Chocolate Maple Porter that came with the kit my family got me last year. Took me a long time to get around to it because I had the idea that the 2 weeks primary ferment/2 weeks bottle conditioning was rigid and I always had things going on. Now I now that more time is actually better, and there really is a lot of flexibility.

I bought the fixin's for an Everyday IPA at our LHBS (Northern Brewer). So I may get that going on Sunday - good way to celebrate/down my sorrows following the Vikings Wild Card game tomorrow night.

Anyhow, I will use the Gift Card I was given to pick up a few items to enhance the process this next time around (like a mini auto siphon and bottle fillers). With that, I am seeking opinions on getting another gallon glass carboy to use for secondary fermentation. I am thinking about using that after the first week or so of primary, with the idea that my final product might have less sediment.

Another obvious benefit of a second carboy is that I can start rotating production. But my first thought is the secondary fermentation.

Just out of curiosity,what has everyone who used a BBS kit as a first brew made as a SECOND brew attempt and how did it come out?

MedBrewer said:

Just out of curiosity,what has everyone who used a BBS kit as a first brew made as a SECOND brew attempt and how did it come out?

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I did the Everyday IPA as first brew. I'm going to brew the Chestnut Brown this weekend.

I first did 5g beer about 25 years ago and never got anything drinkable.

This IPA is fantastic and I love the 1g batch size. I don't drink much, maybe 2 beers a week so this works perfect for me.

Steve

MedBrewer said:

Just out of curiosity,what has everyone who used a BBS kit as a first brew made as a SECOND brew attempt and how did it come out?

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I did the Everyday IPA first and it turned out great even though the ingredients were expired. For my second brew I did the Grapefruit Honey Ale and I had bottle bombs and it had some off flavors. I believe it was because I was not controlling my fermentation temperature. Now that I am, my beer is much better but I'm doing 2.5 gallon batches mostly now.

MedBrewer said:

Just out of curiosity,what has everyone who used a BBS kit as a first brew made as a SECOND brew attempt and how did it come out?

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I just did single hop IPAs for a while...I had no idea what columbus or cascade or anything really tasted like on its own so I did about 8 IPAs then a pilsner...

I don't have my notes in front of me but the columbus actually did pretty well on its own...cascade was very nice...citra was by far the most potent in terms of flavor, aroma...and centennial was also very nice. Did not enjoy a few though.

I am doing the Everyday IPA from the book, not the kit. So I bought ingredients from my lhbs. The book does not mention OG or FG. Would anyone let me know what hydrometer readings they obtained either from the boxed kit or from lbhs ingredients.

Looks like I had a hydrometer reading of 1.076 on the post-boil wort, cooled to just below 70F. But it was only about 3/4 gallon by then. I may have topped it off with a bit too much water (just above the "one gallon" lettering on the gallon glass carboy), and that hydrometer reading was 1.038.

Am I in the ball park here?

My takeway from this thread is they have brew kits at Williams Sonoma??? I had no idea. I now have a reason to go to the mall...

I'm just beginning to crack a few from this kit. My $0.02:

1) Advice to reduce the priming honey is spot-on. 3 tbsps of honey will give you champagne, not beer. 2 would seem to be about right.

2) Be patient and let this stuff bottle condition for at least 3 weeks at 70F. Even though it might be barely carbed at 1 week, it is very bitter and astringent. It mellows out nicely at three weeks. I am going to hang on to the others and crack them one per week to see how they develop.

PsyDanny said:

I am doing the Everyday IPA from the book, not the kit. So I bought ingredients from my lhbs. The book does not mention OG or FG. Would anyone let me know what hydrometer readings they obtained either from the boxed kit or from lbhs ingredients.

Looks like I had a hydrometer reading of 1.076 on the post-boil wort, cooled to just below 70F. But it was only about 3/4 gallon by then. I may have topped it off with a bit too much water (just above the "one gallon" lettering on the gallon glass carboy), and that hydrometer reading was 1.038.

Am I in the ball park here?

Click to expand...

I'm in bed now, so I can't put this into Beersmith, but if you download the trial and enter the recipe it will tell you what your OG and FG should be.

Hiya all again, I decided to go with the Smoked Wheat kit as my second brew. The Everyday IPA was very good for a first attempt IMO. Any one made the smoked wheat kit? I like smoked beers a lot... for that matter I love smoked foods and all the likes! The kit was ordered 2 days ago and should be here in miami on friday this week. BBS has great customer service, every time i send them an email they always respond quickly.
Living down in Miami,FL I have not had much luch finding a local homebrew store, seems nearest one is in lakeland ,FL (about 2 hour drive).
I want to start making SMASH beers also, any one make any ever?
Thanks for any comments and advice ahead- Ben

I just started drinking my first batch of Everyday IPA and am generally happy with it. However, I would like a little more "hop to it".

Now I am about 2.5 weeks into primary fermentation on my second batch. I think I will check an initial FG tonight and am considering racking to a secondary for dry hopping.

Any ideas - particularly what style of hop and how much (likely using pellets)?

PsyDanny said:

I just started drinking my first batch of Everyday IPA and am generally happy with it. However, I would like a little more "hop to it".

Now I am about 2.5 weeks into primary fermentation on my second batch. I think I will check an initial FG tonight and am considering racking to a secondary for dry hopping.

Any ideas - particularly what style of hop and how much (likely using pellets)?

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I did several BBS kits before branching out on my own, but I do recall a similar "complaint" as I am a hop head. What kit is it? Still the Everyday? Its been years but I think that kit was columbus and cascade. I would go with cascade for a dry hop to keep it simple. So many hops compliment cascade that you can really go nuts with it (citra, centennial, chinook, simcoe, etc)

Again, as a hop head, I usually dry hop around 1.25 oz per batch. An ounce should give you more than enough. In the future, if you are still sticking to the BBS kits. Find out what there late hop additions are (20 minutes or less) and toss in .25 ounces at flameout. Let it steep for a while and then continue like normal. You should get a really pronounced flavor/aroma from this, and along with dry hopping it should be rather aggressive

Any one ever use secondary fermentation with these one gallon kits? I racked my smoked wheat yesterday to a secondary fermenter to try that out. Guess I'll let it sit another week or 2?

First Batch - IPA I used a small strainer, over boiled, under mashed (too dry), I over-carbed with 3 tbs of table sugar and immediately stored it in the cold garage, dry airlocked with loose connection and even managed to bottle some in a few screw top bottles. Basically I screwed up big time and the beer was terrible, even after 8 weeks, so I dumped it.

Second Batch - Bruxelles Blonde. I found this forum and took some advice, used a bigger strainer and controlled my mash temp a little better, used more water for the sparge, used 2 tbs of honey, controlled my fermentation temp much better, had a more active primary fermentation and a better airlock experience and much better bottling experience. So far this beer has been wonderful, better than a lot of commercial craft beers I have tasted. I think I'll have on after this post to be honest.

Third Batch - Smoked Wheat. Similar to the second, better quality mash and used 22oz bottles to make that process easier. This one is bottle conditioning for at least 2.5 more weeks.

Fourth/Fifth Batch - Smoked Wheat (I have 6 recipe kits for this one as they went on sale for $10 each), Enter the 2 gallon Mash Tun with a bigger brew pot and a second fermentor. This setup is awesome as I can brew two batches at once and separate into 2 fermenters to play around with a little bit. I got my first real active Krausen this time, that $hit was spurting out like a foaming animal and sparging was way easier, mashing out was a little tricky but I got the hang of it, just almost over flowed my mash tun. I am really excited for these batches.

I think with these kits, they are great, just the strainer method isn't really great unless you have a very large strainer that can produce a decent grain bed.

MedBrewer said:

Any one ever use secondary fermentation with these one gallon kits? I racked my smoked wheat yesterday to a secondary fermenter to try that out. Guess I'll let it sit another week or 2?

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I do when I dry hop or add spices/oak. I usually only let it sit for a week due to the larger amount of headspace and possibility of oxidation

For the first bbs kit I used everyday IPA and used a strainer that was just barely large enough. For second brew last week I went to bed bath and beyond and picked up a 3 piece strainer stainless steel,the largest of the 3 strainer in kit holds the mash with room to spare. It was $14 . Made the process much easier for me.

I'll leave the smoked wheat in the secondary for a week then,it looks as if fermentation is very close to complete. Hardly any bubbles being produced in the jug.I racked to 2nd b/c I read that it helps the flavors of the beer...?

Hello all! Did my first brew today with this kit. Everything seemed to go kind of smooth, though I did end up like a quart short on wort which was odd as I expected to be way over, but I just added water as per the instructions.

The question I have is that it has been about 4 hours and I am starting to worry that my yeast died

Here's a pic, am I in trouble?

(specifically the yeasty looking ring at the bottom)

And I should add, absolutely nothing is going on in terms of movement in the carboy

What were your pitching temps? It will probably take quite a bit before you see activity in the airlock. Closer to a day, sometimes longer.

Funny that this thread popped up. I bought these kits and the books for all of my groomsmen this year along with the Brooklyn beer book. I also purchased one for myself. I'm the only one who has used it

SLRSLY said:

What were your pitching temps? It will probably take quite a bit before you see activity in the airlock. Closer to a day, sometimes longer.

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I pitched somewhere in the high 60s. I was very paranoid about that particular step after reading that it's possible to burn the yeast to death so I erred on the side of cooler. As to the activity, I'm mostly concerned about what looks like all the yeast on the bottom, is that normal?

SLRSLY said:

Funny that this thread popped up. I bought these kits and the books for all of my groomsmen this year along with the Brooklyn beer book. I also purchased one for myself. I'm the only one who has used it

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I got motivated to try it out after finally trying some higher quality craft brews after drinking some of the really poor commercial stuff (guess) most of my life. Maybe buy them a couple of 4 packs of 90 Min IPA!

How did yours turn out? Did you do the IPA?

Your yeast isn't dead. Just give it some time. It will get interesting soon

To be honest I read the Brooklyn book before I even opened my kit. And I came across a recipe for their Apple Crisp Ale. So I went to my LHBS and grabbed the ingredients for that and ended up throwing away the grains that came with the kit. Scaling everything down (as a first time brewer with minimal equipment) was challenging. I remember dividing the yeast and hops on a paper plate. Haha.
It turned out great! I have brewed about 10 batches since and I always compare them to that first one gallon batch. The one where I really didn't even understand what I was doing.
A few months later and I'm making 5 gallon batches, built a kegerator, etc. Be careful, this hobby can grab a hold of you. I LOVE it!

Jints07 said:

And I should add, absolutely nothing is going on in terms of movement in the carboy

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By tomorrow it will be fermenting like crazy, dont worry it takes a while to start. All looks A-Ok in the carboy, you did a good job

SLRSLY said:

Your yeast isn't dead. Just give it some time. It will get interesting soon

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You were dead on, I see activity now!

SLRSLY said:

To be honest I read the Brooklyn book before I even opened my kit. And I came across a recipe for their Apple Crisp Ale. So I went to my LHBS and grabbed the ingredients for that and ended up throwing away the grains that came with the kit. Scaling everything down (as a first time brewer with minimal equipment) was challenging. I remember dividing the yeast and hops on a paper plate. Haha.
It turned out great! I have brewed about 10 batches since and I always compare them to that first one gallon batch. The one where I really didn't even understand what I was doing.
A few months later and I'm making 5 gallon batches, built a kegerator, etc. Be careful, this hobby can grab a hold of you. I LOVE it!

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Wow, that sounds very cool and delicious! Congrats for getting that first batch great. I can see where this hobby is going to be very addictive, thank goodness it is affordable, haha.

MedBrewer said:

By tomorrow it will be fermenting like crazy, dont worry it takes a while to start. All looks A-Ok in the carboy, you did a good job

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Thank you for the compliment and you you were right, it is bubbling nicely in to the blow off bowl and the yeast disk at the bottom is much smaller!

Any one currently brewing bbs kits or recipes? I have Wgd light currently bottled and apple crisp ale cold crashing for a few days. Currently drinking the smoked wheat kit,it's great! Any suggestions about kits or recipes you've tried?

I've only done their recipes at this point. I've done their everyday IPA, maple chocolate porter, red ale, simcoe IPA, currently bottle conditioning the WGD light that I added lime zest to, and will be botteling the rye IPA this weekend.

The simcoe IPA is the best IPA I've ever had and everyone who tried it was amazed.

Buying their book was the best 12$ I've spent in a long time.

I agree! the BBS book has a ton a recipes. Do you follow the recipes and instructions to the letter? or do you modify your technique, equipment, and recipes? I'm still using the strainer method I learned with BBS to sparge.

I stick to it for the most part. I usually brew a two or three gallon batch, so I usually round up my grain numbers when I buy it. A buddy gave me his old mash tun, so I'll be doing my first 5 gal batch this weekend.

Only thing ive modified is adding the zest of one lime at flameout to WGD lite to make my wife a miller chill type beer. It tasted awesome warm and flat, so it's gonna be even better cold and carbed!

Now I gotta figure out what's next. Any suggestions?

I've had the everyday IPA, and the smoked wheat kits and both were great. The Wgd light is up next week for drinking and the apple crisp ale will be ready in a couple weeks also. I'm going to make the cranberry wheat around thanksgiving and the pumpkin beer around Halloween.

Just tried one of the WGD light and it was amazing...only bottled 12 days ago. Seriously amazingly clear and tasty!

I had my first WGD last night. I added lime zest at flame out to make it summer-ish. But yeah , I was impressed too! I don't like lite beer, but it was crisp and refreshing. Mine say in primary around 23 day, but, only after 13 days in bottle, it was well carbed.

I convinced a buddy of mine to brew, so on Monday we will be making the everyday IPA.

What's your next BBS adventure?

I may make the Wgd light again but with mango added to secondary for a week or two. I'm also going to make the cranberry wheat.

Mmmm. Mango.

Out of all the beers I made by them, the simcoe IPA has been the big hit. Even non IPA lovers like my mom and SWMBO loved it!

Just bottled the apple crisp ale a little while ago,gave it a taste,quite a nice smooth flavor. I do believe the American ale yeast gives a smoother,more mellow flavor. I have made 1 batch the Wgd light with American ale yeast s04 and its so smooth. Maybe the apple crisp would be better with the s04?

I'd like to remake the Wgd light less bitter. It's rang in as high as 40 ibu and as low as 35 ibu on different beer programs. I'd like it at about half the bitterness. Any recommendation as to how much hops and additions?