First brew in 12 years!

Working on my first brew in 12 years. Went with a simple DME and steeping grain recipe to get started, then after a few batches want to get into all grain.

I am doing a partial boil with 5 lbs. wheat DME and 1 lb. crystal 15 steeped up to 160, then removed, and a single addition of tettnanger hops for 60 minutes. I am 30 minutes into the boil, and only added 2 lbs. of DME to start with, and will add the other 3 lbs. with 15 minutes left. It already smells good.

Got my fermenter full of star san, and am ready to cool down the wort when the boil is over. Have 2 twenty lb. bags of ice and will do an ice bath in the tub and then top off with water that has been sitting outside in the jug in 33 degree weather for over an hour.

Using dry yeast, safale 33. The place I ordered from didn't have safale 06, so I went with the 33. Hope it turns out ok!

Will keep you posted with updates!

Congrats on getting back in the hobby!

I bet it will turn out fine.

Welcome back!

I just recently got back in after a 10+ year layoff. Welcome back!

Beersmith called for OG of 1.046, I hit it at 62 degrees, so corrected would be 1.045 according to the chart that came with my hydrometer.

I cooled down the wort in the tub with an ice bath using 40 lbs. of ice! Only cost $7.00 for the ice, and I wanted to chill it down pretty quick. In 15 minutes or so it was down to 100 degrees. Added 3 gallons of water that had been sitting outside in 33 degree weather for about an hour and a half, and when I checked the hydrometer sample it was 62 degrees. I had pulled it straight out of the fermenter, so I figure that the temp in the fermenter was pretty close to that!

Here is recipe I did, just to get my methods down again since it had been so long since I had brewed:

5 lbs. Briess Wheat DME
1 lb. crystal malt 15
1 ounce of tettnanger hops
1 pkg. Safale 33 Belgian yeast

Will check the gravity after about 7-10 days and see where it is. Beersmith says it should finish around 1.012, so I hope I can get close to that. I decided that I REALLY like using star san to sanitize stuff! Beats the heck out of bleach for ease of use!

Will update post as events occur!

Got up this morning hoping to see some signs of fermentation. Noticed a ring on the fermenter about 1/2 inch above the level of the liquid, but no activity in the airlock. Since I had read numerous threads about not using the airlock to gauge fermentation, I wasn't worried. I was curious about the ring, but left all alone and went to work.

When I came in this afternoon around 4pm, the ring had risen to about 1" above the liquid level. I bumped the fermenter a little, and noticed that under the ring seemed to be a layer of white looking foam that moved with the liquid. I couldn't resist, and loosened the airlock out of the top of the fermenter, and there certainly was a layer of foam about 1" thick! I think I am fermenting away! Don't know that I can describe the smell, as I am rather stopped up, but I did detect a slightly sweet aroma. The ambient temperature is staying around 67 degrees where the fermenter is located.

In about 10 days I will take a hydrometer reading and see where we are at. Hope it is close to being finished. I am ready to taste my first homebrew in a while, and I know I need to be patient! Hope I can hold out!

Thanks for all the great information that is available on this board. You guys are great. Hopefully after Christmas I will be able to upgrade my account a little so I can help the site.

Will keep you posted!

Welcome back! I stopped brewing for 7+ years, but I restarted in the fall of '08 and have been brewing 1-2 batches per month ever since. Hope you're addicted (to brewing) as me.

Welcome Back to a fantastic hobby! I started sept. of last year, but took a several month break. Now I'm back to brewing 1-2 batches a month!

Cheers!
-T

Took hydrometer reading after 7 days and was sitting at around 1.025. Took another after 11 days and was down to 1.014. FG is supposed to be 1.012. I will take another reading tomorrow, and the next day, and if it is still around 1.014, will bottle it up and let it start conditioning in the bottle for at least 2 weeks before I crack one open. Hydrometer sample tasted pretty good! Don't know if I can describe it, but it definitely tasted like beer!

Looking forward to doing another couple of extract recipes, then moving into all grain. Will need to pick up wort cooler and mash tun, but I think I can swing those without too much stress on the budget!!

I bottled this on 12-19, and yesterday thought I would see what it tasted like. I put one in the fridge, and after a couple of hours cracked it open. It wasn't bad! It was more carbonated than I expected since I used table sugar instead of corn sugar, but the taste wasn't bad.

I really was expecting this to not be that great for some reason, but it turned out to be beer! Not the best tasting beer I have ever had, but still beer!

I have my first all grain batch in the fermenter, and in another week or so, I will get it bottled up and see how I did there.

Thanks for all the great information available on this site.