Long time Drinker - First Time Maker

Hi all,

Normally I skip these parts of the forums and usually just go for the jugular and just ask what I want to know. But in this case it’s not quite that simple. About 6 years ago (maybe more now) when Micro opened up in town they started pushing home brew products along with there own stuff. Well I got the book and became rather discouraged right away because I didn’t feel like I had the talent to do such a thing and it seemed like the process was so expensive because I hadn’t tried the internet much at that point.

Well, with the rise of Google and Samuel Adam’s things have finally changed and I think that now is the time to get involved. Personally, I love beer, spirits or wine doesn’t do much for me and I never really enjoyed those much at all but give me a beer and I’m perfectly happy. I’m the type that even likes the Malt liquors but there is one beer I haven’t been able to stomach and that is Samuel Adam’s. I respect the company but I just don’t like their beer but they have started something made me very grateful.

What pushed me over the cliff to get involved is that Samuel Adam’s started a contest called the Long Shot. I don’t know if it was something that I was going to enter but it seemed that if it gave me the knowledge to brew, I was in to it. Well, the next day I did the research and I found that they had an instructional video that I was so excited to see.

Personally, I loved it because for an outsider looking it the video was gold because it was like the “Food Network” doing beer and I actually got to see the process and I finally understood the ingredients, fermentation and carbonation, which until that point had alluded my comprehension.

So, I plan to get a kit later this week that is discounted for the Samuel Adams people on a product website and I’m going through the agony of buying bottled beer to get empties so that I can get ready for storage (oh the sacrifices I make )…

So I thought this would be a good place to talk or debate process with people that have done it…Because I don’t argue that the methods that the leader of Samuel Adams used, it just seemed like there were far more efficient ways to brew…mostly in the processing of the wort…

Greetings and welcome aboard, Slinger! If you haven't checked it out already, I highly recommend the HowToBrew site for more information about the brewing process.

Darth Konvel said:

Greetings and welcome aboard, Slinger! If you haven't checked it out already, I highly recommend the HowToBrew site for more information about the brewing process.

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No, didn't know about the HowToBrew but bookmarked that puppy

I know personally, that vid was good but I still have a lot of outstanding questions....I guess it will come to me in time, I think most of it is that I don't know because I haven't done it...

I think the biggest thing I've been apprehensive about has been the carbonation process, I'm always in fear of the flat beer but I also don't want to make a case of ticking time-bombs either...

I'll go out on a limb and say that bottle bombs are a relatively uncommon and avoidable occurance. As long as your brew has stopped fermenting when you bottle and you use the standard amount of priming sugar, you should be fine.

Darth Konvel said:

I'll go out on a limb and say that bottle bombs are a relatively uncommon and avoidable occurance. As long as your brew has stopped fermenting when you bottle and you use the standard amount of priming sugar, you should be fine.

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That’s good to know. Actually, in the context I heard it was from the video when he said to pay attention to the amount of priming sugar that your using otherwise if there is too much, it could have an adverse affect because there would be too much of a reaction…