Hay home brew!!

After considering home brew for a month or two I stopped by the local shop to check it out. After talking it over with a friend, who was thinking about it himself, we decided to split the cost of a kit and try it out. Since he is out of town this weekend, we decided to fire things up on Tuesday. The first batch is a "West Coast Pale Ale" using 3lbs Light DME and 3lbs Amber DME along with some Cascade Hops. I'm not sure if I can wait long to enjoy the fruits of my labor. Oh well, good things come to those who wait.

I know that sanitization is critical, but what other tips can you guys offer to a newbie?

Since you are brewing on the 4th: keep sparklers, fire crackers, hot dogs and small children away from the kettle.

Big secret: There is no perfect, universal method for making ales and beer. Every step along the way has a dozen variations and they all work. Exceptions will apply to specific styles. An example, you can't make a Belgian without using a Belgian yeast.

Watch the kettle closely. Wort can go from a simmer to boiling over in seconds. If you are working on an electric stove, keep a spray bottle of water handy to kill the foam.

Most important is bad batches are rare, so relax.

I will be boiling on my turkey fryer. Little did I know that it would provide so many various uses. Good idea with the spray bottle of water to kill the foam. Don't have to worry too much about fire crakers much here is Souther California, the whole desert and dry brush thing kinda makes them illegel.

What David said...

sdgenxr said:

After considering home brew for a month or two I stopped by the local shop to check it out. After talking it over with a friend, who was thinking about it himself, we decided to split the cost of a kit and try it out. Since he is out of town this weekend, we decided to fire things up on Tuesday. The first batch is a "West Coast Pale Ale" using 3lbs Light DME and 3lbs Amber DME along with some Cascade Hops. I'm not sure if I can wait long to enjoy the fruits of my labor. Oh well, good things come to those who wait.

I know that sanitization is critical, but what other tips can you guys offer to a newbie?

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Actually, I knew very little about brewing before this week but sanitation is something I’m very familiar with. I know that allot of these kits have that B-Bright stuff but I wouldn't get too hung up on that....I don't have very much experience brewing but it would seem to me that sanitation for food or drink is the same throughout the industry. I don’t know if you want my advice, but I’ll throw it out anyway…Here are a few tips:

~Keep it simple
~Keep it Hot
~Use the Right Chemical

Ok, I’ve noticed through life that cleaning is cleaning and you have to have the right tool for the job. So if you clean electronics, use alcohol. If you’re cleaning dirt and grime, use ammonia. For grease, soap but in this application never use soap because it there is too high of a risk of leaving residue.

For sanitizing you can just use that B-Bright or just use some bleach. A cap full for about 5 gallons from what I hear. I know from personal experience if you can get a bleach/chlorine mix, that’s even better. Years ago I had to use that stuff and you never quite get that smell out of your nose.

Second, the hotter you can get the water, the better. Nothing kills bacteria better then just good old fashion hot water even without chemicals. Even in the dishwasher, if you stick the stuff in with no soap, that would work good as well because the hotter the water can be the more effective it is…Its kinda like sandblasting…If you don’t believe me, I can show you the results of a vintage Iron Skillet after an episode in the dishwasher because it blasts the seasoning off of it…

I thought the same thing, but if I remember correctly (even though used in HOT water by millions of housewives and batchelors everywhere), bleach is best used in cold or warm water.

Many other chemicals do not recommend using hot water either, i.e., iodophor and Star-San.

homebrewer_99 said:

I thought the same thing, but if I remember correctly (even though used in HOT water by millions of housewives and batchelors everywhere), bleach is best used in cold or warm water.

Many other chemicals do not recommend using hot water either, i.e., iodophor and Star-San.

Click to expand...

I'll go with that, and actually, what I was trying to say in a backwards mannor was that if you’re going to use a bleach, that's cool.....But when I say hot water I mean stuff that I can't touch so even at or above boiling point....

That's why I actually agree with the CEO from Samuel Adams and he claims that too much is made about the water that is being used. Actually, when I stopped and thought about it, I realized that he was right because boiled water is boiled water (unless there are minerals in there) and the wort is basically on a level playing field to start no matter whose kitchen it starts from.

What I’m so awkwardly trying to say is that it doesn’t matter what tap water you use because as long as its clean, boiling hot water is the way to go because just think, when the water systems go down anywhere, what do people say? “Boil your water,” because it kills bacteria and makes the water sanitary…

I'll partially agree with you, Slinger, at least on the sanitation front. You can boil the heck out of any water, and it will be sanitary - even muddy water - but that doesn't automatically make it good tasting water. If your water is dirty or tastes nasty, boiling will only make it sanitary nasty tasting water. Sorry for the tangent.

edit: Almost forgot, welcome aboard, sdgenxr!

Thanks for the support gang. Our batch is in the carboy and happily bubbling away. Things went pretty smoothly once I got the right temperature for the boil. We even made a cooler out of some scrap copper we had laying around. I could not believe how fast that thing worked to cool the wort down!! We did run into a little difficulty with the rubber stopper though, it fell into the carboy! But after a few minutes, we were able to fish it out.

How much of a difference does it make to go through a secondary tank? Or are we better off just going straight into bottling once the yeast has done its magic?

John

Welcome aboard - sounds like you're off to a great start. You'll get a bunch of secondary opinions, I'll just say that I went secondary on my third batch - it substantially improved the clarity of my beer. Importantly, I believe it starts the conditioning process so the beer is ready *sooner* after you bottle it.....

Skol!