Bottling day! Am I the only one who enjoys it ?

I don't understand how it takes people so long to clean and sanitize bottles. I clean homebrew bottles as I go (aka rinse thoroughly) and dry on bottle tree. Now I have over 200 bottles cleaned and upside down in cases. On bottling day I quickly dunk them in a starsan bucket and hang on the tree, and start filling when I've hit 48 or so. It takes almost no time. I definitely think having a clear process helps, and I find it rewarding.

Dynachrome said:

Bottling is fine, but I don't like the hand-washing of the bottles.

I have a dishwasher. I give a lot of beer away. People bring me more bottles and I have to remove the labels.

If you have the labels off already, rinse them well after you pour your beer, next use - can you just sanitize in the dishwasher?

I can't imagine much water actually gets in through the neck of the bottle.

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Thats what I used to do. I would rinse them when I used them after emptied, and then once they were label free, I just went ahead and filled them after a quick dunk in a bucket of starsan.

As long as nothing is dried in them, and you get all the compacted yeast out of the bottom of them, rinsing them is plenty, IMO.

Rooster81 said:

I think you're the only two.

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Hahhahah you beat me to it. No bottling here unless you count me filling growlers from my tap.

Add me to the I don't mind bottling camp.

There are many advantages. I love variety and currently have about 16 different brews in bottles in varying amounts. I always have at least six-eight different brews in the fridge at all time, so I can have different brews depending on my mood. I can take several different brews with me when I go to a party for my friends to try.

I usually bottle on brew days. While the strike water is heating up I siphon into the bottling bucket. While my grains are mashing I bottle. Easily done before the mash is finished.

I just finished bottling my first batch. It was better than expected (I wasn't expecting anything negative). I fired up the stereo, rigged up a "bottling station" and off I went. I think I'm going to keg my second batch and let it sit while I piece together my kegerator project.

On a side note, that bottle wand mod in Revvy's sticky is priceless. Soooo much easier bottling that way. Thanks Revvy!