Brewed my first batch today

My first batch is an American Pale Ale from Brewers Best. It's been 6 hours since I put it into the fermentation bucket and I know that I have plenty of time to go before panicking! LOL
I do have a couple of observations on my procedure:

1. Temperature control, temperature control, temperature control! Had 2 boilovers. The first was after turning up the heat after my 25 minute grain steeping. The second was after adding the bittering hops. I then realized that I didn't need to use full heat during the boil!

2. Did not turn down heat for steeping till too late. Almost entire steep was at 180. Should have been between 155 and 170. Did I mention temperature control yet?

3. Because of the boilovers and because I only felt safe boiling 5.5 gallons in a 30 quart pot, I had to add 1 gallon of pre-boiled water when transferring to the fermenter. My target OG was 1.051-1.055 and my actual was 1.048 at 68 deg. I hope that is close enough.

4. During the boil, I kept scrapping the trub(?) from the sides of the pot above the liquid level. Don't know if I should have been doing that or not.

5. I had planned on using an immersion chiller, but FedEx missed Friday's scheduled delivery so I used an ice and water bath for cooling down the wort. Took approximately 45-60 minutes. Man, I can't wait for the next batch so I can use a chiller!

These are the primary areas for improvement. I felt that my sanitation was good. Kept everything in the sanitizing bucket till needed and remembered to spray down the lids before using them. All in all I kept pretty calm (yeah, right) and even enjoyed the session despite not drinking any beer while brewing (doh!)

Anyone recommend a less hoppy extract kit for the next batch? SWMBO deserves this for being a trooper (I kept going between the kitchen and garage while she was desperately trying to clean the house. oops.) and she doesn't like bitter beers.

Wow, you sound pretty freakin' hardcore already...my first batch had no grain steeping, no hops additions (pre-hopped kit) and no boil (just used hot water).

It was a Coopers Lager kit, I added too much dextrose and then when it didn't start fermenting in about an hour I was "what's up with this?" so I starting stirring it around and poking unsanitized things in the carboy like that would encourage the yeasties.

In the end it tasted like flat, old apple cider (I figure esters, too much sugar and some wild yeast) even when the carbonation kicked in.

Anyways, sounds like you're rocking it already.

Welcome to the hobby. It sounds like you did pretty well.
Scraping the crap off the sides wont hurt anything.
Just keep brewing as often as possible and you'll get your own system dialed in, constantly making small improvements. Cheers.

Thanks guys! Checked this morning and still no bubbles in the air lock, but I'm not panicking yet. I did re-hydrate my yeast and they looked active before I added to the wort. I'll get another chance to check after I get home from work.

You're doing just fine. Some notes:

(1) Boiling water will not exceed a temperature of 212F by definition; any hotter, and it's steam. So if you're boiling, then a "too hot" burner won't affect the temperature of your wort. What it WILL do is risk caramelizing extract, waste electricity and - as you learned - cause boil overs.

You can add your extract later in the boil (at 10 minutes) in order to avoid caramelization and an "extract tang" flavor. Definitely moderate your temperature in the future to avoid boil-overs, because they're a mess to clean up, but don't worry about them now. You might have lost a few hops, but that's OK.

(2) Your OG, adjusted for temperature, was about 1.49. And that's assuming you had a perfect mixture of wort and pre-boiled water, which is unlikely. Probably your OG was, in fact, right in the 1.051-.055 zone called for by your recipe. The yeast will do a good job of mixing the wort for you during primary fermentation, so don't worry about it. Congrats!

(3) Scraping traub back into the boil is perfect procedure.

(4) A 180F steep is high, but remember that the 155-170 numbers are pretty inexact. Also, the temperature of the water in the pot is pretty variable, so if your thermometer was close to the heat source, the actual grains might have gotten a lower temperature steep. Regardless, I wouldn't worry about it; it won't impact flavor much at all.

Congrats on what sounds like a very successful first brew day! Remember to keep your fermenting temperatures low, and to save your bottles.

pericles, when I checked on the fermentation bucket in the basement this morning the bucket temp was 70F. The air temp in the basement is generally around 68F and I understand why the difference, but should I lower the bucket temp by placing in water and occasionally add ice bottles?

The higher the temperature goes, however, the more the yeast will produce off-flavors.

Look up the yeast you're using on the manufacturer's website. They should tell you the temperature range that's appropriate. Most yeasts will tolerate 70F, but it's going to be on the high side for just about everything.

So in short. . . if you CAN get your fermenting temperature down to the lower end of the appropriate temperature range, that would be BETTER. But I don't think it will be strictly speaking NECESSARY.

at least you have had a boilover.....ive brewed the branden o graff (hopped cider) and a winter ale as my first two batches and neither of them have boiled over or even foamed up during the boiling stages.

If you're buying a counter-flow chiller after your first brew-sperience, you're obviously willing to spend a couple of bucks on the right gear - good for you! A craftsman is only as good as his tools.

A fun project to keep you busy between brew-day and bottling-day might be to build a fermentation chamber for your basement. There are dozens of examples of them on the forum in the DIY section, ranging from swamp coolers to automatically temperature controlled outdoor brew-houses.

Danstar Nottingham 57-70F. Ice bath starting this afternoon! Thanks pericles.

pericles said:

If you're buying a counter-flow chiller after your first brew-sperience, you're obviously willing to spend a couple of bucks on the right gear - good for you! A craftsman is only as good as his tools.

A fun project to keep you busy between brew-day and bottling-day might be to build a fermentation chamber for your basement. There are dozens of examples of them on the forum in the DIY section, ranging from swamp coolers to automatically temperature controlled outdoor brew-houses.

Click to expand...

I have been looking at those fermentation chamber DIYs. Will be looking even harder now!

Yeah, definitely a good idea to throw that in an ice bath. Be careful not to agitate the wort while you're lifting and placing it into the swamp cooler, not to agitate the wort while you're pouring ice in, and not to let any ice into the fermenter.

It sounds like you're really taking temperatures, equipment, and procedures seriously. I didn't for my first half dozen brews; they turned out fine, but it took me a while to dial the process in. Your reward for being careful will be a much subtler beer, and a much steeper learning curve.

Got home this afternoon to find a slowly bubbling airlock (Yay!) and the bucket still at 70F. Placed the bucket in a large container with very cold water and a couple of frozen water bottles. We are now at 57F. Airlock is still bubbling but still at a very slow rate.

Oh and the other good news is that the immersion chiller that was supposed to be here on Friday arrived today! Better late than never.

WooHoo!! I have what tastes like flat beer!!
A little background... shortly after my last post the airlock stopped bubbling completely. The bucket was in 64F water. Didn't panic since I have been reading a lot of threads about what to expect during fermentation. But as time passed, and still no more airlock activity I put a drop light behind the bucket and saw a jagged shadow just above the 5 gallon mark. That has to be krausen! Looked thru the airlock stem and saw lots of foam on the top. Something has been fermenting, but the fact that there was less than 12 hours of airlock activity was still sticking in the back of my mind. Especially since I had seen a thread on a recall of Danstar Nottingham yeast (yep, that was what I was using).
So today (Day 5) I got out the trusty hydrometer to see if fermentation was stuck. My OG was 1.048 @ 68F 5 days ago and now I was sitting at 1.015 @ 64F and I smelled BEER!! Another 10-15 days in the primary and I should be ready to bottle!
Listen to the pros on this site... no bubbles in the airlock does not mean that nothing is happening and use a hydrometer before you panic!

Nicely done!

CONGRATS!!!! I feel the vicarious excitement.

Congrats! I just recently made my beer and am hoping it turns out right. I had an issue with other people refusing to leave the kitchen so I could make mine, so I had to keep re-sanitizing every thing, I also sanitized a special no lint kitchen wash cloth to use to wipe things off! Keep us updated, I'm interested in how this comes out!

Thanks guys! This has to be the hardest part...waiting! I'll keep updating this thread as I reach each stage.

Bildo, according to my wife I had a problem with going in and out too much while she was cleaning the house. Boiling wort out in the garage and warming liguid extract in the kitchen sink along with re-hydrating my yeast in the kitchen. I don't know how many times she sighed and asked "Are you almost through yet?"

congrats ive been brewin for a year and learned alot from this forum. enjoy that beer

Bottled my 1st batch today! 3 more weeks to go! The hydrometer sample tasted good, a little dry, but still tasted like flat beer. Bottling was suprisingly easy. It was so easy and fast I am just hoping I got everything cleaned and sanatized well enough.

I do have 1 question though... as I got to the bottom of the fermenting bucket, the yeast cake appeared to be an inch or more thick and was higher than the intake on my auto siphon. Should I have tried to clear a spot around the bucket edges by whirlpooling?

What I did this time was to raise the siphon above the cake and tip the bucket. While this worked well enough I do wonder how much yeast cake got into the bottles from what may have been sucked up by the siphon before I noticed how deep the yeast cake was.