I am a few weeks away from bottling my first batch of beer. Given the number of mistakes and difficulty I encountered in my initial brew I figured I would use the time before bottling to see what I could learn to simplify that process. All my bottles are were given to me by a fellow home brewer who has evolved beyond simple beer bottles. Free bottles are good, but they are used and therefore quite dirty. So here is my plan:
For washing I plan on soaking all the bottles over night in a TSP bath, giving them a good scrubbing with the bottle brush, and then running them through the dishwasher without any soap or drying agents. Because the bottes are old and dirty I dont really want to skimp on the cleaning process, at least for their initial use.
For sanitizing I was planning on using Iodophor and doing a 2 minute soak and then drip dry on my bottle tree. For the 60 bottles I plan to prepare I figured that this process would take about an hour, maybe slightly less. Then my friend told me about this bottle sanitizer that in a single motion squirts the Iodophor solution up into the bottles and then you just put them on the tree to dry. That sounds great, now were talking about 5-10 minutes to sanitize. But how does the sanitization take place without the Iodophor recommended 2 minute soak? The bottle squirter thing sounds like a real time saver, but I am concerned that in my haste to save a few minutes of work I might ruin a beer that I have been waiting almost 2 months for.
So is the bottle sanitizer squirter a viable option? Or should I just go ahead and do my 2 minute soak like the Iodophor instructions recommend?
For washing I plan on soaking all the bottles over night in a TSP bath, giving them a good scrubbing with the bottle brush, and then running them through the dishwasher without any soap or drying agents. Because the bottes are old and dirty I dont really want to skimp on the cleaning process, at least for their initial use.
For sanitizing I was planning on using Iodophor and doing a 2 minute soak and then drip dry on my bottle tree. For the 60 bottles I plan to prepare I figured that this process would take about an hour, maybe slightly less. Then my friend told me about this bottle sanitizer that in a single motion squirts the Iodophor solution up into the bottles and then you just put them on the tree to dry. That sounds great, now were talking about 5-10 minutes to sanitize. But how does the sanitization take place without the Iodophor recommended 2 minute soak? The bottle squirter thing sounds like a real time saver, but I am concerned that in my haste to save a few minutes of work I might ruin a beer that I have been waiting almost 2 months for.
So is the bottle sanitizer squirter a viable option? Or should I just go ahead and do my 2 minute soak like the Iodophor instructions recommend?