SNPorter
Active Member
Well I waited for a day that my wife would be gone to brew my first batch and glad I did, what a mess. She'd of had a fit if she had seen the kitchen.
Everything went relatively well with a few small mistakes. First I was boiling my wort with a lid partly on. I decided to search the forums for "covered boil" and found that I needed to get the lid off asap. Fortunately I finished the last 30 minutes with the lid off in a good hard boil.
The biggest mistake I made was not having something ready to filter the trub out of the wort as I dumped it into my fermenting bucket. I never realized there would be so much. So in desperation I searched the house for something that would work. I >gasp< boiled up some longjohns that had a loose knit. They worked for about a 1/4 of the wort then clogged up good. I then used the supplied sock for the specialty grains and secured it to the bucket with a large rubber band and that did work.
I did nail the wort temp as I cooled it to 115 in ice water then added my chilled water to it. Came out at 68.8 when I pitched the yeast. Currently sitting in a dark room that's 62 degrees(hopefully that's a good temp). Directions call for 64 -70 degrees but from what I've read here sounds better to start low. My next option is 70.
It's a Brewers Best Red Ale. Hope it turns out OK.
Check out my filters. Got to get one of those 5 gal bucket strainers I've read about here that sell on Ebay.
I won't tell anyone it was run through my long underwear LOL!
This is hrough the supplied grain sock. I was really surprised at the amount of trub for a kit like this. I suppose this is normal for the hops, which were pellets btw.
In the end, it looked fine to me.
Everything went relatively well with a few small mistakes. First I was boiling my wort with a lid partly on. I decided to search the forums for "covered boil" and found that I needed to get the lid off asap. Fortunately I finished the last 30 minutes with the lid off in a good hard boil.
The biggest mistake I made was not having something ready to filter the trub out of the wort as I dumped it into my fermenting bucket. I never realized there would be so much. So in desperation I searched the house for something that would work. I >gasp< boiled up some longjohns that had a loose knit. They worked for about a 1/4 of the wort then clogged up good. I then used the supplied sock for the specialty grains and secured it to the bucket with a large rubber band and that did work.
I did nail the wort temp as I cooled it to 115 in ice water then added my chilled water to it. Came out at 68.8 when I pitched the yeast. Currently sitting in a dark room that's 62 degrees(hopefully that's a good temp). Directions call for 64 -70 degrees but from what I've read here sounds better to start low. My next option is 70.
It's a Brewers Best Red Ale. Hope it turns out OK.
Check out my filters. Got to get one of those 5 gal bucket strainers I've read about here that sell on Ebay.
I won't tell anyone it was run through my long underwear LOL!
This is hrough the supplied grain sock. I was really surprised at the amount of trub for a kit like this. I suppose this is normal for the hops, which were pellets btw.
In the end, it looked fine to me.