del
Member
Hi guys,
I've been reading this forum for inspiration for a long time, but haven't been able to get to brewing until recently.
I made my first attempt at brewing with a friend of mine back when we'd just graduated high school, but we ended up pouring that attempt out after we got some sort of sweet ale monstrosity. Oh well, teenage boys aren't exactly quality assurance masters.
My brother in law suggested around Christmas that we try our hand at brewing, and we got to observe a brew day with a friend of his, but then we struggled to make schedules meet (he's a father of two), so in the end I gave up and drafted the SWMBO as co-brewer. Due to having some constraints in space, I've started with dry malt extract brewing, and steeping some specialty grains.
The first batch was 25 l (or 6.6 gallons for the metrically challenged) of American Pale Ale, that however did not come out as pale as planned due to using a darker crystal malt than I had specified in Beersmith. That one tasted quite good after a week on the primary, and I'm going to bottle it this weekend, after it's been on the primary for 2 weeks.
The SWMBO, however, is more of a light lager drinker, so she found the brew too hoppy. Since I want to suck up to her before we start talking kegerators, I brewed up a batch of a much blonder ale with less hops this tuesday, and it's just finished the vigorous phase of fermentation, so I'm looking forward to seeing how that comes out. I also tried a slightly different method of brewing on this one, which was a lot easier, so I'm keen to see how it turns out.
Anyway, just want to say thanks to everyone on the forum for sharing all your knowledge and experience, it's an invaluable resource.
Cheers,
Daniel
I've been reading this forum for inspiration for a long time, but haven't been able to get to brewing until recently.
I made my first attempt at brewing with a friend of mine back when we'd just graduated high school, but we ended up pouring that attempt out after we got some sort of sweet ale monstrosity. Oh well, teenage boys aren't exactly quality assurance masters.
My brother in law suggested around Christmas that we try our hand at brewing, and we got to observe a brew day with a friend of his, but then we struggled to make schedules meet (he's a father of two), so in the end I gave up and drafted the SWMBO as co-brewer. Due to having some constraints in space, I've started with dry malt extract brewing, and steeping some specialty grains.
The first batch was 25 l (or 6.6 gallons for the metrically challenged) of American Pale Ale, that however did not come out as pale as planned due to using a darker crystal malt than I had specified in Beersmith. That one tasted quite good after a week on the primary, and I'm going to bottle it this weekend, after it's been on the primary for 2 weeks.
The SWMBO, however, is more of a light lager drinker, so she found the brew too hoppy. Since I want to suck up to her before we start talking kegerators, I brewed up a batch of a much blonder ale with less hops this tuesday, and it's just finished the vigorous phase of fermentation, so I'm looking forward to seeing how that comes out. I also tried a slightly different method of brewing on this one, which was a lot easier, so I'm keen to see how it turns out.
Anyway, just want to say thanks to everyone on the forum for sharing all your knowledge and experience, it's an invaluable resource.
Cheers,
Daniel
