Making First Batch on Sunday

[SkaWes]

So I bought my equipment kit and a extract kit today from a local homebrew store, however it seems that their kit is low on instructions. I would call the store, but the guy was kind seemed pretty disinterested, so if I can avoid calling there I would prefer to.

It came with 2 cans of malt extract, and on the back of the can it says "Mix can (4 lbs) with 5 gallons of water"

However my concern is that I have 2 cans of the malt extract, should I mix BOTH cans with 5 gallons of water? Plus I was under the impression you didn't boil that much water for the wort.

What should I be doing here? I would hate to brew this up, and then in 2 weeks find my beer tastes like pee.

EDIT: It also has nothing mentioning what the starting gravity should be. For what it's worth I am making a California style IPA.

 

[jerrysfinger]

Two good links = How to brew and Facts
The first brew I did had these directions from a midwest kit .
That was enough info for me to muddle through my first brew. Good luck, I'm sure it will be fine. Read more.

 

[SumnerH]

So I bought my equipment kit and a extract kit today from a local homebrew store, however it seems that their kit is low on instructions. I would call the store, but the guy was kind seemed pretty disinterested, so if I can avoid calling there I would prefer to.

It came with 2 cans of malt extract, and on the back of the can it says "Mix can (4 lbs) with 5 gallons of water"

However my concern is that I have 2 cans of the malt extract, should I mix BOTH cans with 5 gallons of water? Plus I was under the impression you didn't boil that much water for the wort.

What should I be doing here? I would hate to brew this up, and then in 2 weeks find my beer tastes like pee.

EDIT: It also has nothing mentioning what the starting gravity should be. For what it's worth I am making a California style IPA.

What else did it come with? Some sort of hops (whole or pellets), or is it pre-hopped extract?

 

[hcarter]

Find a different store or order online. All of the kits I've ordered online come with very good instructions. OTOH, I suppose you could try your LHBS again and hope that either the guy was having a bad day or there will be someone else to help you.

 

[SkaWes]

Two good links = How to brew and Facts
The first brew I did had these directions from a midwest kit .
That was enough info for me to muddle through my first brew. Good luck, I'm sure it will be fine. Read more.

I will check these out, thanks.

What else did it come with? Some sort of hops (whole or pellets), or is it pre-hopped extract?

Yes sorry, I forgot to mention this. It came with 3 bags of pellet hops, I am assuming they are 0.5 ounces each (I haven't weighed them) and a bottle White Labs yeast. The only instructions I have is on the back of the malt extract cans, and a note he wrote down telling me at what times to add the hops. (And even at that he wrote down the wrong names for the hops.)

Find a different store or order online. All of the kits I've ordered online come with very good instructions. OTOH, I suppose you could try your LHBS again and hope that either the guy was having a bad day or there will be someone else to help you.

I originally ordered a kit from Morebeer, but they had some things on backorder and I didn't find out until 3 days later. (So much for their claim of "We will call you if we don't have anything in stock!") So I went to him as a second choice. The guy who owns the store is supposed to really know his stuff, but he was sick so maybe he just didn't really care yesterday.

 

[TexasStu]

Hmm, California style IPA... Would that be an IPA with cascade hops or some other west coast hops?
It would help to know who makes the cans of extract, whether they are pre-hopped already, etc.
Example: Coopers IPA is pre-hopped. Any additional hops added just make it hoppier (other than dry hopping which increases both aroma and mouthfeel - added after fermentation is pretty much complete [usually in a muslin bag]).
I recently did a Coopers IPA with cascade over-hop + dry hop. I do not think I got the correct OG (either didn't stir enough or something?) as it came out lower than I anticipated as I added a box (500g) DME plus a couple hundred grams of Dextrose. I figured these should have raised the OG above 1050 and may well have. It turned out good (and hoppy) and it's what I guess would be called a California (or American) IPA?

Anyway, I imagine you will get more input and more specific information if you can identify more of what came with your kit(s)?

Note to self: The Coopers Sparkling Ale I made either should have fermented out more, conditioned in secondary more or I should have used more yeast. It turned out the least favorite of the 6 batches (so far) with much sweeter and cidery overtones. It's still ok but very sweet. (added this note as additional info for your edification).

 

[SumnerH]

So I bought my equipment kit and a extract kit today from a local homebrew store, however it seems that their kit is low on instructions. I would call the store, but the guy was kind seemed pretty disinterested, so if I can avoid calling there I would prefer to.

It came with 2 cans of malt extract, and on the back of the can it says "Mix can (4 lbs) with 5 gallons of water"

However my concern is that I have 2 cans of the malt extract, should I mix BOTH cans with 5 gallons of water? Plus I was under the impression you didn't boil that much water for the wort.

What should I be doing here? I would hate to brew this up, and then in 2 weeks find my beer tastes like pee.

First off, John Palmer's How to Brew is the place to look for full instructions. That said, here's a checklist I used doing a simple extract partial boil:

Part 1: Preparing the yeast starter
1. 3 days before brew day, mix 200g of DME with 2 liters of water in a sanitized jug (1 gallon or so is fine). Add the yeast to this. Cover the lid loosely with sanitized aluminum foil. Let it sit at 70F (or slightly warmer; below 80 is fine). Swirl it around gently whenever you happen to walk by it (a couple times a day or so)
2. The night before brewing, move this jug into the refrigerator and let it sit undisturbed. By morning, the yeast should have settled out on the bottom of the jug.
3. Gently pour off all but 1/2 inch or so of the liquid on top of the yeast.

Part 2: Brew day
1. Put 3 gallons of water in a pot; bring to boil.
2. While that's going, put 2 gallons of clean water (either boiled or distilled water straight out of the jugs) into your sanitized primary fermentor. Cover it up (sanitize the cover!) Shake it up a lot to aerate it. Leave covered
3. Once you're at boiling, turn off the burner. Add 1 can of malt extract. Mix it thoroughly. Unmixed extract can settle on the bottom of the pot, burning or creating off flavors.
4. Bring back to a boil and wait for the hot break.
5. Start your 60 minute timer now. Add the hops on the schedule they were given to you (if some are added at 60 minutes, they go now).
6. At 15 minutes, turn off the burner and mix in the rest of the extract. Turn back on and count down the last 15 minutes (add any hops at 15 minutes or later after you turn the burner back on).
7. With 5 minutes to go, prepare an ice water bath for cooling.
8. When time's up, put the pot in the ice water and cool to 75F.
9. Pour vigorously into the fermentor (you're trying to mix air in with the wort) while keeping out as much break/hops as possible. You need 5 gallons at this point, and there could have been some boil off. Use sanitary water (boiled or distilled water straight from a jug) to top it up to 5 gallons.
10. Put the sanitized top back on the fermentor, and shake it for 10 minutes to aerate
11. Using a sanitized hydrometer, take a gravity reading.
12. Add the yeast (swirl the liquid in the starter jug around to mix up with the yeast and pour it all in)
13. Put the top on and shake again to blend the yeast
14. Put the airlock on and put it somewhere that's about 5F below the right temperature for your yeast (the fermentation will generate some heat to bring that temperature up).

 

[SkaWes]

Hmm, California style IPA... Would that be an IPA with cascade hops or some other west coast hops?
It would help to know who makes the cans of extract, whether they are pre-hopped already, etc.
Example: Coopers IPA is pre-hopped. Any additional hops added just make it hoppier (other than dry hopping which increases both aroma and mouthfeel - added after fermentation is pretty much complete [usually in a muslin bag]).
I recently did a Coopers IPA with cascade over-hop + dry hop. I do not think I got the correct OG (either didn't stir enough or something?) as it came out lower than I anticipated as I added a box (500g) DME plus a couple hundred grams of Dextrose. I figured these should have raised the OG above 1050 and may well have. It turned out good (and hoppy) and it's what I guess would be called a California (or American) IPA?

Anyway, I imagine you will get more input and more specific information if you can identify more of what came with your kit(s)?

Note to self: The Coopers Sparkling Ale I made either should have fermented out more, conditioned in secondary more or I should have used more yeast. It turned out the least favorite of the 6 batches (so far) with much sweeter and cidery overtones. It's still ok but very sweet. (added this note as additional info for your edification).

Yes sorry I forgot to mention this. I have 2 types of hops, Cascade, and the other one escapes me at the moment. I also can't remember the name of the malt extract, I will have to check when I get home. The hops are in pellet form.

Lots of stuff

Thanks for this, it is incredibly helpful. I read through John Palmer's site and it made perfect sense, I just wasn't sure if it is always the same for each type of beer or not. (I have read at various sites that some beers brew for different lengths of time.)

The only thing I don't have is the DME for a starter, so I was just going to pitch it straight in to the fermenter, which it has instructions stating how to do that on the vial of yeast.

Sadly I am not as fully prepared with every item that I wanted to have for this project, I ideally wanted to go to a meeting of the local homebrew club before I did this, but they won't have one until the end of next month, and well I can't wait that long!

 

[IrregularPulse]

Post on your profile where you are located. Good chance there might be someone local who could maybe come show you how to brew, or you could take a burner and your stuff over there and brew together. They may have an extra burner even to borrow. It is a very family type environment here. People always willing to help and meet up when they can.

 

[SumnerH]

The only thing I don't have is the DME for a starter, so I was just going to pitch it straight in to the fermenter, which it has instructions stating how to do that on the vial of yeast.

Sadly I am not as fully prepared with every item that I wanted to have for this project, I ideally wanted to go to a meeting of the local homebrew club before I did this, but they won't have one until the end of next month, and well I can't wait that long!

First, read Palmer's site again. My checklist came primarily from reading through How to Brew, plus some tips picked up here and there.

Second, you're going to have an OG of around 1.059 with 8 lbs of light liquid malt extract. That means you want to be pitching around 205 billion yeast cells (use the free Mr Malty Pitching Rate Calculator calculator to figure this out). One vial of White Labs (or a Wyeast smack pack) has about 100 billion yeast cells.

So if you just pitch directly, you're underpitching which means the yeast is going to spend longer reproducing and be a bit more stressed. That means more lag time before visible fermentation, more possibility of off-flavors, and more possibility of failure (stuck fermentation or whatever).

OTOH, many people underpitch and come out with okay beers.

Most recipes/kits don't include the malt extract for a starter, which sucks for first-time brewers. I was lucky the first time I brewed--I'd ordered enough for my first _2_ batches of beer and was able to pillage some malt extract from the 2nd one to make a starter and avoid pushing back my first brew day (and order replacement DME in time for the 2nd brew day).

I'm not sure what I'd do in your shoes; either wait a week and help your odds or simplify and underpitch with the yeast you have.

 

[SkaWes]

Curses! Well I guess my only options are to either buy something for a starter from the local homebrew store, or buy another vial of yeast. I think I might just buy the starter kit online, because I really don't feel like going in to the store again. When I was asking him some questions to clarify my understanding, he would kind of roll his eyes and give me a condecending answer, which I thought was a rather odd way to try and get repeat business!