So after what seemed to be an eternity of research on which beginner brew kit to start out with, you think I was spending 20k on a car, I bought the Premium Fermonster Homebrew Starter kit from morebeer on 2/04/17 which has started what I fear is my next addiction. It just seemed to offer all the basics with a couple upgrades most brewers seem to immediately purchase after getting hooked. An 8 gallon kettle to brew full 5 gallon batches, wort chiller, sanitation, bottling equipment, etc... I started out with the ingredient kit that came with the equipment package an American Ale and to be honest it has been my favorite so far. lol. Beginners luck?
The first batch was like cooking a concentrate and then topping it off to get to volume. I didn't like that. It was like buying cheap orange juice to me... but it turned out pretty good.
So a short week later I was ready to improve my brew style by doing whole 5 gallon batch on stove top. I was going to make the best Kolsch ever from a Brewer's Best kit. I quickly realized my electric stovetop was no match for 6 gallons of water and took forever to get to temps and could barely keep a rolling boil after hours of heating. Ugh :-(
With a sense of I can do better on my third batch of Brewer's Best Gose. I tried to steep the grains in 4 gallons while boiling 2 gallons to heat the extract. My thinking was I could get the temps up quicker by adding the boiling water but the result was nominal and again I spent much of my brew day waiting on the stove to perform its basic duty.
As I was eagerly awaiting results of batches 2 and 3 to finish fermenting which surely had to be better than batch 1, right?. Ugh wrong! So for whatever reason, maybe I did something wrong or maybe I wasn't as fond of my versions of Kolsch and Gose as some of the pros but I just felt like batches 2 and 3 missed the mark :-( They were drinkable but I missed my OG on the Kolsch and it seemed a little watery. The Gose just didn't have the tartness I was looking for. As the saying goes 1 batch forward 2 steps back. Sorry couldn't resist!
Immediately I knew I wanted to upgrade my kettle to increase the efficiency of my brew day. So I started researching options. I wanted to keep it indoors and the dangers of using propane inside lead me to electric. So I purchased a 5500w element from Brewers Hardware, DIY Still Dragon Element Control Kit, changed out my dryer breaker to GFI in my electric panel and pimped my kettle out with site glass, thermometer and ball valve.
I got to say at this point I stepped back and thought I had this all figured out and would soon be brewing beers that brought tears to my eyes with leaps and bounds of improvements with every batch.
Hah! Wrong again! For batch 4 I was brewing a Weizenbier on my new electric kettle and I was going to knock it out of the park! Well as I cranked up my new electric element I was quickly disappointed with the time to get temps up, to boil and the result was no better then my stovetop. I thought how can this be?? I just spent hundreds of dollars on what seemed to be a sure fire solution. Thanks to the great people on this site they helped me identify the problem in my wiring of the the plug for the element controller which was only feeding half the power. As of this writing the beer is in secondary (3 gallon original then spit two 1 gallons and added lemon and orange tinctures).
Alright now I got the electric kettle working correctly the 5th batch is going to be it!! I know it :rockin: So hell with the kits I breaking bad and going recipe! I start doing my research and stumble across BeerSmith and found an American Amber Orange. Ahh now I got it. This is going to be easy!! I setup my equipment profile pick the recipe I want to use and voila, magic! Ugh!!! No not again I have never boiled on my new kettle when it's been working right so when I entered my equipment info I was just taking my best educated guess. Turns out it wasn't so educated. My boil off rates, cooling and trube reductions were way off and I ended up with a recipe that had way to much pre-boil volume and again my OG was significantly off and I ended up with about a gallon of extra beer that I couldn't put in the fermentor. Thats right I was feeling mad, confused and sad at the same time. Who knew there was an emotional side to brewing?
So now I am starting to think there is a little more to this brewing thing then I thought.
lol.
Surely now that I have my kettle working, a little more clarity on calculations this 6th batch has got to be better! And I am happy to tell you it was my best brew day yet.
I found a Stillwater 420 clone that was a blast to brew. Much more ingredients and steps then any of the other kits I have brewed. Just going to the LHBS and weighing out the grains was a blast. I know I probably sound like such a newbie but that's ok.
My volumes and OG were spot on this time around. My processes were tightened and improved. My kettle fulfilled all my needs. I was able to hold precise temps for steeping/mashing. I was able to bring to boil very quickly and hold perfect rolling boil for entire session, etc...
So as you can see just 68 days into brewing I have made 6 batches, more failures than successes. Hell I don't even know what batches 4,5 and 6 taste like yet. I do feel that every batch taught me something and pushed me in the right direction for me. This is such a great hobby because the possibilities just seem endless and the choices sometimes can be overwhelming.
I would love to hear other stories of successes and failures within the early start of others homebrewing experiences. Things you wish you would have done. Things you wish you wouldn't have done. Pieces of equipment or processes that took your brewing to the next level? Fermentation advice? Anything that will help a newbie like me flatten the learning curve!
Thank you in advance for any feedback!
The first batch was like cooking a concentrate and then topping it off to get to volume. I didn't like that. It was like buying cheap orange juice to me... but it turned out pretty good.
So a short week later I was ready to improve my brew style by doing whole 5 gallon batch on stove top. I was going to make the best Kolsch ever from a Brewer's Best kit. I quickly realized my electric stovetop was no match for 6 gallons of water and took forever to get to temps and could barely keep a rolling boil after hours of heating. Ugh :-(
With a sense of I can do better on my third batch of Brewer's Best Gose. I tried to steep the grains in 4 gallons while boiling 2 gallons to heat the extract. My thinking was I could get the temps up quicker by adding the boiling water but the result was nominal and again I spent much of my brew day waiting on the stove to perform its basic duty.
As I was eagerly awaiting results of batches 2 and 3 to finish fermenting which surely had to be better than batch 1, right?. Ugh wrong! So for whatever reason, maybe I did something wrong or maybe I wasn't as fond of my versions of Kolsch and Gose as some of the pros but I just felt like batches 2 and 3 missed the mark :-( They were drinkable but I missed my OG on the Kolsch and it seemed a little watery. The Gose just didn't have the tartness I was looking for. As the saying goes 1 batch forward 2 steps back. Sorry couldn't resist!
Immediately I knew I wanted to upgrade my kettle to increase the efficiency of my brew day. So I started researching options. I wanted to keep it indoors and the dangers of using propane inside lead me to electric. So I purchased a 5500w element from Brewers Hardware, DIY Still Dragon Element Control Kit, changed out my dryer breaker to GFI in my electric panel and pimped my kettle out with site glass, thermometer and ball valve.
I got to say at this point I stepped back and thought I had this all figured out and would soon be brewing beers that brought tears to my eyes with leaps and bounds of improvements with every batch.
Hah! Wrong again! For batch 4 I was brewing a Weizenbier on my new electric kettle and I was going to knock it out of the park! Well as I cranked up my new electric element I was quickly disappointed with the time to get temps up, to boil and the result was no better then my stovetop. I thought how can this be?? I just spent hundreds of dollars on what seemed to be a sure fire solution. Thanks to the great people on this site they helped me identify the problem in my wiring of the the plug for the element controller which was only feeding half the power. As of this writing the beer is in secondary (3 gallon original then spit two 1 gallons and added lemon and orange tinctures).
Alright now I got the electric kettle working correctly the 5th batch is going to be it!! I know it :rockin: So hell with the kits I breaking bad and going recipe! I start doing my research and stumble across BeerSmith and found an American Amber Orange. Ahh now I got it. This is going to be easy!! I setup my equipment profile pick the recipe I want to use and voila, magic! Ugh!!! No not again
I have never boiled on my new kettle when it's been working right so when I entered my equipment info I was just taking my best educated guess. Turns out it wasn't so educated. My boil off rates, cooling and trube reductions were way off and I ended up with a recipe that had way to much pre-boil volume and again my OG was significantly off and I ended up with about a gallon of extra beer that I couldn't put in the fermentor. Thats right I was feeling mad, confused and sad at the same time. Who knew there was an emotional side to brewing? So now I am starting to think there is a little more to this brewing thing then I thought.
lol. Surely now that I have my kettle working, a little more clarity on calculations this 6th batch has got to be better! And I am happy to tell you it was my best brew day yet.
I found a Stillwater 420 clone that was a blast to brew. Much more ingredients and steps then any of the other kits I have brewed. Just going to the LHBS and weighing out the grains was a blast. I know I probably sound like such a newbie but that's ok. My volumes and OG were spot on this time around. My processes were tightened and improved. My kettle fulfilled all my needs. I was able to hold precise temps for steeping/mashing. I was able to bring to boil very quickly and hold perfect rolling boil for entire session, etc...
So as you can see just 68 days into brewing I have made 6 batches, more failures than successes. Hell I don't even know what batches 4,5 and 6 taste like yet. I do feel that every batch taught me something and pushed me in the right direction for me. This is such a great hobby because the possibilities just seem endless and the choices sometimes can be overwhelming.
I would love to hear other stories of successes and failures within the early start of others homebrewing experiences. Things you wish you would have done. Things you wish you wouldn't have done. Pieces of equipment or processes that took your brewing to the next level? Fermentation advice? Anything that will help a newbie like me flatten the learning curve!
Thank you in advance for any feedback!
