Question regarding a better bottle and Potassium Metabisulfite

[MikePGS]

Hello. So far my friend and I have only brewed one batch of beer (it turned out pretty good). However after reading this forum for the past few days I became interested in brewing up some of Ed Wort's Apfelwein. So I went to the local brew shop the other day and picked up some yeast, dextrose, a better bottle with air lock and cap, and I asked for some sanitizer. The guy gave me a small bag labelled "Potassium Metabisulfite" and he said that it was something you just leave in. I looked it up a bit and it said that it kills microorganism's which I thought was a bad thing to use if I wanted the yeast to convert sugar into alcohol. Could anyone give me some advice on this? Do I use the prescribed amount then wash it out, or do I do as the guy said and leave it in? Also do I need to clean and sanitize, or is sanitizing the only step I need to do? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Also I'm going to try and do a one gallon batch of Malkore's not so ancient orange mead. If cleaning/sanitizing a glass carboy is any different than a better bottle any advice regarding that would be similarly appreciated. Thanks in advance, Mike

ETA: If something else would work/be easier than potassium metabisulfite (say that three times fast!) I have no qualms about buying that instead. I've read a lot of good things about star san, and since it's something I can leave in (I think) it would make me feel more comfortable if I didn't get every drop of the stuff out.

 

[ihomebrewing]

I wrote a basic tutorial that might help you out a bit:

http://www.canadianhomebrewers.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=38

 

[malkore]

Sodium and potassium metabisulfate get used lots in wine making...not much in beer making...as a sanitizer.

this is the 'sulfite' in wine that protects it from oxidation when aging for years.

In beer, its useful for removing chlorine and chloramine from tap water.

Best to stick with Star-san for sanitizing (beer, wine, mead, etc)

 

[FishFace]

My first thought is wine, not beer. I make both and use those for wine, not beer.

 

[MikePGS]

Hmm. I'm making mead, and apfelwein so I would imagine these are more wine than beer. What I'm curious to know is whether I can just use the potassium metabisulfite as a sanitizer and if so do I leave it in the bottle as the guy said, or will this kill off the yeast? The directions (or something I read online, can't recall which) said that I could use it to sanitize, but I don't want to have to worry about this damaging my better bottle (the glass 1 gallon carboy will be fine I'm sure).