Make sure there's no fecking paper towels in the dishwasher!!

Tonight I bottled an ESB. My dishwasher gets hot enough to sanitize, so I always run my bottles through it once with soap, then again with a little Starsan to make doubly sure everything is sanitized; it works like a charm. Today I ran the bottles through, then around 8:00 I started the bottling process. I had the flat beer siphoned over into the bottling bucket with the priming sugar, and started to bottle. I had gotten about a half-dozen bottled and picked up the next one out of the dishwasher, and paused. It had some weird white mush stuck to the inside, so I frowned at it and set it aside. I got the next one out, and it had it too! I went through the whole batch, and out of about 50 bottles, almost 2 dozen had the stuff in it. I thought it was just part of some leftover label paper, but then I found the real culprit: a small piece of paper towel was in the bottom; it must have been torn apart and bits of it washed up into my bottles. So, I spent the next 30 minutes hand-washing and re-sanitizing those bottles - talk about a PITA! Come on KEGS!

 

Yes, Kegs!! for sure, nothing like bottling 1 Bottle

 

But there's also nothing like cracking open a bottle and sitting down in front of the game. I've been using bottles for a while, so did my teacher(dad), keging requires time, space, and money that I don't have. Plus, bottling in my eyes has always been a fun and integral part of the home brew.

 

You must be joking, kegging a beer takes a fraction of the time that bottling does. I started kegging after bottling 1 batch of brew because I didn't want to spend that much time hehe.

You can still bottle from the keg with a BMBF and then you also won't have sediment to worry about. Plus, it's ready faster since it doesn't have to bottle condition.

 

Kegging is the only way to go. Time to go pull a pint of Weizenbock...

 

You put Star San in the dishwasher? How much? I tried that once thinking it was a good idea and ended up with a kitchen full of foam.

 

well played. kegging does tak less time to do, but i like the fact of bottling and waiting, no other tasks involved(force carbing is my nemesis......).

 

Not everyone has the space or money for a kegging setup anyway, and not eveyone thinks bottling is a chore either...I sometimes wish some keg-heads wouldn't be so EAC about it and quit thinking it has to be their mission/or thinks it is helpful OR funny to jump into every bottling thread to say "Keg!" It really solves nothing...

You guys could actually try to be helpful...try to be part of the solution...or not post at all in a bottling thread, it's really not that funny after the 3000th time...And all we have to do to look that the title of this section to be aware that such a thing as kegs exist this is called the KEGGING AND BOTTLING SECTION afterall...bottlers are not idiots...


I quite enjoy bottling now that I got my process down to what works for me.

Read this thread...http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/revvys-tips-bottler-first-time-otherwise-94812/

On a similar vein to the paper towels...if you are using the oven, make sure you don't leave a hot pad in there....They really stink when they catch fire...

 

Plus one on enjoying the bottling. Hell, I may keg one day, but I don't feel any great need for it right now.

I feel that my time spent bottling is quality time with my beer. In fact I enjoy it better now that I actually take more time over the ritual. I've learned to enjoy it.

 

I have thought about this too, but in this case I don't think "Don't Fear the Foam" applies.

 

I've done the dishwasher route once before and it worked well. I did however, send it through a sanitize cycle empty without detergent first before running it again with bottles. I wanted to make sure everything was cleared out first.

The best time is the night before bottling morning. Get up, and your rack of bottles are ready to go.

 

I like my kegging set up, but I only have room for 2 kegs. Maybe 1 or two kegs on standby, but then I am forced to bottle. I frankly don't mind the bottling once the labels are off that is, and now I know some more shortcuts that make that part of the process go much faster and easier.

Putting labels on your bottles has a certain amount of appeal.

Of course you can also bottle from a keg, but I do like storing a few cases of bottles in the closet too.

 

I don't know; just a tiny little squirt, and I've had no problems or leaks at all.

Re: bottling v. kegging - I used to hate bottling, but like some of you have said, once you get a good process down, and have a bit of time in which to do it, it's a fun ritual. I just got a 60qt kettle and two 5 (or possibly 3) gallon kegs, so once I've got my kegging setup off the ground I'll probably be kegging and bottling part of each batch. I like that because it will let me drink some right away, and then break some out on down the line.

 

I really don't mind bottling either, in fact, if I have a helper capping, it can take as little as 20 minutes for a 5.5gal batch. Thats not a whole lot of time. And you're done.

I can't wait for the next few weeks. I have 10 gallons that need to be bottled. 4 full cases coming down the pipe. YAY!

Re: The crap in the bottles. Yeah, I had that happen to a few bottles too. Makes ya wonder if some slipped by and that stuff ended up in your beer. Yikes!!

 

IMHO bottling and kegging take about the same time. Also, when you bottle you have an insurance plan against being an idiot. I just lost my entire last batch because I hadn't gotten my keg setup right..... with bottles I would have only lost 12oz.

I keg now, but never dis the bottlers.

 

I bottled 5.5 Gallons of stout yesterday.2 friends 1 12pack 15 mins.I don't mind doing it alone either.I don't think of it as a chore.It's kinda like when you keg it and say.Damn i made a good beer,But you do it 50 times

 

I don't have a kegging set-up yet. However, my SWMBO is going to spain to study in seville until may. In order to keep myself busy, I have a couple DIY projects, one of them being a kegerator conversion. I dont mind bottling (since I have 22oz bottles up the ying yang from work), but kegging beer is going to help me save precious time and if I want to take some to go I can always take some growlers wherever I need to go. Plus I am going to convert a larger fridge so I can use some of the extra room for cold crashing/hiding my craft brews/lagering.