Mr Beer - Read all about it and ask questions

Oh I know the Mr. Beer cap is vented. I was asking what I should do to convert a one gallon wine jug I have into a small fermenter. I figured I couldn't just screw the original jug cap on so I was inquiring as to what to do. That's where the stopper and airlock came into the discussion. I used my Mr. Beer to make my apfelwein and I agree it is useful. Thanks for contributing though.

 

I just did two batches of Apfelwein in the two Mr Beer primaries I ended up with. I won't be using these things for anything again until I do one of the valve mods. Only real weakness in these things, IMHO.

 

i just brewed a batch of canadian ale. and the bottles that came with the mr beer are 1 liter, so i thought i wood by some glass swing top bottles and not thinking when i added the suger these bottles were 16 oz not 48 so i added
2 1/2 tablespoons of suger to the 16oz bottles like i wood have done to the liter ones realizing it after the fact.

my question is, is my beer going to be good, or are the bottles going to burst?
this is my 3 batch and it just keeps gitting better.

thanks-
catch em

 

just brewed a batch of canadian ale. and the bottles that came with the mr beer are 1 liter, so i thought i wood by some glass swing top bottles and not thinking when i added the suger these bottles were 16 oz not 48 so i added
2 1/2 tablespoons of suger to the 16oz bottles like i wood have done to the liter ones realizing it after the fact.

my question is, is my beer going to be good, or are the bottles going to burst?
this is my 3 batch and it just keeps gitting better.

thanks-
catch em

 

The OP was asking about a one gallon jug ,not his Mr.Beer keg.That's why I
suggested the stopper and airlock.
I did learn your leason the first time I washed out my Mr. Beer. Got soaked from shaking it.

 

Sorry if my attempt at a friendly jest offended!

I would agree with the suggestion to use a stopper and an airlock on the jug.

 

im thinking you are going to end up with some bottle bombs, of course if you have flip tops you can vent them to release some pressure so they dont blow up.

 

Haha it's cool. I was just acknowledging the smart-assedness. I ordered a stopper and airlock today.

 

Ah, I thought so, but wasn't sure. Good luck with the little fermenter. I'm thinking of picking up a little three gallon carboy to brew up small batches of cider and mead. My wife isn't a big fan of beer but enjoys wine, cider, and mead...come to think of it, so do I!

 

Yeah I'm designating my Mr. Beer soon to just small batches of cider and wine and other experiments. I'm moving on to a 5 gallon set-up for beer soon.

 

i just finsihed brewing my 3rd batch of beer with my mr beer keg. i brewed an ipa with products from my local homebrew store. i boiled 3lb. amber malt extract for 50 minutes with 1 oz. columbus 50 minutes
1/2 oz. simcoe 15 minutes left
1/2 oz. cascade 5 minutes left
then i cooled it in a sink of ice water. this took a lot longer than i thought, upwards of 20 minutes. once it got to about 74 degrees, i pitched the yeast. im using a 7 grams of coopers dry ale yeast. its about an hour later and its still at 74. do you think that was a good yeast pitching temperature?

 

Yep, you'd be suprised, Yeast is sturdy!

 

74 should be fine, you should be in the mid 60's for fermentation so you will be ok.

 

Hello all beer lovers and fanatics! I am new to the forum and new to the beer brewing hobby/magical experience. I dont have to say a lot, I just love beer. I recently bought a new MB kit and I'm almost ready to begin my first brew. I've been reading this forum for a few days but I'm not sure on a couple of things. Starting by: -what type of sugar should I use for carbonation? white sugar, brown, corn sugar, or has anyone had any luck with maple syrup? ive read it is also better to make the conversions and mix the sugar with water and add it to the fermentor before bottling instead...? Also, I live on Puerto Rico, the temp. right now is avg. 82, where can i maintain a temp from 65 to 75?? I was thinking of an air conditioned room where temp can go to "60" but at the same time it will not be on all day... haha maybe I have a bigger problem than I thought... That's it for now, Ill be sure to keep on reading. Thank you all for your help and good luck with your brewing!

 

Yep. 74 should be fine for a pitching temperature. But you really want the keg in a location no warmer than about 65 deg F by the time fermentation starts cranking. Active fermentation can cause the wort to run much warmer than ambient.

82 is definitely too warm for most beer styles. You might try either a picnic cooler with freeze packs; or a water bath with the fermenter covered by a wet cotton cloth (old T-shirt). Seems like Revvy has some good pics of this posted here someplace. If you immerse the keg tap, don't forget to allow for good sanitation. I like to put some iodine solution in the water bath.

 

Anybody have problems with the Mr Beer plastic bottles?

Mine seem to be nice and firm before i put them in the fridge and then they go soft. I bottled a couple in 12 ounce glass bottles and they all came out fine. Only the very first plastic bottle held and it was on in the fridge 12 or so hours. These were batch primed and the caps are on so tight I'm struggling to get them off.

 

my IPA was fermenting crazy the next day, blowing foam out around the cap of the keg. now its settled down, but still a lot of bubbles and such. the only proplem i can see is that there looks like a very tiny bit leaked out by the spighot. not even enough to make a drop and fall on the table. you can just see a tiny bit of hard crust around the edge on the one side. i plan on fermenting for 3 weeks and this is only day 2, but its so small, i dont think it would just start leaking really bad.

 

My first batch had a very small amount leak out of the spigot. It was just a few drops and had dried to a syrup consistency by the time I found it. It never developed into a drastic leak. I find that the spigot tends to loosen up as I'm sloshing beer around in the thing on brew day and develop a very slow leak. I have to retighten it several times before it will stop.

 

Re: Mr Beer Priming Sugar Problem:

What is the best priming sugar to use when using the 1 liter bottles?

 

Probably corn sugar, but I've been using regular table sugar for my Mr. Beer batches.

 

I think regular table sugar is fine for priming. I've gone back and forth, depending on what I have at hand, and I can never tell a difference in taste. The quantity is much too low to affect flavor. I think cane sugar might ferment a little quicker.

 

I agree with yeoldebrewer, you've got to try to get the temp down to under 70F. For me, the greatest improvement to my beers came from properly controlling the temperature of fermentation, particularly for the first few days. The only bad beers I've made were caused by too hot a fermentation.

You might want to use very cold water to mix with the wort as you're filling the carboy, so that after you top it up to 2.whatever gallons it's about 60F. Then pitch the yeast and it will kick in as the wort warms up. At least then you have a head start on it. If you pitch the yeast warm, it will take off like a rocket and the yeast activity will make the wort even hotter.

Follow one of the suggested methods of cooling it, like putting it in a picnic cooler with bags of ice. Too cold is not that big a deal...too hot tastes like kerosene.

Good luck bro!

 

I got a Mr. Brew for my birthday in the beginning of January. I think I committed some noob mistakes, but am not sure. The pale ale can is what my kit came with.

I had heard sterilizaion is key and made sure to follow the instructions surrounding this to the T.

I cooked it all up and placed it in the fermenter for about 10 days. From there I bottled it with table sugar and let it sit in the top of my closet out of the sun for another 7-10 days. From there I placed the beer in my fridge for another 2-3 days and cracked my first one open.

It was certainly carbonated as I could hear and feel the pressure release when I opened the plastic bottle. The beer seemed to be sweet tasting, is that normal or is that because I used the table sugar?

Other then that I think everything worked fine. I'm excited to get another can and more bottles, prefferably glass bottles like the grolsch brand ones I see in stores. Anyone use these and have feedback on them?

 

You suffered from 2 things, green beer and kit directions. You really want to let that beer sit in the fermenter for 2 weeks minimum before bottling. After that, you should let it sit at about 70 degrees for 3 weeks in the bottle. This will reduce that sweetness, and should result in better tasting beer overall.

Instead of using table sugar to bottle, try corn sugar. The usual formula is 3/4 cups of corn sugar per 5 gallon batch, and I had success using 3/8 cup with the 2 gallon Mr Beer batches.

Even doing all this, I found the Mr Beer Pale Ale tasted like Natural Light, but it was drinkable.

 

I've never used a Mr. Beer, actually never seen one in person but that's all my buddy has. I'm going over to his house this weekend to help him out, I've been brewing full-boil extracts for a couple months and wanted to make sure he was on the right track. He's got 3 cans, 19.4oz, of pre-hopped extract, a Blonde Ale, Oktoberfest, and a Golden Ale. They all use munich and crystal malts but of course don't mention amounts or even the type of hops.

I really think I could help him make better beer. Rather than adding the alcohol booster, table sugar, etc I suggested he use all 3 cans. I figured it'd still make beer and he wouldn't get the strange tastes of table sugar. According to Beersmith 3 cans, or 3.6 lbs would make the alcohol around 6.5%. What I wanted to check though is do these pre-hopped w/ grains included LME cans have the same approx amount of fermentables as regular LME? He's broke right now so I don't want to suggest he upgrade equipment. If I decide to just use 2 cans I guess the blonde and golden would be the best to combine?

 

Thanks for the information. I really enjoy New Castle and would like to give Mr. Beer's Nut Brown Ale a try to see if I can get it to turn out with my second batch.

Do you think I should use the two weeks in the fermentor and three weeks in the bottle rule for this as well? Longer? How long in the fridge?

 

You'll probably want to leave it in the fermenter for a minimum of 2 weeks. At 4 weeks, you might get a better flavor out of it, but it's really up to you how long you want to wait. I wouldn't ever leave anything in that little keg for longer than a month, because of the lack of a proper airlock. After 3 weeks in the bottle, it will be drinkable, but again age will only help. Since we're talking Mr Beer ingredients here, I doubt 6 months in the bottle is going to turn it into something amazing, so 3 weeks is probably long enough.

After that, 48 hours in the fridge and you're good to go. They did tell you that waiting was the hardest part, right?

 

I have read waiting is the hardest part. I'm seriously considering buying another small keg to minimize the waiting after I get this next batch going

 

bpasker28,
I just opened my 2nd bottle of High Country Canadian Draft from Mr. Beer. My two have been great so far. No cidery or sweetness. Infact mine were very dry, in a pleasant and unexpected way. I did however do a few thiings with the batch:
Substituted 1lb of Pilsen Dry Malt Extract (DME) instead of the booster.
Let it sit in the fermenter for 10 days (made sure of 3 days at same FG reading from the hydrometer)
(Highly recommended "must have" addition to your brewing arsenal)
Bottled in glass bottles with recommended table sugar level and carbed for 11 days and still counting.

I am now purposefully taking one out every three days, refridging it for three days and then sampling so I can keep notes on how it ages. This also helps me pass the time as "waiting is the hardest part".

As for other flavors/recipes. I recommend that you spend some time on the Mr. Beer website and see what combinations and recipes they have. I have two recipes in primary fermentation right now. American Gold Premium that I will test/sample/ and hopefully bottle on Sunday; and the May the SchwarzBier With You that will ferment an additional 2-3 weeks before hydrometer testing and bottling. They both smelled great, looked great, and my OG sample tasted great. Can hardly wait for those.

I have also added a 3 Gal PET water jug as a second fermenter so that I can get a pipeline going. I think I am going to prefer the small batch size so that I can create a variety and not have gallons to drink to keep the churn going. I also like the ease/simplicity of this for now. I think it will really help develop my techniques, as well as develop my palate for the specific tastes that I like/don't like (hoppy, malty, dry, fruity, etc.) I really enjoy alot of different kinds of beer, so this will help me keep some variety going without guzzling 5 Gals. of everything I make.

Many others will recommend pushing you towards 5Gal setups.... and I will go there too someday, but I highly recommend that you be patient and read everything on this site before you do.

It helped me create a great first beer. Not an award winner, but better than BMC at the grocery store!!

If you are interested, I will keep you posted on my "over time analysis".

Read every post from Revvy, Yooperbrew, and pals and heed their words..... Patience is the key. Welcome to your next addiction.

 

Thanks, and yes I"m interested in hearing of your experience.

I still have 2-3 liters of my first batch in the fridge, which gives them probably another 6 weeks fridge time. Sadly they were all put in there at the same time hwoever. I'm going to pop one open in the next day or two to see if that has helped with the green-ness of them at all.

 

Honestly, after making my first Mr Beer batch and reading up on the forum here, I knew that little 2g fermenter wasn't for me. I had all the equipment delivered, and had my first proper extract batch fermenting before that Mr Beer batch was ready to bottle. They just didn't offer enough variety in the recipes to keep me interested.

 

And how exactly are you (did you) planning to break MRB to your wife? Just wondering how it goes b4 I tell my wife I'm about to start brewing in a side closet.

 

So I've read the first 50+ pages of this thread and I can't take it anymore. I need to brew beer! I'm going to go get a MrB (any relation to Mr T??) and if I understand everything right ....

Just skip the booster b/c of cider aftertaste. W/out a hydrometer: Follow the MrB directions but on time tables ... ferment 2 weeks, bottle condition 2 - 3 weeks, fridge for a couple days and drink.

Do I need to replace the booster w/ anything? (Sorry, such a noob)

Sound about right?

 

I feel your pain. Did the same thing, but very well worth it. Lots of great information and good contacts too!

I HIGHLY recommend that you replace the boost with 1 pound of Light(Pilsen) Dry Malt extract(DME). You need the fermentables if you leave out the booster. I am now drinking my first batch of Canadian Draft and I left out the booster and put in the DME. It was a great plus I think. No sweetness or cidery flavor. Just a little dry. Probably because it is still green.

Other big recommendation is 2 weeks in the fermenter, and 2 weeks in bottles is a minimum. I did 10 days each. Still great beer, but DO NOT do the 1 week and 1 week as the instructions say. Otherwise, we will have Revvy send you the "Step away from the BEER" post.

Enjoy your next great addiction

 

Ideally, another can of Hopped Malt Extract. If you want a less full-bodied beer, you could substitute a can of their unhopped malt extract in a color similar to what you want to see in your finished product. For example, you don't want to use their Pale Export UME for a stout, or the Creamy Brown for a blonde.

 

LOL. I've lost track of how many times I've seen "It's fine, step away from the beer."

DME is what? Dry malt extract? That's what the yeast feeds on I assume? Still trying to get my acronymns straight. All this info makes me feel

 

You will notice when you re-read my post that I gave the acronym first Dry Malt Extract (DME).

This is a dry malt that is the consistency of very fine corn meal. Very dusty, but great for the little yeasties. You use it exactly like the booster. Stir it in slowly before you turn on the heat. It will clump together and give you a mess if not careful. Same as Booster actually.

It gives a malty and dry add to the beer, where the booster will be more cidery and sweet. But only when it is green(young). If you give either enough time, it will improve dramatically.

Drink lots of good micro-brews while waiting for it. You get the benefit of free bottles when empty, and an easier time at the long first wait!

 

Sounds good! I think I could become a top poster if I threw out all the questions I had. LOL. Can't wait to get my MrB Monday. The wait through fermentation and bottling is going to kill me!

Cheers!

 

I started out on Mr Beer too. Every Easter Sunday in my home town of Baltimore they had a charity event called Kegs and Eggs. Basically consuming hard boiled eggs and beer for charity. Sound gross - it was. I can not describe to you the horrors of what happened on those days.

Anyways, I had a consolation prize of a Mr. Beer kit. I was hooked once I tasted my first batch. However, it has a lot of problems.... as I am sure everyone is aware.

 

I am leaving the Mr Beer system behind and heading into All-Grain brewing, but I have a lot of HME's and a couple of UME's if somebody close to me wants to buy them just PM me.