Search results

I'm sure the Midwest kit from Groupon is good. I don't know exactly what's in the kit, but these are some basic things you want to have to help you make beer: - Fermenter - Airlock for fermenter - Bottling bucket with spigot - Autosiphon with tubing - Hydrometer - Preferrably a wine...

A funnel and strainer will be a good idea to help filter some debris out of your beer. I use a carboy now and currently just autosiphon from the kettle to the carboy. This will get you some aeration, but I also shake the carboy vigorously for a minute or so just to make sure. As the previous...

I think some people take their sample, get the reading, and dump the sample back into the carboy. If everything is sanitized thoroughly, this could be okay. I'd be a little worried about oxidizing when dumping it back, but if you do it carefully, I doubt it would be a big deal.

Lol, that's awesome. Thanks for the notes, everyone. I need to start making.. starters. Losing half my yeast vial is probably the sucker punch I needed. Hopefully this batch turns out all right though.

I've done several batches using some twist-off bottles. However, I am now switching 100% to pop-off bottles. Here's why: 1) The wing-capper (I assume you have this) does not seem to like to crimp the caps onto the top of the bottles very well in my experience. I actually broke about four...

Samuel Adams Boston Lager and a few of my recently brewed AHS Belgian Wit

Did my first partial mash on Friday, everything went perfectly, other than taking 45 mins to cool my boil (I need a wort chiller). I aerated by shaking the carboy vigorously. Final step: pitch the liquid yeast. Of course I shook it up, opened it, and half of it spewed onto the floor.. maybe even...

I am limited to partial boils for now, and I add top-off water to the wort for the reasons you described. I prefer to add the appropriate top-off water to get me close to my target OG, rather than guessing. There are too many factors that can contribute to needing a little more or a little less...

5 gallons of Cream Ale 13860.25 + 5 = 13865.25

A lot of people raise the temp gradually after the initial fermentation phase is over, which it sounds like yours is. The first few days of fermentation are most important.. after that, raising the temp a bit is just fine, and sometimes helps finish the fermentation quicker.

It still says to sparge, by just pouring 170F water over the grains and letting it drip into the pot. It says slightly less than 2 quarts of sparge water for the 3.5 pounds of grain. FreshZ, I got my kit at Austin Homebrew too. I guess their recommendations are for using more mash water. Not...

Doing my first PM later today. I only have about 3.5 pounds of grain (mostly 2-row), and the rest is extract. I've read a lot on here about mash water-to-grain ratios, and a lot of people seem to do anywhere from 1.25 qt/lb to 2 qt/lb of grain for mash water (seems like 1.25 and 1.33 is common)...

Looking at their website, I sort of like Beck's, Landshark, Rolling Rock, Leffe.. heck, I didn't even know Anheuser-Busch owned the production of these.

Probably Shiner and Blue Moon. I know these don't necessarily say a whole lot, but these beers tasted different, and great, compared to keystone and BMC beers I had been drinking up to that point. They got me branching out to different styles, opening up the magical kingdom of beer to me.

Yooper is spot-on. Since they are just specialty grains, they are just being steeped (not mashed), so the amount of water is not that important. You can do it in all 5-6 gallons if you want.

Agree with OClair. Don't pitch more yeast just because bubbling stopped after 48 hours. It's possible it already finished most of the fermentation. It's also possible it's just temporarily stalled due to factors such as temp changes. There can be a number of reasons. I'd wait until its been in...

Highly recommend a bottling bucket since it doesn't look like you have one. This is used to mix your beer with priming sugar, and is much more efficient than adding sugar to each bottle separately. Also recommend a bottle filler attachment, which connects to the bottling bucket spigot using...

You've got a nice list going there. Don't forget to buy some siphon hose (tubing) to go with your auto-siphon. Make sure you get the matching size.

Yeah, good idea. I was thinking about using some type of tie to keep the seal tight.

I played around with my auto-siphon for about 20 minutes using water and figured out the problem.. and figured I'd chime back in. The auto-siphon was pulling water from the bucket just fine, with no bubbles in the cane. The bubbles were being added in the tubing that connects to the...