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Good advice from the poster above. I start many of my newbies on 1 gallon starter kits which offer high quality ingredients. Honestly, most the time customers will taste one of our beers we have on tap and opt for that kit in a 1 gallon recipe. It’s really easy to scale down from 15 gallons to 1...

I honestly would not be surprised. I actually bought 1000 live worms for our beardy from Amazon, but live was quite relative. I think I may have had half that were still alive when they arrived. I learned a valuable lesson to buy live things locally. Back to the original issue; why don’t you...

Kent is absolutely correct. Check your local homebrew shop. Not only should they have everything you need to get rolling, but they should also offer beginner classes with some hands-on interactive courses. Your local shop will also be a wealth of knowledge for you as well. They should also be...

I doubt the products you are ordering from amazon is alive and extremely perishable requiring specific rush delivery on ice. As for Midwest, I try my best to get people to support their local homebrew shops and not give their money to inbev, but that’s just me. Remember if we don’t support our...

As Jamil has stated many times and John Palmer has written, it is literally impossible to over pitch on a homebrew scale. The exception maybe is the one gallon brewers, but even then it’s very hard to do. As for fermenting too warm, on the homebrew side we’ve always either used a dedicated...

Things to consider: white labs is in San Diego, CA where we were just hit with a 12% gas tax increase. All CA companies have to drastically increase shipping charges. White Labs does not profit one bit from the shipping charge. That is literally the price they are charged by the carrier to get...

I think the higher PH may be a big part of your issue. An off flavor associated with an infected sour is indeed vomit. When we kettle sour this is our process: 80% Pilsner malt 20% 2 row Mash for 60 min at 152* F at 5.2 PH. We add 100ppm Calcium Sulfate, 50 ppm Calcium bicarbonate, and 40ppm...

25.00 is absolutely correct and acceptable. We order normally 200 vials every 3 weeks and our brewery down the road will order 25 liters every two weeks. We also pride ourselves on carrying the same yeast stock you can find online along with over 100 varieties of grain and 100 hop varieties...

Even as a normal homebrewer (brewed at home for 10 years twice a week which is what I consider normal) I would want to see activity within 6 hours. By listening to Jamil and John Palmer, as well as what was taught in the Brewer’s Guild, we learn that the less lag time the healthier your yeast...

It’s more of a personal preference. In the west coast style dank IPA chinook is quite common as a late or dry hop. As the juicy/hazy is becoming the fad we are seeing the Australian hops used more in late and dry hops. Chinook is a fine hop to use throughout the process, but it just depends on...

The lag time you mentioned is a huge factor in bringing oxygen into solution. Anything with a lag time over 4-6 hours is absolutely unacceptable for us. As quickly as we turn beer around I need to be at high krausin within 6 hours and finished within 10 days at the most. Also without enough O2...

According to Chris White and the microbiologists at wyeast, each vial or small pack is designed to inoculate a direct pitch at 1.040 or below at 5 gallons. Factors such as how your yeast has been treated and the manufacture date also affect this rate. We always overnight our yeast orders...

As others stated it’s just a matter of reducing your ingredients. The time will be the same weather you’re making 1 gallon or 30bbl. I’d recommend something like beer smith to recalculate your recipe. I must say however, that I get confused when I hear this though. Most of my customers who are...

There are a lot of factors that affect your attenuation as others have stated. Your two biggest factors are going to be pitch rate and O2 absorption. For instance: my RIS starts at 1.090 with a 5000ml starter at 48 hours on a stir plate and 8 liters of O2 into solution at pitching then 5 liters...

I’m curious what the “odd flavor” is that you describe after 3 weeks on the yeast. Lab studies show yeast will take a minimum of 6 months to start metabolizing themselves resulting in an off flavor. If you are detecting off flavors after three weeks I’d look at possible signs of wild yeast...

I think you’re just fine. My NEIPA, House IPA, House pale, and House amber all have flameout hops at around half a pound for 15 gallons. These usually sit in the kettle at about 190* for 5 minutes. It takes us about 5 min to run from the kettle through the chiller to the fermenter and get 15...

While I agree new brewers should concentrate on what I refer to as the “brewing fundamentals,” minimizing oxidation is one of those things we want to advance to as we grow in our hobby and move from making good beer to great beer. As Jamil has stated many times the both in his publications and...

Yeah the oily substance is usually indication of a wild yeast inoculating during fermentation. It’s possible you caught the infection during your first batch and now it forever resides in the plastic. Also the lid is a big culprit too along with your grommet. If you are on your 5th batch or so...

I’d place my money on an infected fermenter. Once plastic becomes scratched, I’m talking about microscopic scratches you’d never see, bacteria will hole up in there and can not be killed no matter how much star San you throw at them. I think replacing your fermenter and lid would most likely...

While it is not at all my goal to discount your brewing ability at all, I pose a challenge or more of an experiment to really prove or disprove this theory. While your friends say you make good beer that is hardly a good control group. You are giving your friends free beer; of course it’s...