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It started coming to life in the fermenter this PM, but still very slow. I pitched the starter which was in pretty good looking shape. Thanks for the thoughts!

I've got a German Ale kit that came with Wyeast 1187 Ringwood Ale. I was out of town last week so I didn't have a chance to make a starter. The pack was also about 6 months old in the fridge after having been shipped ground a long way. 48 hours later, it's done the same thing Ringwood Ale does...

Beer culture has been about getting blasted for a long time now. Maybe that's starting to change, but only for a subsegment. When I'm in Europe I love being able to get all kinds of non-alcohol beer and have no stigma around it. Forget about that in the US. The assumption is that you drink beer...

Bottled yesterday and got a good chance to test it mixed up from transfering and it measured 1.002 again. The yeast cake was bubbling by the time I got done bottling, but I think that was just from it warming up and the CO2 coming out of suspension. I canned some of the yeast and it built up...

Thanks for the feedback! It's on its way to 40 degrees now. It will be there at least until I get enough bottles emptied. I didn't really expect consumption was going to be the bottleneck in the hobby...

Fair enough... this is an extract kit. Link to the full instructions. Start with 2.5 gallons of water. I use the grocery store Spring Water bottles as my source. 0.5 lbs Gambrinus Honey Malt - 20 minute steep, I did it at 150 degrees held temperature for 20 minutes versus the directions. 1...

Brewed 2 weeks ago. Used a 1.5L starter... it didn't flocculate overnight in the fridge so I ended up letting it warming up and pitching the entire starter. I got the yeast by mail and it was quite warm when it arrived, I was worried about the viability. It fermented intially in the mid 70's F...

It's much easier to let the beer take its time once you have a few batches under your belt and lots of bottles to drink. My third batch is on Day 15... I haven't taken a gravity reading yet... and the krausen is still pretty thick. But I'm feeling nowhere near the rush to get it into bottles for...

While the CO2 output appeared about the same pace, there are definitely some big differences. I cracked open the real fermenter today to do a gravity measurement and it has a huge krausen layer with large foam bubbles on top... so I closed it back up untouched. So I'm in the dark on what the...

A week later, I decided to chill one down just to see what I ended up with. They carbonated pretty well. It probably could have been okay with 5 ounces. Pre-fridge it was crystal clear. After... well, now I know what chill haze is. I used a wort chiller and took it from boiling to 70 degrees...

I measured the gravity of the experiment today... it's on the recipe final on the dot. CO2 activity is essentially zero. The real fermenter has stopped as well. I absolutely see the yeast suspension differentiation... it's highly transparent at the top and the transition line to cloudy is...

At some time yesterday the top layer and most of the krausen fell to the bottom in the experiment. This morning, there's a very distinct layer of suspended particles about 1/10th of an inch from the surface. What little CO2 bubbles that are still rising don't interact with the layer or disturb...

Good to know I'm not the only one. After about 16 hours it's somewhat dull in comparison to the beginning. It did blow the top off overnight that was rubberbanded on. The real fermenter is bubbling away as well. Much of the yeast that was on the bottom is now on the top and there are...

I'm on my third brew. I use a plastic bucket primary, so I've never really seen what's happening on the inside. In other words... noob. This time I used the sample for original gravity in a glass and I added the tiny bit of left over liquid yeast. It's been very interesting so far! CO2...

On day 12 the gravity still read 1.009 and the temp difference had dropped, so I went to crash. I could only get it down to 42 or so, and it got 4 days worth of cold crash. I bottled it cold, and ended up adjusting the sugar downward to about 4 ounces to compensate (Hopefully that works!). It...

Just an update... Day 10 and it's down to 1.009 or so, below the recipe FG. Some Krausen still left on top with a 3 degree F temp delta. I started to question the LCD temp strip on the fermenter ... I stuck some water in the fridge and it cooled down to the set temp, and I measured the temp of...

Thanks for the feedback... I'll go with your suggestion!

I'm working on my second batch. It's a Blonde Ale using Wyeast American Ale yeast. Today is day 7 with fermentation starting within 10 hours, and airlock activity largely stopped at day 5. It's still 3 degrees F warmer than the 60 degree setting on the wine fridge so the yeast are still up to...