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Thanks. Will go back to reading more in the meantime...

Thank you for your quick and informative response. As a follow-up to this, I was thinking about buying a manual hand pump for the keg. It seems like a good idea, and I'm afraid that adding CO2 from the injector will stir up the yeast at the bottom, so having it condition and settle will have...

Hello, I just bought all the necessary replacement parts to get my 3-gallon used keg operational. Instead of using a CO2 tank, I bought an injector with cartridges. Because this is the first time that I will be doing this, I have some very basic questions: 1. With the injector attached, when...

I marked my carboy at what seemed like the 5-gallon mark, but I eyeballed it based on the water volume in my bottling bucket. That would explain why my past batches had skewed gravity readings. The gallon jug way will be a lot more accurate...and I already swiped a Sharpie from my office to mark...

Thanks so much for that quick and enlightening response! I didn't add any more water after the partial boil, which seems to be the culprit here. In the future, I'll use the OG posted on the recipe kit and just take a final before bottling to make sure that fermentation is over and to get my ABV...

Hello, I recently bottled my latest batch and was somewhat confused by the numbers from my pre-bottling readings. The recipe instructions said that I should expect a brew with an ABV of just over 4% (Northern Brewer's Biere de Table), but my OG was 1.051 and FG was 1.008, for an ABV of 5.6%...

Thank you for your thorough explanations! There were a lot of problems with that batch: the hops were not loose in the kettle but rather in a tight bag, so the beer ended up bland, and maybe I got the carbonating sugar proportions wrong because when I finally decided to dump the lot a few weeks...

Hi, I recently experimented with secondary fermentation for the first time. I figured that this was another necessary step in the homebrewing learning process. I let the beer sit in my secondary fermenter for over 2 weeks before bottling. Then, after conditioning in bottles for another 2...

Hi Everyone, I recently bought two new products for my homebrewing arsenal: Star San and a bottle rinser. I'm wondering, because Star San should be left for a minute in whatever is being sanitized, are a few sprays of the solution using the bottle rinser enough? I'm planning to experiment with...

This is all good advice for future batches, but for this one? Should I make a tea out of the hops I used and add it to my secondary? I tossed the bag away yesterday, but pulled it out earlier today. I figure I can sanitize it, add the loose hops to a French press, and voila...

Thanks. I went back to fermenting in a bucket after making a few batches in a carboy, so I couldn't use a funnel. Never thought about a paint strainer. I appreciate the tip!

Hmm, thank you. How do I make a "hop tea"? Are there any specific proportions? Do I add it during secondary? I'm relatively new to this (it's only my fourth batch), so any advice from an expert is greatly appreciated...

Hello, I recently realized that I'd forgotten to add hop bags to my last supply order, so instead of dropping hop pellets directly into my brew pot, I placed them into a bouquet garni bag, which I use for slow-cooking or making soup. I'm concerned that because these bags have a very fine mesh...

Thanks, guys. VanHolton - that's exactly what I'm thinking. The alcohol content is somewhat high, and the coffee came in an airtight bag. The instructions didn't mention sanitizing it in any way, even though they were anal about sanitizing everything else along the way in most steps. I...

Hello, My current batch is a first attempt at adding extra ingredients and secondary fermentation, and I have a few questions. My Peace Coffee Stout (Northern Brewer extract kit) is in secondary. I racked it last night after 9 days in primary, even though fermentation seemed to have...

Hi Everyone, I'm planning to brew another batch this weekend (cooler fall temperatures are here at last!), and I'm already reviewing mistakes and lessons learned from previous experiences. In the past, I usually worked with only about a gallon of water in my brew pot, which produced a more...

Autumn is just around the corner. My latest batch is conditioning, and I'm taking a break in this heat until September. Then maybe pick some apples and pears and make some cider or perry...

Thanks, elpenoso! Seems that no matter what mistake one makes, it's hard to be a pioneer - someone has done it before. I'll be able to sleep without tossing and turning tonight...

Because of my excitement at finally being able to bottle my latest batch, I racked my fermented beer to another carboy to bottle. Only then did I realize that the sauce pan with the cooled and dissolved priming sugar was hiding untouched behind the other equipment! I added it slowly through a...

I made my first batch from a kit last month, and it fermented out in about 2 days because the temperature was constantly between 74 and 80 degrees. I was thrilled that the beer tasted like beer, but now, I can definitely taste estery off flavors in it. I'm currently fermenting another batch...