First Batch Brewing notes

[Donutz]

I want to post this because last night I had NO clue about the yeast. A lot of people said that I should of hydrated the yeast and I should have added it when the wort was much cooler (per the instructions I got, I put it in at 80 degrees). Based on this, I want to post exactly what I did so that I can get hints, tips, suggestions, etc. BTW, last night was my first brew and I didn't know half of anything of what I was doing other than reading a sheet of instructions and trying to guess that I was following the sheet correctly!!! Here is basically what I did:
Washed everything with dawn then sanitized everything with Ion- Star Sanitizer. First Gallon for wort was tap water. Once water was at a boil, removed from the burner and put both containers of malt in the water (one can was from the kit (Muntons IPA Bitter 4lbs and the other was from the home brew shop... no clue on brand or weight, but I would guess it too was 4 lbs). Mixed until it was blended well. Put pot back on the burner and added one ounce of hops (cascade 7.3%). Weighted for the water to come back up to a boil and boiled for 2 full minutes. Removed the pot from the burner and put the pot in the sink with ice water around the pot. Home brew shop said it should only take 12-16 minutes for it to cool but it took almost 3 hours for it to cool to 80 degrees. In fermenter bucket, I put 1 gallon of bottled spring water. Once the Wort was at 80 degrees, I added it to the fermenter bucket. I then added approx 3 more gallons of water (charcoal filtered tap water from the fridge). I took a hydrometer reading it it was at 1.05. Sprinkled packet of safale US-05 yeast on top of the water. Put lid on the bucket and airlock and moved to storing area.

Forgive me for any spelling/grammar mistakes. Also, I might not be calling things by the correct name because I just don't know proper names yet! I was a craft beer drinker...not a beer cooker!!! LOL. Anyhow, please tell me everything and anything that I did wrong or what I should or can do to improve my beer. Lastly, I was told to wait 4-5 days before I add the second batch of hops which is also one oz of Cascade 7.3%. He gave it to me in a cheesecloth bag (plastic bag inside with the hops to keep them fresh)... But I have no clue what to do here. Do I just add them to the wort at the temperature that it sits? Do I add the hops straight or leave them in the cheese cloth? Do I have to re-boil the wort? And lastly, I haven't strained anything yet... it is all in the bucket!!! His directions never told me to strain anything (is this normal)?

 

[GrogNerd]

sounds a lot better than my first attempt at brewing.

biggest issue is pitching temp, you should get a little lower than 80°. get it below what you're going to be fermenting at and let it rise

rehydrating is best, but the yeast will get the job done without it

sanitizing EVERYTHING is not necessary. remember this: clean everything, sanitize everything after the boil

means sanitize the cheesecloth bag, but not the hops, tie it off (maybe some sanitized glass/stainless marbles for ballast) and drop it in.

some strain, some don't.

 

[unionrdr]

Dish soap isn't the best for cleaning brew equipment. PBW is made for this.Dish soap has a sheeting enzyme in it that kills head on the beer. And never boil pre-hopped extracts. It changes the flavor/aroma hop profiles rto bittering & can darken the color. Adding it all at the beginning of the boil can give "extract twang",a sort of cooked extract flavor. But a 2 minute boil would minimalize these things somewhat.
Use plain extract in the boil,say 2lbs or so in 2.5-3.5 gallons of water. Do your hop additions & chill asap. I put the kettle in the sink & fill the sink with cold tap water till the water warms to knock off some of the initial heat. Drain the sink,then fill to the rim with ice. Then top that off with cold tap water to bring the temp down to 75F or so.
I strain the chilled wort into the fermenter with a large,dual layer fine mesh strainer. Gets the gunk out for less trub later. It also airates the wort. Then pour in well chilled spring water to recipe volume I stir roughly 3-5 minutes to mix the top off water & wort more. It'll airate more as well.
Sprinkling dry yeast on as is will work. But rehydrating it in water for 30 minutes at no more than 10 degrees above current wort temp will give a healthier yeast pitch to start with. As you gain experience,you can rehydrate in a flask at,say,80-90F. I use 400mL of warm water this way. Getting the rehydrate down to within 10 degrees of current wort temp helps prevent shocking the yeast into settling out,or worse.
And as stated,sanitize the hop sack before filling & dry hopping. But wait till the beer hits FG & settles out clear or slightly misty before dry hopping 5-7 days.

 

[Rhumbline]

If you waited for the wort to reach 80 and then added several gallons of water your temp was probably fine.

I generally stay away from dishwashing soap, especially anything scented.
You typically boil for 60 minutes.
1.05 sounds really low for SG, but that might just be the brews I do.
you can put the hops in the cheesecloth bag if you want, no reboiling.
Don't sweat the junk in the fermenter, it'll be fine.

Look around on Youtube for some basic brewing videos, there's some really good ones on there that cover the basics.

You will probably make beer, it's maybe not going to be what you were expecting.

good luck, don't dump it, regardless of what you think. Let us know how it turns out.

 

[jtratcliff]

Have a look at the book "how to brew" by John Palmer. It'll answer a lot of your questions. The 1st edition is online for free (some best practices have changed since it came out, so you should also look at the newer edition and ask questions here!)

 

[unionrdr]

You can also check out craigtube on youtube. He's been brewing for some 25 years & does it all from all extract to all grain. He has some down to Earth,easy to follow brewing videos.

 

[RM-MN]

You did fine. Apparently you got pre-hopped malt extract since you didn't need to boil for an hour. That's fine for a starter batch but you will learn to make better beer. The hops you added are called flavor hops because you boiled them but not very long. You hops you add later will be aroma hops and you can put them in fermenter in the cheesecloth bag or just dump them in with no bag at all.

I would have preferred that you cool the wort more before you added the yeast but I've done it that way and still got beer. Try to keep the fermenter cool (low to mid 60's) for the first 3-4 days if you can, you'll get better tasting beer that way than if you leave it at room temp.

I'd suggest you do some reading before your next batch. A book that I think does a nice job of explaining the brewing process and why you do things a certain way is "How to Brew" by John Palmer. I like having the paper copy because it has corrections that the online version does not but I'm impressed that he has released the entire first edition online for free. www.howtobrew.com Once you have a little more info, you will find that there is more yet available here on Homebrewtalk but it isn't as organized as Palmer's book.