First batch turned out well.

[brew4thewife]

Well I accomplished my first batch and it turned out well. It was a Honey Brown Ale. I found out the hard way that my stove and the SS pot I have don't work well. So out to the side burner of our grill I went to finish up the process. Even the side burner had a hard time keeping the wort at a rolling boil. Not sure what I need to get to be able to continue brewing. It took me over 4hrs to brew my first batch. Hopefully now that I have an understanding and better idea of what I need to do it will go smoother and faster.

One thing I messed up on is when I added the bottling sugar. I didn't mix it up. I was in such a hurry to get it bottled that I just dumped the sugar mix in the batch and started to bottle. Needless to say some of the bottles had a nice head when you opened them up and some didn't have any and then there were those that kind of erupted after you took the top off. But all in all they all tasted great.

Thanks for all the help and great information.

 

[unionrdr]

Next time,boil 2C of water & add the weighed priming sugar to that,stiring till dissolved. Cool a bit,then add to bottling bucket while racking beer into it.
And I have the same problem with our electric stove. A 5 gallon BK with 3 gallons of water is hard to get to a rolling boil. Thinking og getting a burner from gander mntn to boil in the garage. It takes us about 4 hours to get a boil & do the rest as well. So a gas burner to fit the SS BK would really speed up the process imo.

 

[brew4thewife]

I did boil per the directions, sorry I didn't make it clear. I just poured the cooled sugar mix in and started to bottle. I guess like all things, learn from experience. The issue I have now is that we really don't have anyplace cool enough to store the fermentation bucket. Our house is 80 in the summer for the most part. I guess it is wait until winter before we can brew again.

 

[unionrdr]

Or try the swamp cooler method. You can get by on that.