First Home Brew Ever - Lessons Learned

[koenigwi]

For my first brew, I made a Gluten Free Ale kit from Brewer's Best which uses liquid sorghum extract. The box says:

• IBUs: 16 - 18
• OG: 1.049 to 1.053
• ABV: 5.25% to 5.75%

GEARING UP:
I'm using a brew kit that my wife got me for Christmas (thanks!) and supplemented it with a homemade 25' x 3/8" wort chiller ($15 from Menards); an 18" paddle, a floating thermometer, and some Star San ($9, $6, and $10 respectively from my local home brew store), and a cheapo propane turkey fryer with a 7.5 gal aluminum pot ($30 on clearance from Walmart).


BREWING:
I washed everything last weekend with the powdered cleaner that came in the kit and stored it in a clean spot until last night. I also meausured water into my carboy so I'd know where the 5 gallon line was. The sharpie didn't stay on the glass very well, so I also measured the height of each line above the counter top and took pictures, figuring that I could remeasure in a snap if I lost the marks completely.

Last night seemed like the perfect time, so I got started at 7:45 after cleaning up from supper. I figured I'd be boiling in 30 minutes, transferring to the fermenter by 9:30 and cleaned up by 10:00 (mistake #1). So here's how it went.

• 7:45 - Started setting up in my garage. Ambient temp was 3 deg F. Left the door open for ventilation. I used hot tap water (~120 deg F) to fill my Carboy to 5.1 gal, planning to empty it into my brew pot since my pot wasn't marked for gallons. I figured I'd lose enough from boil off to get back down to 5 gal. I also filled my bottling bucket to 3 gal for sanitizer. I let the extract soak in hot water in the kitchen. I also hooked up the hose on the outside of the house and ran it to the wort chiller in my garage, planning to use the floor drain for discharge.
• 8:33 - Lit the fryer (finally).
• 9:00 - Couldn't believe it wasn't boiling yet. Temp was up to 180 deg F using the cheap dial thermometer from the fryer set. I wasn't sure how accurate it would be.
• 9:22 - Ambient temp had dropped to -4 deg F when I started the 1 hour boil and added the extract and maltodextrine. I kept a close watch and had no issue with boil-overs or the hop schedule. I stirred regularly, at least every few minutes.
• 10:00 - I realized what an idiot I was for planning to turn on a hose in sub zero weather, and ran down to the basement to check the mop sink. Lucky for me, the faucet had garden hose threads. If it hadn't, plan C would have been to cover the pot and set it in the snow outside. Less lucky for me, going to the mop sink meant carrying a full pot of boiling wort through the house and down the stairs.
• 10:05 - Put wort chiller in the pot to sanitize (it was previously soaking in my sanitizer bucket)
• 10:22 - Finished boil and carried the covered pot downstairs (soaked lid in sanitizer). I wore leather work gloves and considered soaking them in sanitizer before grabbing the pot, but decided that was a dumb idea. The gloves were still necessary, because the pot was hotter than my frozen hands realized.
• 10:28 - Started wort chiller. No problems. I kept checking the temperature and saw an obviously cooler area near the coils, so I occaisonally grabbed the chiller by the protruding ends and swirled it in the pot.
• 10:50 - Wort was down to 67 deg F, so I transferred it to the carboy. I used my racking cane and siphon hose, because I don't have an adequately sized funnel. It worked pretty well. I pulled a siphon with a 50mL syringe from my backpacking water filter kit (sanitized). I got occaisonal plugs, but nothing that didn't suck right out with the syringe. I had a hard time guessing the depth of my racking cane, so next time, I'll mark my racking cane for the desired depth before putting it in the pot(maybe 2" from the bottom). I tipped the pot up to get the last few drops off of the trub (right word?). OG was 1.062 before I transferred it, which was higher than expected.
• 11:10 - Finished transfer to carboy. Turned out to be maybe a tenth under 5 gal. I figured it was close enough and decided not to top it off. I pitched the yeast, and shook the ever loving sh** out of it. That wasn't in the directions, but it seemed like a good idea. I used a piece of plastic wrap soaked in sanitizer and wrapped around the rubber stopper while I shook it. Then I removed plastic wrap and added the valve. Since the stopper and the carboy were wet with sanitizer, the stopper kept wanting to squeeze up and out. I'd push it all the way down in and after about a minute, it would be barely 0.25" in. I was worried it would work itself out, so I tied it down. Effective, but seems like I shouldn't have to do it.
• 11:22 - Finished washing up. I scrubbed everything with soap and a scouring pad.
• 11:30 - Finished admiring my work and had a celebratory cocktail.

LESSONS LEARNED:

• Everything took longer than I expected. I should have expected that.
• 3 gal was a stupid volume to use for sanitizer, since Star San uses a 1oz:5gal ratio. I'll do 2.5 next time.
• When I figured 5.1 gallons for my brew pot, I didn't consider the nearly 0.5 gallon of extract that would be added later. Miraculously, it turned out just under 5 gallons.
• I need to mark 0.5 gallon increments on my pot. From my backpacking experience, I know I can hold a flat washer with a pair of vice grips and give it a whack with a hammer on the outside of the pot to make an indentation visible on the inside. I wouldn't want to etch it on the inside.
• Subzero is too cold to brew outside. I'm obviously too hardcore to be bothered by the cold, but it made everything else a little more difficult (no hose for wort chiller, cold hands, too much steam to see through, fear of temperature issues with the glass carboy, etc.). Also, it was cold outside.
• The turkey fryer thermometer turned out to be accurate at 212 deg F for the boil, but was terribly inaccurate below 150 deg F. It's made for higher temperatures (350 to 400 deg F), so no surprise there.
• I originally planned to use the longest spoon in kitchen (one of the missus' serving spoons), but it was only 1" longer than the wort was deep. Once the boil started and extract was added, it was several inches deeper with an inch or two of foam. I would have been screwed. The flat ended paddle was great and made me feel comfortable that nothing was scorching on the bottom.
• Speaking of spoons, I need somewhere to hang it. I had it soaking in the sanitizer before the boil, but then I didn't want to put it back in and get my sanitizer all dirty. I also didn't want to leave it in the pot to melt. I ended up using some bailing wire to make a hook hanging from the garage door track overhead. Hanging in mid air seemed as sanitary as I'd get. I told myself that there was no way I'd open the garage door with my paddle hanging from it, but then I was super bummed out when I opened the garage door with my paddle hanging from it! Down on the garage floor it went. Super sanitary.
• With the wort chiller sitting in the pot and the hoses hanging over the side, it's easy to let the hoses swing too close to the propane burner. I only sort of melted the hose connection. Still worked, though.
• The 15 minute timer on the cheap turkey fryer got me four times. It was really more like a 10 minute timer. There are lots of articles about bypassing it, but I didn't do it. I suspect the insurance company would take issue with bypassing a safety feature if it ever caused a fire.
• The 7.5 gallon pot that came with my cheap fryer is more like 6.5 gallons. I need to measure it to be sure, but it's certainly not as big as advertised.

QUESTIONS:

• Why would the OG be so high and what should I have done? Add more water to get it down? Was it a temperature issue? My hydrometer says it's calibrated for 60 deg F.
• Does ambient temperature affect the beer?
• Why would my stopper keep squeezing itself out?

WRAP UP:
That's it. I checked it this morning, and it was fermenting like crazy. I look forward to drinking this batch and brewing my next one!

 

[jbunton]

Yes you should temp correct your hydrometer readings and go from there as to whether you need to add water and how much. Ambient temp does affect your beer for fermentation. Stopper could be the wrong size or type. You sound like you did ok, had fun, and kept good notes. Good luck on your first beer!

 

[jbunton]

Oh and I bypassed my turkey fryer timer as ain't nobody got time for that! Brewing is busy enough without me having to press a damn button.