First non-kit batch!!!

[marshman]

Well, I just finished my first totally non-kit batch of beer. Still using my Mr. Beer mini-keg, but planning to use a 2d fermenter for the last 10 days.

I adjusted the kaduva IPA recipe I found here. Decided to use amber LME because it seemed a bit more interesting to me for some reason. Couldn't score any Chinook, so I started with some Kent Goldings pellets, and then used the Cascade/Northern pellets for the boil. I bought some leaf Cascades for the secondary, which I figger is about a week to 10 days off.

Had an ugly boilover at the beginning which seemed to blow all of the initial hops out of the 'wort', so I added a bit extra...think that was a bad idea? Naaaah, there's no such thing as too much hops!

The house smells great.

I think I love those Cascades...

You folks have been a great help...Thanks!

 

[mysterio]

Good luck!

You're right, no such thing as too much hops

 

[Axegod]

Its a good feeling getting away from kits. (not that kits are bad).
Its the idea of having more control over the ingredients..and the fun of experimentation - not to mention a bit of cost savings.

Good Luck !

 

[marshman]

I probably went through 10 Mr. Beer batches , but the first time I found a local supply store I started hot-rodding my kits...using can'o'malt and instead of the booster/corn sugar, trying to slip in extra hops, priming with brown sugar, extra honey in the 'wort'...but going on my own is pretty cool.

 

[Engelramm]

Tonight I got wild and used a Brewers Best kit for an English Brown Ale and adjusted it to match the Style Rrecipes in Papazian's The Complete Joy of Homebrewing.
I'm on my 4th batch and I'm feelin' crazy! :rockin:

 

[Monk]

I love this thread. You guys have the spirit! Keep on brewing and sharing your experiences. Cheers...

monk

 

[Yuri_Rage]

Echo Monk on the great thread. Kits are a great way to get started, and some folks never leave 'em behind. As for me, I find myself wanting more and more control each time I brew. Been doing the partial mash thing lately, but I'm going ALL GRAIN next! Can't wait to give it a shot.

 

[the_bird]

I've got the same IPA in bottles right now, needs another two weeks of conditioning. I'm not sure if Walker-san developed the recipe or not, but I stole it from his site. I screwed up and forgot to get the Chinock from the HBS, didn't realize it until I had already started steeping, so I used the Cascades I bought for dryhopping as my bittrering hops (I got more later so I could also dry-hop). I'm sure it won't have quite the kick that it *should* have, but I've been assured from the master himself that it'll still probably be pretty good, just not quite as bitter.

 

[marshman]

I think I'm a bit loose in the terminology department, but here goes...I'm not interested, as I understand it, in 'bitterness' for itself. I'm intersted in the beautiful, citrus-sy aroma from my favoritest IPAs. The Cascades, when raw, at least, seem to be a step in the right direction. The trick is that my favorite IPAs are all up in the mid 7% alcohol range, so I'm hoping to get something with the hop kick but a bit lower alcohol content.

Could I bottle with a sprig of hop?

 

[pariah]

I think I'm a bit loose in the terminology department, but here goes...I'm not interested, as I understand it, in 'bitterness' for itself. I'm intersted in the beautiful, citrus-sy aroma from my favoritest IPAs. The Cascades, when raw, at least, seem to be a step in the right direction. The trick is that my favorite IPAs are all up in the mid 7% alcohol range, so I'm hoping to get something with the hop kick but a bit lower alcohol content.

Could I bottle with a sprig of hop?

No, don't do that. You do what's called dry hopping, where you put hops into the secondary fermenter.

You can use pellets or whole hops leaves. Pellets were actually invented for the purpose of dry hopping, but the crushing they undergo may reduce the amount of aroma you will get out of them.

I recently dry hopped an IPA with 1 oz of whole cascade. Man, that was a mistake. It took me 20 very messy minutes to get the hops leaves out of the glass carboy...next time I am using pellets. Additionally, I didn't sterilize my whole leaves, and I introduced a wild yeast of some sort that ruined my beer! Its still beer, sort of, but that wild yeast really ****ed things up for me. It's very dry and has a strong pineapple flavor.

Sterilizing the whole leaves is a problem too. You can boil them, but the aroma agents in hops are very water soluble so you have to worry about them going into the water and evaporating out. I think steaming them would probably work though...and make sure you put the water they were in into the secondary as well.

 

[marshman]

Hey, Pariah, I actually did know the answer to that one. I have an ounce of vacuum-packed leaf cascades, some of which I plan to use for dry-hopping when I transfer.

I did NOT know about the sterilizing of the hops, though. I'm guessing that they're presently sterile in their packaging, but can't really imagine how to get them out and into the secondary. I'm thinking of using some sort of cheesecloth-baggie-sort-of-deal for the hassle factor, however.

Hmmm. Hops