First time brewer with questions

[Paradisebrews]

Since this coronavirus is going around I decided to brew some beer at home so I can avoid the shady convenience stores to buy beer there.

Anyway, I found a recipe online to make beer. I'm not distilling this batch. What I'm doing is this. I bought a 5 gallon bucket with sealing lid at the hardware store. The stores at where I live is stripped with empty shelves so I could only get red star yeast, I think it's bread yeast. I heard that's not very good to use but I'm stilling going to use it. Any advice with fast acting red star yeast brand? I'm also using possibly a mix match of white and brown raw sugar.

Like I said earlier I'm not distilling it. What I'm doing will the end result be safe to drink? Any advice?

 

[jrgtr42]

There's a lot to take away here -
What are you using for your fermentables, just the sugar? That's not really beer, then.
If you want to get into this hobby, there's a whole lot of stuff to get into.
There's a kit called Mr. Beer. It includes a can of (for all intents and purposes) concentrates, unfermented beer. It's probably the easiest way to get into it.
Beer is really 4 main ingredients: malted barley, hops, water and yeast.
To simplify things, you would first make essentially an oatmeal with the barley and water. You'd then drain the water off into a big pot, then boil, adding hops at given times.
Once that is done, cool it off to roughly room temp, then add the yeast. A couple weeks later you have been.
There's stuff called extract that basically takes the first step and concentrates it, you'd then dissolve that in water and boil.
I guess the thing I'm trying to say is that brewing is not something to just do on a whim.
And distilling is specifically for spirits- whiskey, vodka, etc, to concentrate the alcohol to to the 40+ percent that spirits require.

 

[Paradisebrews]

I Don't have hops, I don't even know where to get that. I was joking with my girl that I'm probably making pruno more than beer. I don't have much in ingredients and hope the water, yeast and sugar works. We are not really looking for anything fancy. Just a buzz. Going to let it settle for 3-10 days.

 

[McKnuckle]

If you're just looking to get loaded, buy a jug of organic fruit juice (without the preservative called sorbate - check the ingredients) and toss the yeast into that. It will ferment and give you a strong, alcoholic, fruity drink. What you're describing, however, is not beer at all.

 

[jack13]

^yep, do that. You don't have the equipment to carbonate your beverage, and the fruit wine described above will be better flat than your original plan (which would be, I suppose hard seltzer but without the fizz?)

 

[mongoose33]

Agree with all the above. Good on you, though, for exploring this.

If you are serious about getting into the beer-brewing thing and have a few resources available....

....consider buying a kit from an online retailer. It will come with everything you need for ingredients. You can also buy some pretty great kits that include ALL the equipment you need except for bottles and a source of heat to boil. You can get such a kit from morebeer:

https://www.morebeer.com/products/premium-home-brewing-kit.html

It's $239 (free shipping) and includes everything, as I said, except bottles and a source of heat to boil. It even includes your choice of an ingredient kit.

This is as good a deal on a kit as I've ever seen. Nothing is close.

********

If that's not within your resources right now, it'll be harder to brew beer you'll recognize as beer. I've got a fair amount of experience doing this, and making do with sketchy ingredients is a real challenge for experienced brewers.

You might be better off to just have someone deliver beer to you at curbside, spray it down with disinfectant, and get it that way.

On the other hand, if you like learning new things--and what better to learn about than brewing your own beer?--then this could be a lot of fun.

Either way, welcome and good luck as you move forward.

 

[Paradisebrews]

Well this is what I have been reading on chemical reactions

Can you make alcohol with just water sugar and yeast?

Making Moonshine the Simple Way. Making sugar wash moonshine using a simple Sugar wash is a mix of water, sugar, and yeast necessary in the fermentation of alcohol. ... When a sugar wash comes into contact with a strain of yeast, over time the yeast will start to feed off the sugars and grow.

I'm not going to be distilling it to make liquor so the alcohol from the sugar, water, yeast should be there after fermentation? (converted into ethanol and carbon dioxide) Possibly making 20% ABV. This is my educated guess.

 

[jack13]

Well this is what I have been reading on chemical reactions

Can you make alcohol with just water sugar and yeast?

Making Moonshine the Simple Way. Making sugar wash moonshine using a simple Sugar wash is a mix of water, sugar, and yeast necessary in the fermentation of alcohol. ... When a sugar wash comes into contact with a strain of yeast, over time the yeast will start to feed off the sugars and grow.

I'm not going to be distilling it to make liquor so the alcohol from the sugar, water, yeast should be there after fermentation? (converted into ethanol and carbon dioxide) Possibly making 20% ABV. This is my educated guess.

There was never a question of whether you'll end up with alcohol. You will--it just won't taste good, and certainly will not be beer.

As far as the %...that will depend on how much sugar and what kind of yeast. Assuming you'll use plenty of sugar, the limiting factor will be the alcohol tolerance of the yeast. As the yeast turn the sugar into alcohol, fermentation will stop when either a) there is no more fermentable sugar left or b) the alcohol level reaches a critical point and the yeast die. In normal brewing 'a' usually happens first, but in your case b may happen first. Since you're using a yeast not usually used for this purpose, its alcohol tolerance may not be published. But it's worth googling.

 

[Paradisebrews]

There was never a question of whether you'll end up with alcohol. You will--it just won't taste good, and certainly will not be beer.

As far as the %...that will depend on how much sugar and what kind of yeast. Assuming you'll use plenty of sugar, the limiting factor will be the alcohol tolerance of the yeast. As the yeast turn the sugar into alcohol, fermentation will stop when either a) there is no more fermentable sugar left or b) the alcohol level reaches a critical point and the yeast die. In normal brewing 'a' usually happens first, but in your case b may happen first. Since you're using a yeast not usually used for this purpose, its alcohol tolerance may not be published. But it's worth googling.

Your reply answered most of my questions and the best of them all. A) I wanted to know if this type of brewing was going to make alcohol. B) I wanted to know if it was going to be safe to drink.

I was going to start brewing today but decided to wait until I asked some questions to professionals in this field. i.e you folks. As soon as I wake up tomorrow I'm going to start the cleaning process and then brew a little over a gallon of the batch. I'll give it 10 days and check out the final product. I'll try to take pictures and tell you people how it turned out.

 

[Bubbles2]

Label Peeler or Northern Brewer (Online) "You know that thing you are surfing on". You are about to make Sugar Head for Distilling, It will be a waste of money and time for your application.

 

[Alex4mula]

Buy some NyQuil and call it a day. You can drink your mouth wash too to get alcohol.

 

[bracconiere]

Since this coronavirus is going around I decided to brew some beer at home so I can avoid the shady convenience stores to buy beer there.

Anyway, I found a recipe online to make beer. I'm not distilling this batch. What I'm doing is this. I bought a 5 gallon bucket with sealing lid at the hardware store. The stores at where I live is stripped with empty shelves so I could only get red star yeast, I think it's bread yeast. I heard that's not very good to use but I'm stilling going to use it. Any advice with fast acting red star yeast brand? I'm also using possibly a mix match of white and brown raw sugar.

Like I said earlier I'm not distilling it. What I'm doing will the end result be safe to drink? Any advice?

you're going to need nutrients for the yeast...i've drank sugar washes mixed with coke, ferment them to about 16% then mix, but i used a wheat germ tea to fuel the yeast....not too bad....

 

[bracconiere]

We are not really looking for anything fancy. Just a buzz.

remember i'm your only friend here then...lol, if they cuss you out TOO much, PM before you rage quit....


and Welcome! not everyone here is stick up their ass serious!!

 

[khannon]

I might look into "freeze distilling".. Without Water, barley, hops, and water, you don't have beer..

All of this being said, and yeast might be a limiting factor, but I do a Ginger "beer" that for 10 gallons is
sliced fresh and powdered ginger, I usually do a few lbs of fresh, and powdered depending on how much fresh I picked up.
1lb mixed lemons and limes(I just blend them all and add after boiling)
~20lbs sugar
1 to 2 packets dry yeast
I've added hops, molasses, etc.. to change it up over the years, and I carbonate(naturally or kegging), but it probably wouldn't be horrible flat.
In a 10 gallon batch depending on the amount of sugar I end up at 8-10%abv

Scale this if you are doing a smaller batch! (cut in half for a 5 gal bucket)

What I do is start water to a boil
Add ginger
remove heat
add sugar
resume boil
boil for a bit
remove from heat
add pureed lemons and limes(while still hot, I like to add at ~180F)
cover, and let it cool
add yeast at ~80F(this depends on the type of yeast, if redstar is all that's available, ~80 should be fine)
ferment with airlock(look this up, it will help, there are ways other than commercial airlocks)
carbonate and serve, though I'm sure if freeze distilled, it would make a great apertif(or whatever you call it).
If you are stuck and still want to carb, without availability to equipment, try plastic soda bottles, they hold pressure fairly well, and are pretty available(unless you are like me and never have soda around). Once you are done fermenting, transfer liquid to the bottles, add some more sugar(there are suggestions and calculators) and wait

I usually end up with something close to reed's ginger ale, and it makes a great moscow mule or dark and stormy.

This being said, you are going to get nowhere beer or anything pleasant from a sugar wash and bread yeast without some research(and probably some ingredients and equipment).

Also, hardware buckets are not "food safe", I would not recommend (at least long term, lockdown might be different), and if you do use one, at least wait until things are cooled(80F) to put liquid into.

Also, great idea on the fruit wines, search for apfelwine(sp?) or others on this forum, there are some great things you can make, unfortunately, almost anything you try to do is going to take a week or two.. We may not be out of the woods by then, but there should be a clearer picture.

Good luck, and maybe this takes you into brewing...

 

[bracconiere]

Without Water, barley, hops, and water, you don't have beer..

leave out the hops, and you have "Malt Liquor"....