Good evening,
I was talking to a friend about brewing. I realized that, without a bit of research, a lot of standards we as homebrewers do might not be available without a good bit of research. This friend and I talked about sanitation, brewing practices, etc., And I wanted to try and break some rules to make a brew and see how it turns out.
Rule 1.) I did not use starsan. I sanitized all my equipment with boiling water and hydrogen peroxide from the dollar general. I have starsan, I personally think it is the gold standard for sanitizing, but this is an experiment. Boiling water and peroxide.
Rule 2.) I squeezed the bag. I've never squeezed the bag, I've heard horror stories about tannins and off flavors. I said screw it, squeezed the bag.
Rule 3.) Water. I have always used bottled spring water for brewing. This time, I used a publicly available mountain spring for the water. No additions, no nutrients, just water from this spout coming out of the mountain.
I am doing this experiment with two kits I am very familiar with- the Irish red ale kit and the dry Irish stout kit, both from northern Brewer. I am not a full grain brewer, between grad school and my kit, extract brewing is most convenient for me right now, and I figured would the average new brewer would start with extract anyways. Both are fairly malty, and the water profile around here has a good amount of chlorates.
I'll post an update in 4-5 weeks when the beers are bottled and carbonated. The purpose of this experiment is to see how a brew turns out when some standard homebrew conventions are broken. I am super excited to try my two favorite styles when I break a few rules making them. I also hope to let my friend know what, exactly, happens when things are brewed the way they intended to brew them before we talked.
Note: I did highly recommend my friend not do what I did. I am so excited to see how this turns out, I will keep y'all posted.
I was talking to a friend about brewing. I realized that, without a bit of research, a lot of standards we as homebrewers do might not be available without a good bit of research. This friend and I talked about sanitation, brewing practices, etc., And I wanted to try and break some rules to make a brew and see how it turns out.
Rule 1.) I did not use starsan. I sanitized all my equipment with boiling water and hydrogen peroxide from the dollar general. I have starsan, I personally think it is the gold standard for sanitizing, but this is an experiment. Boiling water and peroxide.
Rule 2.) I squeezed the bag. I've never squeezed the bag, I've heard horror stories about tannins and off flavors. I said screw it, squeezed the bag.
Rule 3.) Water. I have always used bottled spring water for brewing. This time, I used a publicly available mountain spring for the water. No additions, no nutrients, just water from this spout coming out of the mountain.
I am doing this experiment with two kits I am very familiar with- the Irish red ale kit and the dry Irish stout kit, both from northern Brewer. I am not a full grain brewer, between grad school and my kit, extract brewing is most convenient for me right now, and I figured would the average new brewer would start with extract anyways. Both are fairly malty, and the water profile around here has a good amount of chlorates.
I'll post an update in 4-5 weeks when the beers are bottled and carbonated. The purpose of this experiment is to see how a brew turns out when some standard homebrew conventions are broken. I am super excited to try my two favorite styles when I break a few rules making them. I also hope to let my friend know what, exactly, happens when things are brewed the way they intended to brew them before we talked.
Note: I did highly recommend my friend not do what I did. I am so excited to see how this turns out, I will keep y'all posted.
