I think this one may have come out pretty darned good

[rossscottnz]

Ok this is from the third batch of beer I have ever brewed and is my first successful one, I just had to have a taste test after 1 week of carbing up in my old fridge that I have out in the garage where it is nice and cool even with it turned off. I carbed half of the batch with soft brown sugar and the other half with carbonation drops. The beer in the pic was carbed with soft brown sugar and I liked how it tasted. The rest is going to be left longer for conditioning in the fridge (with it turned on of course) ABV 4.2%

 

[doug293cz]

If you are bottle conditioning at less than room temperatures, you may need to wait longer for your beers to fully carbonate. It usually takes most beers 2-3 weeks to fully carbonate at room temperature. It takes much longer if conditioning at cooler temps, as yeast work slower the cooler it gets.

Brew on

 

[rossscottnz]

If you are bottle conditioning at less than room temperatures, you may need to wait longer for your beers to fully carbonate. It usually takes most beers 2-3 weeks to fully carbonate at room temperature. It takes much longer if conditioning at cooler temps, as yeast work slower the cooler it gets.

Brew on

Hey thanks for that pointer I just went out and shut the refrigerator off and pulled the beer out of there and covered it with some cardboard to keep the sun off it to let the beer come back up to the temperature inside the garage as I do not want to screw this up as it tastes so good.

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

As many pitfalls as there is in this hobby, it is my opinion that a reasonably careful brewer will make better tasting beer than a commercial one 9 times out of ten. Since apparently your first two weren’t great, that means you have 17 more good ones in your future. Cheers!!

 

[rossscottnz]

As many pitfalls as there is in this hobby, it is my opinion that a reasonably careful brewer will make better tasting beer than a commercial one 9 times out of ten. Since apparently your first two weren’t great, that means you have 17 more good ones in your future. Cheers!!

hope I get more than 17 more good ones lol, my first two I brewed about 8 years ago first one tasted absolutely foul and the second one tasted worse than the first one and it made your mouth go numb so I poured it all down the drain and sold my brewing gear. 8 years later I am giving it another go I also have wine brewing and that has been successful so far due to lessons learned from previous mistakes with the beer.

 

[Sparkncode]

Yep learning lessons helps.
Once you get the water, sanitation and fermentation temperature sorted its kind of hard to make really bad beer so now you have a good one you are on the right track.

 

[JohnSand]

Congratulations! Good beer is it's own reward.

 

[rossscottnz]

I think I may have lost most of this batch I used swing top bottles that I had purchased secondhand some of the beer has fully carbonated and some are as flat as a pancake and they are going into week 3 since bottling, I suspect some of them may have worn out seals so I ordered some new ones to replace all of the seals that are on the bottles. Have also bought a bottle capper as I am going to crown seal the batch I have brewing now into some brand new bottles I bought that take crown seals. Lesson learned here when buying secondhand swing top bottles change the damn seals before they get put to use to avoid losing the beer.

 

[Sparkncode]

Thats irritating after getting a successful batch but at least easially solvable for the next batch. You could open the bottles and drop a carbonation drop or two in as required and replace the seal if they have truely leaked out and finised the last carbonation sugar and put a new seal on at the same time and maybe save those bottles of beer if you spray some starsan on the new seals etc.

I do like the idea of swing caps but the sealing concers me so so far I have used crown caps.

 

[rossscottnz]

Thats irritating after getting a successful batch but at least easially solvable for the next batch. You could open the bottles and drop a carbonation drop or two in as required and replace the seal if they have truely leaked out and finised the last carbonation sugar and put a new seal on at the same time and maybe save those bottles of beer if you spray some starsan on the new seals etc.

I do like the idea of swing caps but the sealing concers me so so far I have used crown caps.

Yes it is very irritating but a valuable lesson learned what alerted me to the possibility of faulty seals is the bottle that I opened I was able to take that seal off the cap with no resistance.

 

[gunhaus]

Ouch - THAT brings back bad memories! I have kegged for some time, but i still bottle some things, for various reasons. I make a hard cider that my son is especially fond of, and he asked me to make him a batch that was bottled. No worries, we made the cider and it came out especially nice. We primed it and I bottled it all up, and we set it aside to do it's thing. About a month later we took it "up to the cabin" for a little weekend hunt with a couple of his buddies. He grabs a bottle from the cooler and say's. "HEY, when did you start using twist tops?"

I got that really bad sinking, pit-of-the-tummy feeling . . .

I do not know exactly HOW I managed to NOT fully seat and crimp the caps - My system SHOULD, but did not apparently preclude that possibility. And almost all the caps were loose enough to pop off with little hand pressure. Needless to say they were quite flat, and the few we tried were clearly starting to spoil.

That is a sad feeling to loose a fine batch of brew is that manner. But it does remind ya to double check everything!

 

[rossscottnz]

I am going to try the suggestion that sparkncode made and drop some more carbonation drops into the bottles and change those darned seals hell i may even drop a hop pellet into each bottle too (or is that a bad idea with the hop pellets)

 

[JohnSand]

I have 'bottle hopped' beer, even carbed beer. A small amount won't hurt, but will of course leave hops in the bottle. If any float after chilling, just tap the neck and they'll sink.

 

[rossscottnz]

I have changed all of the seals and dropped one carbonation drop per bottle into them even though the bottles are 750ml as some were slightly carbed along with a hop pellet each (triskel pellets) I will give it a couple of weeks and see how it goes. It may only be a coopers real ale kit but may as well try my best to save it.

 

[rossscottnz]

Just a quick update i opened a bottle today and changing seals and just dropping one carbonation drop into the bottles to get carbonation level up has worked was very lively as soon as you opened the bottle (was like opening up a can of coke that had been shaken) so i finally got to enjoy a nice cold beer out of my first batch, apart from getting hop flakes in my mouth it was darned good and i can honestly say that this batch has been saved from going down the drain thanks to the advice given in this thread

 

[divrack]

It's a shame none told you not to put a Pellet in .

 

[rossscottnz]

It's a shame none told you not to put a Pellet in .

I do not have a beer jug to pour the beer into was fine on the first glass but once the hops and sediment stirred up thats when i got the hop bits but didn't worry me

 

[rossscottnz]

Cheers!!!!!!!

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

Well I wish I’d had my wherewithals to warn of leaky seals back when it might have meant something. Flip top bottles are super cool and leak like emmer effers if the seals aren’t good. I know this from experience. Glad you were able to salvage the batch and learn a lesson or two. Looks like some good beer. As a side note, I heard that if you want a nice malty beer a little calcium chloride goes a long way.

 

[El Nino]

Looks great man! The problem I'm currently having is my beer disappears too dang fast. I thought 2.5 gallon batches would last me a while, but I didn't factor in my friends/family liking my beer. 2 gallons worth can be gone with 1 good party lol.

 

[rossscottnz]

Looks great man! The problem I'm currently having is my beer disappears too dang fast. I thought 2.5 gallon batches would last me a while, but I didn't factor in my friends/family liking my beer. 2 gallons worth can be gone with 1 good party lol.

I am experiencing the same issue but it is only me drinking it but my sleeping at night has improved lol

 

[rossscottnz]

Well I wish I’d had my wherewithals to warn of leaky seals back when it might have meant something. Flip top bottles are super cool and leak like emmer effers if the seals aren’t good. I know this from experience. Glad you were able to salvage the batch and learn a lesson or two. Looks like some good beer. As a side note, I heard that if you want a nice malty beer a little calcium chloride goes a long way.

The beer is tasting pretty good for a kit beer as much as i like a nice malty beer i am more of a fan of beers loaded with hops (you could say i am a hop head) which is what i did with the latest brew i just bottled 5 days ago but this one may be sitting for a while to let the yeast taste settle out. Also thanks for the tip about the calcium chloride will keep that in mind if i do go for a malty beer at some point

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

The beer is tasting pretty good for a kit beer as much as i like a nice malty beer i am more of a fan of beers loaded with hops (you could say i am a hop head) which is what i did with the latest brew i just bottled 5 days ago but this one may be sitting for a while to let the yeast taste settle out. Also thanks for the tip about the calcium chloride will keep that in mind if i do go for a malty beer at some point

They said that conversely calcium sulfate will help to emphasize hop character for a west coast IPA. They suggested a 1:1.5 ratio with the sulfate being higher up to 200PPM for chloride for NEIPAs.

 

[rossscottnz]

They said that conversely calcium sulfate will help to emphasize hop character for a west coast IPA. They suggested a 1:1.5 ratio with the sulfate being higher up to 200PPM for chloride for NEIPAs.

That is definitely something to consider if I can get it here in new zealand