I want to start brewing beer

[whitesheperd]

Okay so I want to start brewing beer, I make wine and ciders, and about to start meads soon. Now beer is a bit different terms involved and involved a keg to carbonate. The only thing I have a problem with is the expense.. I will get the keg later down the road, I can drink non carbonated beer. But I have 5 gallons and 1 gallon carboys.. Wine yeasts..siphoning tubes, basically everything to make wine. Now getting used to the beer ingredients.. Could some one give me a VERY SIMPLE recipe and CHEAP just to get me started? And step by step how to add and what to add.. Please little ingredients as possible to make it taste like a beer.. Just like wine I had to ease my self into it an learn all the terms and stuff before I jumped into making 5 gallon Merlots.


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[heckler73]

You'll be bottling with a bit of dextrose and you will have carbonated beer. Don't need a keg!

 

[heckler73]

http://beermaking.ca/beginners.html

http://beermaking.ca/recipes.html - read the instructions. Pretty simple.

 

[whitesheperd]

How do you use dextrose? Can u use it in ciders, and meads??


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[whitesheperd]

So I can add about a pound and half straight in my secondary racking of mead? About 2 weeks before bottling? Or how am I supposed to use it


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[evrose]

Type the following in to a Google search:

how to carbonate beer in a bottle

 

[whitesheperd]

Never mind someone pointed me in the right direction on how doing it, I just don't want to spend $200 on a keg right now. So tablets or prime sugar and I figure prime sugar would be cheaper for the bulk. And I don't want to add each tablet to each bottle wen I can pour about 1 1/2 pounds of the prime sugar in the secondary. My only question is how do I add it? Just pour the amount in? Or boil it first?


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[Tombstone0]

You add your priming sugar at bottling time. Typically you'll add it to your bottling bucket and rack on top of it. Beginners kits usually provide 1 oz per gallon of corn sugar, but you can carbonate with any fermentable: corn sugar, table sugar, honey, malt extract, etc...
I recommend using a priming sugar calculator to determine how much sugar to add. When they ask for the current temperature of the beer what they really want to know is what's the warmest it got after fermentation completed so they can estimate the co2 currently in the beer. Here's a link to one on northern brewer which was the first one that came up in a google search:
http://www.northernbrewer.com/priming-sugar-calculator/


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[Tombstone0]

You add the priming sugar to a small amount of water and boil it. Also, don't add 1.5 pounds of priming sugar, that's way too much unless you're making 25 gallon batches or so!


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[ArizonaGoalie]

Do the Google research and you'll find that carbonating beer with corn sugar is easy, cheap, and effective. AND you'll read EXACTLY how to do it.

Just in case: http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter11-4.html

 

[whitesheperd]

Oh wow someone els said to do that, so how much? And boiling to what temp? So I can add the priming sugar (corn sugar) to my last racking about a 1 week before bottling or right before and I can open up a bottle in a few weeks and it will be carbonated?


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[jrgtr42]

Never mind someone pointed me in the right direction on how doing it, I just don't want to spend $200 on a keg right now. So tablets or prime sugar and I figure prime sugar would be cheaper for the bulk. And I don't want to add each tablet to each bottle wen I can pour about 1 1/2 pounds of the prime sugar in the secondary. My only question is how do I add it? Just pour the amount in? Or boil it first?


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Relax and take a deep breath, lets start with the beginning.
Brewing itself isn't really that hard; I say that if you can make soup, you can make beer.
The difference in beer versus wine and cider is the boil, and needing to cool down before fermentation.
Once fermentation is done, IMMEDIATELY before bottling, you add priming sugar, usually corn sugar, but table will work as well.
You do not need a pound and a half - usually 5 oz is plenty for a 5 gallon batch.
I like to bring about a cup of water to a boil, then dissolve the sugar into it. Bring back to a boil for a minute or 2, then take off heat. I pour it into my bottling bucket, then rack the beer on top of it. This will get the beer off the trub (spent yeast, hops, protein and other smegma at the bottom of the fermenter) and mix the priming solution in.
from there into bottles. I personally mostly use bombers - half as many to clean, sanitize and so forth, but 12-ozers is fine too.
Also, you really want a bigger carboy for fermenting beer. you will need room for the foam to build (krausen, in our terms) without blowing over the top and all over everything. 6.5 gallon carboy is the generally accepted size.
Before you get going, read John Palmer's How to Brew (You can read an old version on line, but there are many things in there he's changed his mind about) and / or Charlie Papazian's Joy of Homebrewing. These are the two best books to get started with brewing.

 

[Tombstone0]

Read the link to "How to brew" that someone else posted.

But, basically you add the boiled priming sugar to your bottling bucket, rack your beer onto it (maybe stir gently to make sure it mixed), immediately bottle your beer, then put them somewhere around 70 degrees or so and allow them to carb and condition for 3 weeks. I recommend tasting one chilled bottle each week so you can tell how the carbonation and flavor changes over that time so you'll know why waiting 3 weeks is a good idea.


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[jrgtr42]

Oh wow someone els said to do that, so how much? And boiling to what temp? So I can add the priming sugar (corn sugar) to my last racking about a 1 week before bottling or right before and I can open up a bottle in a few weeks and it will be carbonated?


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um..... boiling is boiling. 212 degrees.
and see above, you add it right before bottling - or else the yeast will just eat the sugar when still in the fermenter. You need a sealed, airtight environment for the CO2 to dissolve into solution and create carbonation. Added a week before, it will just off-gas and go out the airlock.

 

[whitesheperd]

Okay thank you all so much! Right now I will prime sugar my mead and ciders, maybe even one of my wines, to practice with the carbonation


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[whitesheperd]

um..... boiling is boiling. 212 degrees.

and see above, you add it right before bottling - or else the yeast will just eat the sugar when still in the fermenter. You need a sealed, airtight environment for the CO2 to dissolve into solution and create carbonation. Added a week before, it will just off-gas and go out the airlock.

Sorry I had a brain dead moment. Okay thank you, now what if I bulk it instead of bottling? Hm like putting it in a 5 gallon ice chest with a air tight sealed. It would be the same as bottling just in bulk. Oh and the ice chest has a spigot.


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[whitesheperd]

So when I use prime sugar will it look like this?




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[electrolight]

Sorry lots of people are being rude to you. I know how it can be spending 30 minutes looking up something when someone could just spend a minute or two of their time to save you a ton. Anyhow, please don't add 1.5 lbs of dextrose to your fluid. You will highly likely have bottle bombs. The rule of thumb is 1 oz per gallon. Anyhow you bring half a cup of water to a boil and add the dextrose to it until the mixture becomes completely clear again (should get cloudy first, then clear again after a bit of time). Then quickly remove it from the heat so you don't carmelize/burn it. Lastly you put it in your bottling bucket first and then rack the fluid on top of that. This prevents unnecessary (albeit little) oxygenation from happening and also allows the fluid to mix together as you rack on top of your dextrose water.

As far as brewing beer. You didn't specify if you wanted to do all grain or extract. So it's difficult to advise. Personally I prefer grain. In my opinion making extract beer is like making easy mac. But if I'm going to go through such a process and brag about how I 'brewed beer' I want it to feel like I was in the kitchen making my own macaroni from dough... that I also made... but maybe thats just me haha.

 

[whitesheperd]

Alright thank you so much! Yes some people are rude but hey I don't take offense to it. Difference between grain and extract I would guess is like making wine from frozen juice grape concentrate difference from squeezing freshly grown grapes?


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[electrolight]

Sorry I had a brain dead moment. Okay thank you, now what if I bulk it instead of bottling? Hm like putting it in a 5 gallon ice chest with a air tight sealed. It would be the same as bottling just in bulk. Oh and the ice chest has a spigot.


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I'm the furthest thing from a pessimist, but I doubt an ice chest can withstand that much pressure. And if you managed to seal it that well, I bet the walls would bend (thus increasing the volume) thus lowering the pressure acting on the fluid. You are much better off buying/harvesting bottles and a racking wand and using that. Its much less tedious than it sounds

 

[electrolight]

Alright thank you so much! Yes some people are rude but hey I don't take offense to it. Difference between grain and extract I would guess is like making wine from frozen juice grape concentrate difference from squeezing freshly grown grapes?


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Yes. I think that would be a fair analogy.

 

[whitesheperd]

Yeah true, plastic does bend.. I will defently invest in glass bottles and a capper.. So when I first started making wine i did frozen concentrates because it was easier and cheaper to start with, then once I got more experienced I went with fresh fruits. So I'll probably start with extract since it is cheaper and easier to begin with..


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[electrolight]

So when I use prime sugar will it look like this?

View attachment 198738


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Yes it will! Though, how you pour your beer has a pretty huge impact on the amount of foam or 'head'.

 

[whitesheperd]

Obviously the kegs have pressure on the spigot, so if I shook up a bottle of beer then open I would make a mess at first then it would finally foam/head in the cup yeah makes since. Alright good


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[electrolight]

Yeah true, plastic does bend.. I will defently invest in glass bottles and a capper.. So when I first started making wine i did frozen concentrates because it was easier and cheaper to start with, then once I got more experienced I went with fresh fruits. So I'll probably start with extract since it is cheaper and easier to begin with..


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Thats probably a safe bet. But don't fool yourself into thinking it's cheaper. It actually tends to be more expensive than grain. But it's pretty easy to grasp.

The premise is that you go gather your extract. Bring 5 gallons to a boil in a huge pot and add in the extract. Then you throw in your hops at the times and quantities listed on the recipe. Then you cut the heat and put the pot into your bathtub full of cold/ice water with a thermometer. Then just wait till the temperature is under 70 (more important than it sounds). Then dump the mess into a 5 gallon carboy and add your yeast at this point.

Most people will advise you to make a starter. I would too but it may be too much for a first batch, just get two packs of yeast and spare yourself the hassle.

The last step, which Iis unfortunately the most difficult, is waiting!

 

[whitesheperd]

Extracts are liquids I would assume?


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[electrolight]

Extracts are liquids I would assume?


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Good assumption, but they actually come in powder form as well. ^^

 

[whitesheperd]

Ah, so I was watching a video and this guy used 1 lb crystal 10, 1 lb crystal 20 al , 1lb 80 al, one sock and boiled then a different socked he boiled was 1lb flake oats, and 1lb flake wheat In a sock boiled. And he had 2 things of extract, and of course yeast. That's all?!? What exactly is that stuff the crystal and wheat all do ?


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[whitesheperd]

So how much would all this normally cost? Extract, crystals and all that for 5 gallon batch.


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[electrolight]

Ah, so I was watching a video and this guy used 1 lb crystal 10, 1 lb crystal 20 al , 1lb 80 al, one sock and boiled then a different socked he boiled was 1lb flake oats, and 1lb flake wheat In a sock boiled. And he had 2 things of extract, and of course yeast. That's all?!? What exactly is that stuff the crystal and wheat all do ?


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Almost all normal malt (crystal = malt) is just a means of providing sugar for the yeast which will get transformed into generic beer. The flavor profiles and perceived sweetness may be different but overall they don't have huge impacts. Noticeable for sure, but not huge. However, the other grains like oats, flaked things, black patent malts and others can often have huge impacts on flavor. For instance if you brew a pale ale and use the same recipe but add some flaked wheat and black patent malt you will have a flavot profile much more like a stout! Those were the grains he used in the sock. The "specialty grains" as they are called often don't have extract forms because they are bought and sold in smaller quantities...

many extract brewers will therefore use them in tandem with extract brewing.

The different crystal numbers represent how long the barley was kilned (and thus darkened (and thus generally flavorened? (and thus darkend (as in the color of the final beer beer)))). But that said the crystal comes in sord-of big jumps. So they often get mixxed and matched to hit other numbers.