Least favorite thing about Homebrewing?

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Oh yeah, this has been a topic. Many, many, many times.

General consensus every time this pops up (and I agree with said consensus): cleaning and sanitizing. I'd group bottle delabeling under that umbrella. I find patience isn't a problem once you've got a sufficient pipeline built.
 
Lol, I figured it had to have been a topic, cause it seems too easy. Yeah, I didn't even really think about clean up. That does kinda suck too I guess.

Another would be not having a lhbs close by. That kinda sucks.
 
How do you delabel beer bottles? I just leave my labels on. I figured it would just make a mess to try to get the labels off.
 
Thedillestpickle said:
How do you delabel beer bottles? I just leave my labels on. I figured it would just make a mess to try to get the labels off.
Click to expand...

I had just soaked them in water for a while. But then I watched a video saying to soak them in oxyclean for a few hours and they just fall all. They've been soaking now for a couple hours so well see here in just a bit.
 
Bottling was literally the only thing I disliked about brewing.
I went over the edge when faced with 20 gallons and 200+ bottles on the hottest day of 2004 and that evening ordered all the parts for my first keezer...

Cheers!
 
day_trippr said:
Bottling was literally the only thing I disliked about brewing.

I went over the edge when faced with 20 gallons and 200+ bottles on the hottest day of 2004 and that evening ordered all the parts for my first keezer...



Cheers!
Click to expand...


Haha! Oh man I couldn't imagine!!!
 
Clean up post brewing. I use 20 oz. soda bottles so de-labeling isn't an issue. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I hate paying for my ingredients....
 
day_trippr said:
Bottling was literally the only thing I disliked about brewing.
I went over the edge when faced with 20 gallons and 200+ bottles on the hottest day of 2004 and that evening ordered all the parts for my first keezer...

Cheers!
Click to expand...

Wimp.

:p
 
It's a tossup between having patience and cleaning. I think I'll become more efficient at cleaning as time goes on, so only having patience will remain.

I kind of like delabeling but I now have quite enough bottles and with kegging I likely won't be doing much of that any more.
 
I actually like bottling, except for all the delabelling before hand. Hopefully I"ll build up a big enough "fleet that I won't need to anymore.
 
I've got a few hundred bottles all ready to go. But I have a ton more to de-label, as I thought to collect the labels & frame them, rather than keeping the bottles. But cleaning everything after brew or bottling day is still something i do not enjoy...
 
Seals not sealing. Threaded fittings not lining up. Stupid amounts of time cleaning.

Oh, and the amount of lore and opinion preached as fact and best practice.
 
I have a drop sink with a hose in the basement so I've never really found cleaning to be much of a pain.

I'd probably go with bottling but I don't even mind that as much now that I have a bench capper
 
Re: the "work" of de-labeling, cleaning, sanitizing...

For de-labeling, I now use only bottles I have previously used that have my own 'easy-off' labels (attached with milk) on them. I fill a cooler with hot water and Oxyclean and soak them for an hour or so and the labels slide right off, rinse, store upside down.

I don't clean bottles @ bottling. Instead, right after pouring, I triple rinse in hot water and store upside down; @ bottling I sanitize them in a tub of StarSan and bottle while wet.

Same for equipment, I clean with soapy water right after use (don't let crud dry and get a foothold), hot water rinse, sanitize everything just before bottling, leave wet.

If I clean and rinse everything well right after use, the amount of "work" @ bottling is minimal. Besides, at the end of the day when I'm sitting there enjoying a cold, tasty sample of my own product, the "work" that got it there is pretty much forgotten. ;)
 
I have been just using washing soda and warm water, they soak for 5 minutes and the label peel off really easy. Then a quick carboy brush and back into the water, the whole process, besides 3 minutes in sanitizer takes less than ten minutes
I have had the best experience with New Belgium bottles
 
Running out! My stocks are eternally low due to my limited time to brew, so sometimes I run dry and have to go out and *buy* beer. Which can suck, since I live in PA which means I can't just hit a convenience store or grocery and pick some up (don't get me started!).
 
Running out of propane:

Especially mid boil when I'm in the house doing something else and who knows how long it actually just sat there till get another bottle hooked up 10? 20? 30min? I just shoot for post boil volume and call it good .... whatever it is it is at that point. Its happened to me twice now. But I keep 2 or 3 spares on hand for the BBQ and Brew burners so not the end of the world.
 
My least favorite part is probably everything to do with bottling. That includes cleaning bottles along with filling them. Next to that it's got to be the cleaning after a brew day.

As for delabeling, I've been doing that with a sink of oxiclean solution, you can put the bottles in there, come back in 20 minutes and many labels literally just fall off. The hard to delabel ones (Sierra Nevada, Ballast Point, etc) can be easily removed by scraping with a butter knife.

With that being said, after 9 months of brewing and bottling 18 batches, the first thing I'm going with my income tax return is investing in kegging. I'm so thrilled to be done bottling that the next two batches I'm going to bottle soon aren't as frustrating (although for the stuff I want to age, I'll probably keep bottling).

I'll also agree with another poster, when it comes to bottling the best thing I've ever purchased was a bench capper.
 
Its the cleaning. Dear god, do I hate the cleaning. It doesnt help that I dont have a good brew area, Im running around between the laundry room and kitchen, trying to clean kettles and and swearing when I spill something. I dont have a utility sink anywhere in my house, so Im trying to do this in our shallow kitchen sink.

Its getting better. I have a Mark's Keg and Carboy cleaner. That has made cleaning those things much better. My plate chiller is cleaned in place, as is my tubing and pump. Lots of hot PBW and water. Next brew day Im going to try to clean the kettle in place as well by just mixing up two gallons of PBW and scrubbing it, then pumping out the gunk. The pint of water and crud left in the bottom I will just mop up with a towel or sponge.
 
day_trippr said:
Bottling was literally the only thing I disliked about brewing.
I went over the edge when faced with 20 gallons and 200+ bottles on the hottest day of 2004 and that evening ordered all the parts for my first keezer...

Cheers!
Click to expand...

Have to agree with this one. I hated bottling so much on the first batch. I have just finished my Keezer and batch 2 and 3 are just about ready to be kegged.
 
I love bottling. Srsly

Give me your full fermentors and SWMBO and I will package em up for ya after I take my cut of a 6pack or two
 
The worst parts about being a homebrewer is that when you go to a bar you end up the DD because there is no beer there that you'd be caught dead drinking or the misconceptions people have about making beer (anybody remember that ad with the hotdogs in the carboy?).

Oh, and the people who think that you should just give your beer to them because you made it and it didn't cost anything.

Well... people in general.
 

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