New member.... New to brewing!

[jongrill]

Sorry for the double post.

Hello! I wanted to introduce myself to the community. I found out about this community through my local bottle shop in Lakewood, NJ. One of the employees home brews and when I told him I just bought a beginners kit, he became very excited and the first thing that came out of his mouth was "GO ON HOMEBREWTALK.COM"


So here I am. Ready to take on my first real brew kit (I dabbled with a Mr. Beer once. It came out tasting like apple juice.).

I ordered a Northern Brewer One Gallon kit with the White House Honey Porter. I figured the one gallon kits would suffice for me to start. I really do not have the room for five gallons of beer and when I discovered beer recipes are scaleable it seems like the right way to go.

Along with the kit I ordered a few extra things that I think would help me:

- ProAccurate digital thermometer
- Cacao nibs for the honey porter - I like to experiment!
- 2 gallon bucket and spigot for bottling - I heard it was easier to bottle from a bucket than a siphon from the fermenting jug


I also ordered a second recipe (Caribou Slobber) and an extra one gallon fermentor because I'm not one to wait and wanted to make a second brew while waiting for the first one.


Anything else you all think I need or is everything that comes with the kit sufficient to start with?


Thanks!


Jon

 

[RM-MN]

Um... On the Cacao nibs for the honey porter, how will you know if your process is done right and the cacao nibs were the cause of a problem? Why not start with the recipe as you got it and brew it up, sample it, then repeat with the nibs? It's not like you are making a 100 bbl batch. You can drink that one gallon in a week if you work at it.

 

[jongrill]

Um... On the Cacao nibs for the honey porter, how will you know if your process is done right and the cacao nibs were the cause of a problem? Why not start with the recipe as you got it and brew it up, sample it, then repeat with the nibs? It's not like you are making a 100 bbl batch. You can drink that one gallon in a week if you work at it.

That's the plan! I had a gift certificate to use up. Saving them for next time!

 

[GeorgiaTiger]

You can drink that one gallon in a week if you work at it.

A WEEK? A gallon in a WEEK? Try two days...maybe one if he drinks it slow and starts early. LOL

 

[jongrill]

A WEEK? A gallon in a WEEK? Try two days...maybe one if he drinks it slow and starts early. LOL

Yeah... A gallon is easy! Might of done that tonight!

 

[ryan_howard]

You're going to have a good time with this. I got started over the summer, and am pretty much hooked. Don't be surprised if you find yourself wanting to upscale your capacity to larger batches, even if not a full five-gallons. I started with five gallon, but bought one-gallon growlers to play with "sub batches." But, I've since decided 3-3.5 gallons is the perfect size for me. Lowes has food-grade buckets pretty cheap, so I made some small fermenting buckets last month.

 

[jongrill]

You're going to have a good time with this. I got started over the summer, and am pretty much hooked. Don't be surprised if you find yourself wanting to upscale your capacity to larger batches, even if not a full five-gallons. I started with five gallon, but bought one-gallon growlers to play with "sub batches." But, I've since decided 3-3.5 gallons is the perfect size for me. Lowes has food-grade buckets pretty cheap, so I made some small fermenting buckets last month.

Cool! I think ill stick with one gallon batches for a while. Not much room and like my friends, my tastes change quite frequently. I don't want to be stuck with tons of one brew!