I have always use the oven at 190 for sanitizing my canning jars,,,, I would guess that would be affective for beer bottles as well? I have a batch coming out of my secondary fermenter soon and did not want to find out in 4 weeks that it did not work,,,thanks
Oven Sanitizing
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If your bottles are clean, yes. But. To just sanitize, use Starsan! So much cheaper, easier, better-er.
Also, you understand you are talking sanitize, not sterilize. Neither method will sterilize. When I used to can, I thought the practice was to sterilize the jars in the pressure cooker first, to get the higher temps needed. That was what I did.
When I tried the oven method, I found it took forever to cool down. A quart of Starsan is 16 bucks at my LHBS. Enough for many years.
Also, you understand you are talking sanitize, not sterilize. Neither method will sterilize. When I used to can, I thought the practice was to sterilize the jars in the pressure cooker first, to get the higher temps needed. That was what I did.
When I tried the oven method, I found it took forever to cool down. A quart of Starsan is 16 bucks at my LHBS. Enough for many years.
SmokeyMcBong
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I've got a quart of star san almost gone in 3 months
cluckk
Well-Known Member
I used to go through StarSan real quick, until I read the specs and other information on it. It can be stored for some time. I know some like Yooper can use a gallon jug of it for months. I haven't gotten there yet. But I will make up five gallons that I keep in a RO water cube from walmart. I use that for months.
I've been using star-san pretty much exclusively for 7 years. I am starting on my second small bottle. A bottle lasted me almost 7 years!
If someone went through a QUART of star-san in 3 months, it must have a leak in it. You use like 5 milliliters per gallon, and I mix up one gallon of sanitizer at a time and store it in an old plastic one gallon jug. It lasts for months, and I always end up spilling it pouring back and forth, long before it would lose effectiveness.
I don't think I could use up a quart of star-san in a year, even though I make tons of wine each year, and brew a LOT!
i hope he meant a quart of mixed star-san..
i got the big bottle as a gift a couple years ago and i may have taken an inch out of the bottle.. distilled water in gallon jugs is great.. i keep an extra spray bottle under the kitchen sink that we use around the kitchen counters and tables as well.. i'll probably have to get a new bottle when my daughter graduates high school (she's 5)
i got the big bottle as a gift a couple years ago and i may have taken an inch out of the bottle.. distilled water in gallon jugs is great.. i keep an extra spray bottle under the kitchen sink that we use around the kitchen counters and tables as well.. i'll probably have to get a new bottle when my daughter graduates high school (she's 5)
SmokeyMcBong
Well-Known Member
My water is ****, it turns cloudy instantly. Plus I use it to sanitize everything. Like my kitchen and my bathrooms. I was using quarenary sanitizer that I get from work but I figured I didn't need to have two different food grade liquid sanitizers kicking around
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It still works if it gets cloudy, the company that makes it stated this. I keep 2.5 gallons in an old 5 gallon bucket for a month or so, and change it out when I feel I need to. I have never had any issues. As long as the PH is 3 or lower, it will work no matter how much it has already been used.
As for the OP, just get a vinator and starsan. Very easy and quick.
1 quart = 32 ounces. One ounce of Star San when mixed equals 5 GALLONS of liquid. So, one quart would yield 160 GALLONS of Star San. I made six batches of beer in the last two weeks, and used about 16 ounces MAX of StarSan (mixed). Even assuming I am off by a factor of TEN, that would mean I could make about 768 batches of beer with one quart.
Tips to keep it and use less:
1) Get a spray bottle (or two or three) from a "dollar store". Mix up some star san in them. Spray your stuff that you want to sanitize.
2) If you keg and you have a bunch, dedicate a keg to hold Star San. Then you can use it w/pressure, and keep oxygen and other stuff away from it. I sometimes will pour the star san from the keg to another, then use the source keg as I know it is (and has been) sanitized.
BridgewaterBrewer
Well-Known Member
Getting back to the original question, YES, the oven works well to sterilize bottles. Cover the openings of clean bottles with aluminum foil, bake for 1 hr at 350 degrees and let cool slowly. Convenient for stockpiling lots of bottles so you can save time on bottling day. If you did it the day before you could skip the aluminum foil and just use the bottles directly from the oven. Some people fear the glass will get brittle but I've done it for 2 years and I've heard from other brewers that have done this much longer without any breaking.
