Sanitizing

[agroff383]

Hello I am new to the hobby and this forum...everyone talks about sanitizing and what not...is bleach acceptable? Or is there other sanitizers available? The bleach won't impart any flavors?

Or can I put it in the dishwasher (my bottles and other cold side stuff), or won't that do the trick? I am doing a lot of research here just trying to figure this all out!

 

[The Pol]

Bleach works, but mix it correctly and rinse REALLY well, or you will taste some funk.

Many people use Star San, no rinse, you can drink it... short contact time.

I used to place my bottles in my dishwasher, worked well, never an infection.

 

[McKBrew]

Do some searching and you will find more info than you ever wanted on sanitizing. As homebrewers, there are a wide variety of sanitizers out there and we can't even agree on which one is better.

I personally prefer star-san because it's got a fairly quick contact time and it's no rinse.

Some of the other common sanitizers are low concentration bleach and Idophor.

 

[DoctorAft]

Bleach is acceptable, but be sure to rinse a few times to get rid of the odor. I use StarSan which is very popular, but there are many other ways to sanitize. It would depend how hot the dishwasher gets and for what period of time. I would still recommend sanitizing with solution of some sort. Unless you boil, you still need to sanitize.

 

[beersydoesit]

I used bleach for a time. I wasn't too fussy about rinsing. I drained carefully but rinsing a sterile utensil seems counter productive
Bleach can be tricky.
I did have a few bottles that tasted bad, luckily no whole batch problems.

There is a great podcast on homebrew radio about bleach and starsan

http://cdn4.libsyn.com/basicbrewing...24&nva=20090311021824&t=0a8571246f12b98446065

or here march 29 2007
Basic Brewing™ : Home Brewing Beer Podcast and DVD - Basic Brewing Radio™ 2007