Official Beer and Wine making Thread

[Big Shasta]

I did a batch with a buddy showing me the ropes. But this is the first one with all my own equipment and on my own. I did a test boil yesterday to see if my burner converted from propane to NG is going to heat OK. Had to drill out the orfice a few times to get it making good heat with NG.

Going to brew a northern brewer American Wheat extract kit.

Yeast is definitely good to go. Smacked it about 36 hours ago.

(I know, my deck has some issues....It's on the to-do list...somewhere below "Brew Beer")

 

[Big Shasta]

Ready to go...waiting for the boil.....Drinking a Belgian Triple that me and a buddy brewed and bottled.

Worms all setup for wort cooling. I'll put the SS one back in the boil for the last 15 minutes to sanitize it....that's after the last hops addition.

Let there be WORT....Damn I LOVE that smell.

 

[4x15mph]

@Big Shasta , congratulations on the brew. It takes time but there is nothing better than your homemade brew. I am bottling wine tonight and have 3 batches going (~90 bottles). I like to say that i am "prepping" in case of a disaster

 

[RiverRat]

I recently got a keggerator and set it up for ball Lock kegs. Way less work than bottling and cuts out the 2 week bottle conditioning time, but obviously not as easy to share away from my house.

Definitely nothing better than beer you make yourself!

 

[MikeyL]

@Big Shasta .......... Kewl thread. While we're not into this, it was neat seeing your photos & story. Many Thanks, Mikey

 

[Murf'n'surf]

I'm craving a beer now! Thank you.....hope the place we are going to eat at has some craft beers.

 

[HawkTX]

Nice set up! Hope it turns out good. CHEERS!

 

[Big Shasta]

I recently got a keggerator and set it up for ball Lock kegs. Way less work than bottling and cuts out the 2 week bottle conditioning time, but obviously not as easy to share away from my house.

Definitely nothing better than beer you make yourself!

I bottled the first batch I made and sanitizing bottles for 5 gallons of beer was enough to motivate me to get a keg setup. I got the dual 5 gallon soda keg setup with ball locks. I'll be able to serve from one keg even if I'm force carbonating in the other. This will be my first kegged beer. It's an American Wheat....nothing fancy but I love wheat beer. I'll probably have one keg with some form of wheat beer in it at all times. I'm going to make something light maybe with a lemon hint for summer next.

Changed the title of this thread to make it a common topic for all brewers. Share up, how many of us make their own?

 

[Big Shasta]

@Big Shasta .......... Kewl thread. While we're not into this, it was neat seeing your photos & story. Many Thanks, Mikey

I do love craft beers but thankfully this won't be ready until after the loser competition. It's going to be way too easy to go to the keg of craft beer in my garage.

For those of us that love good craft beer (beer snobs), we know it's EXPENSIVE. I've spent 14.00 on a 12 oz bottle before. 1 just one. My 20 year old self would kick my butt for that. When you brew it yourself, you can make 5 gallons for 30-40.00 depending on the style (after you buy the equipment of course).

 

[MikeyL]

Offered to put a SMILE on yer face this morning !

Hey ! Have a really GREAT week ahead ! - Mikey Lulejian - Lake Oconee, GA

 

[Big Shasta]

Saturday will be the day my American Wheat goes into the secondary. At that point it will have been 3 weeks in primary and I'm sure it will be done fermenting since it was going strong 36 hours after pitching it. I've been away on business, get home Friday otherwise I'm sure I would have already racked it to secondary. I thought about skipping the secondary but I wanted it to sit a little longer and it's already sat with the dead yeast long enough.

I'll be kegging this one in my new dual keg corny keg setup. I asked my buddy about kegging it and he confused me. He said I would still use the priming sugar....But he also acted like I'm force carbonating with high co2 pressure. I don't get it, why would I use both? I've read about people doing the priming sugar carbonating in the keg but I just want to force carbonate. not wait 2+ weeks for sugar to work and then have to toss the bottom couple pours if they are yeasty.

With some of the stuff he did on our first batch together, my trust in his methods is waning. I'm doing this one completely on my own.

The way I see it, my options are. Do the shake keg carbonation method or the 3-4 days under pressure carbonation method. No priming sugar for either one.

I'm leaning toward the 3-4 days method as it seems like it gets more predictable results.

@RiverRat what's your method of force carbonating?

 

[RiverRat]

I don't add any priming sugar when kegging. I hook the Co2 line to the "out" side of the keg so the the gas comes up from the bottom of the keg. I'll run it pretty high for 30 seconds or so, then shut it off, and bleed off the air that's at the top with the bleeder on the top of the keg. I repeat this a four or five times or until I'm getting only foam/beer coming out of the bleeder. Then I put the Co2 on the correct side and put it in the keggerator. Probably not the way the experts would tell you to do it, but I haven't had anything but great tasting beer doing it this way. Speaking of which, I better brew some more, since my friends and I pretty much killed the brown ale I kegged last week!

 

[Big Shasta]

Kegged the American wheat. I realized I had fermented it at the right temp. So I moved it back to primary and repitched it. I got very little activity. So even though I'm at 1.020 there is obviously no fermentable sugars for this yeast. I just went ahead and kegged it. Anyone have any thoughts on why it wouldn't ferment further? I'm using a digital temp controlled freezer so it's holding rock solid at 66 degrees. I even tried moving to the top of this yeasts range at 70, no activity.

Oh well. I've already got the yeast starter going for the next batch. A Ginger Snap Saison. Planning on brewing it today or tomorrow.

 

[BobJohnson]

Did you use a starter wor the American wheat? What was the OG? 1.020 is high, but really need the OG to know. Also, maybe next one let it go at the 66 degrees for 3-4 days then as the yeast slow down ramp up a couple degrees. The flavor development from the yeast come in the early parts of fermentation, so you can warm it up a little later to keep the yeast going. Finally, just a suggestion, I would skip the secondary. Go from primary to keg is fine. I hook up co2 to the in port and just let it sit for a week. I'm new to jet boats but been home brewing for 15 yrs. I am sure the wheat is going to taste great. Maybe just a bit more body than planned but just slightly.

 

[Big Shasta]

Did you use a starter wor the American wheat? What was the OG? 1.020 is high, but really need the OG to know. Also, maybe next one let it go at the 66 degrees for 3-4 days then as the yeast slow down ramp up a couple degrees. The flavor development from the yeast come in the early parts of fermentation, so you can warm it up a little later to keep the yeast going. Finally, just a suggestion, I would skip the secondary. Go from primary to keg is fine. I hook up co2 to the in port and just let it sit for a week. I'm new to jet boats but been home brewing for 15 yrs. I am sure the wheat is going to taste great. Maybe just a bit more body than planned but just slightly.

Welcome to the forum...Love having a fellow jetboater/brewer. I'm really new to the brewing thing. This was my first beer on my own. I did a Belgian triple with a buddy that has been brewing for years. It came out ok. Didn't ferment out as well either and we did it at his house with his stuff. Not sure what happened there. It ended up being a 4.5% triple. Good though. Bottled it.

I used Wyeast in the starter pack. Just smack it (breaks the internal pouch) and let it go at room temp about 36 hours before brewing.

The OG was 1.037. I didn't meet the target of 1.040 but I think it's because I used 6.5 gallons for my boil. I should have just used 5.5 There was NO grain in this kit, just the malt extract. I was surprised, checked the kit contents online to make sure it wasn't missing. It's an ok beer. It does have some "extra flavor" not sweetness like I expected. It's good, don't get me wrong. but only like 2.25%. No problem running to the store even if you've had a couple. LOL.

The wheat is good. I struggled getting it carbd right. I took a suggestion I saw online hooked it up to the serve port and went to 30psi for 2 days then 15 psi for a day then serve. It was flat. Ramped it up to 20 and did some light rocking and sat for another day ...still had great head that dissipated quickly with little remaining co2. Did the rocking again at 20 for another day. It's ok now but I'm having to serve it at like 2-3 psi so it isn't all head. Ok amount of co2 in the beer, not a lot though. I'm thinking it will get better the longer it sits. I crank it back up to 15 or so before I go to work (not switching to the serve port though)

I'll try your method on the next one. What pressure are you sitting it at for a week? any rocking/sloshing while it's on pressure?

 

[Big Shasta]

Brewed my Ginger Snap Saison on Sunday.

Active fermentation in about 12 hours. Still going pretty strong.

This was a complicated little kit. (for an extract kit) A lot of fun to brew. The candi'd ginger didn't fully dissolve (added in the last 10 minutes of the boil) maybe it wasn't supposed to. But I moved the chunks to the fermenter...hope it's not "over gingered"

And my lonely wheat in the keg. I'm gonna have to figure out how to drill this thing for taps on the outside soon. The picnic taps are gonna get old fast.

 

[BobJohnson]

when I carb my kegs, I just put them in my kegerator and hook the co2 line up to the new keg (gas in port) and let it sit at the same pressure as my other kegs are at. Basically the new keg is sitting at around 10-12 psi (serving pressure). It will take a week or a little more to carb the keg this way, but it is the absolute easiest way to do it. called the "set it and forget it" method on some of the homebrew forums.

when I make a stater, I take the wyeast pack and smack it as you did. then the process is basically to make a very small (500ml - 1000ml, 1.040 gravity) bath of wort. you pitch your yeast into that small amount of wort and let the yeast go. After a couple days, you can either pitch the hole starter into your fermentor or chill it over night so the yeast settle to the bottom, decant the beer off the top and pitch the yeast.

some good homebrew forums are:
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum.php
https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/forum/index.php

made a starter last night myself for a Hefeweiss I'll be making this weekend. perfect beer to put in a growler for the boat!

 

[Julian]

One of my co-workers is in the process of constructing one of these:

http://www.theelectricbrewery.com/

He just got the first delivery of parts....says he plans to build it over the next year.....

 

[BobJohnson]

electric brewing is nice. I use propane for boiling but a electric bucket heater to heat up my strike water. I put the heater on a timer so it starts warming the water around 4 am and then when I wake up and head out to the garage where I brew at 7 or so, the water is hot and ready to go.

If I could start all over again, I would go with an all electric in door brewery. Be nice to not have to worry about weather at all when planning a brew day.

 

[Big Shasta]

Moved the saison to secondary. It's at 1.024. With the refractometer conversion it's at 6.9% Tastes delicious. Can't wait to get it in the keg.