My head is spinning. Tons of information here!
Any home-brewers???
- Thread starter Greg24
- Start date
It also depends on if you go for all grain brewing (what I typically do) or varying levels of extract mixed in.
Basically, the whole process is to get the sugars out of the grain and into the liquid runnings (wort) which you then boil and add hops to. I don't mean to step on toes, but to me, using extract is a bit like making instant coffee, and all grain brewing is more like brewing actual coffee. With all grain, you fill a mash tun with cracked grain and mix with hot water, steep for about an hour or so, then drain it. Basically a really large coffee filter so that the grain stays in the tun, but the wort goes into the kettle. It's more equipment, more time, and more to clean (and you have to throw out 10# or so of spent grain somewhere). If space is tight, you can skip that step and use extract, which is just concentrated wort that you add water to get the pretty much the same thing.
As for price, as said, it can vary greatly. For what I call "regular beers" such as a 5% abv pale ale like Sierra Nevada, I can usually spend about 25 bucks for 5 gallons for ingredients (so about 63¢ per pint). If you want to make something strong (big beer) like a 10% abv you basically need to start with twice the grain (or extract) and use the same amount of water so that it's twice as sugary, so maybe 40-45bucks. Then there are the fancy schmancy New England IPAs which tend to be pretty high alcohol, and use a ton of hops in them. I made one last month and the total was 80 bucks ($2 per pint) for ingredients. I don't make that very often.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
Couple of pics. First is two BMB's (Big Mouth Bubbler fermenters). The one on the right is in primary fermentation. Notice the foamy krausen floating on top of the wort, the very cloudy appearance, and the trub in the bottom. The tape is to help hold the lid down. Sometimes they will pop off. The one on the left is dressed in his tshirt to keep light from hitting it. That one is my secondary. The batch that was in it started out in the primary. I transferred it to the secondary but left the trub in place to inocculate the next batch, instead of pitching fresh yeast in it. The secondary allows a little more fermentation of complex sugars, and more settling and clarification. Transferring straight to keg from the primary results in a good bit of sediment in the keg. The Tshirt has been removed from the primary keg just for the pic. I put it back on immediately after. Light is one of beer's worst enemies.
Behind the two BMB's is a large window AC and it is handy for keeping the fermenters in optimum temp range. We keep our house in the 70s and that will work for most ale yeasts, but upper 60's is better.
Lower pic is a closeup of the primary.
Behind the two BMB's is a large window AC and it is handy for keeping the fermenters in optimum temp range. We keep our house in the 70s and that will work for most ale yeasts, but upper 60's is better.
Lower pic is a closeup of the primary.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
Here is a pic of a corny keg full of beer and ready to serve. Notice the 5lb CO2 tank behind it, and the double regulator. CO2 is introduced to the keg with the red hose. Beer faucet is mounted right on the beer post of the keg. The freezer section of this repurposed fridge contains pint glasses and mugs, as well as my hops. There is room for another keg and most of the time there are two kegs, one full and one "on deck". Many keggers mount the faucet on the side or on the door of the fridge, making it a "kegerator". That makes it unnecessary to open the door to pull a glass of beer. I prefer it inside, so it stays cold. Strictly preference. Also many keggers keep the CO2 tank outside, as well. I like it inside. Again, just preference.
And here is what it's all about.
And here is what it's all about.
Thanks @Brocktune and @Slash McCoy ! Youse guys will be sorry when I start doing this. I find it all so intriguing. You too @TexLaw .
I REALLY want to do that keg and fridge deal.
@FarmerTan, I know you are from Michigan! ...where Larry Bell (Bell's Brewery of Kalamazoo, MI) virtually founded the home and micro brewing industry in the USA! Bell's STILL caters to home craft brewers with a vast selection of brewing supplies, ingredients, and lessons/gatherings for all skill levels!
Good stuff. Brewer, winemaker, sake maker, meadmaker since 1983...
I tend to keep it simple, or at least what I think is simple. Dissolved carbonates in the well water mean pale ale -- and I've done some award-winning ones. I also do the occasional stout or porter -- I have one maple stout recipe I called "One and Done" that comes out strong enough to be a vacation in a bottle.
Cost-wise, for Canadian prices, I can brew good stuff for maybe one-third the cost of going to the store. I can brew swill for a lot less than that, and have. A couple of years ago my wife was looking at my brew fridge, wanting a beer to use as bait in the wasp traps.
Thus was born Wasp Trap Ale -- a truly cheap beer with just enough hops to notice and just enough malt to support fermentation. "The Pale Stale Ale With the Foam on the Bottom" as they used to say about Old Frothingslosh. It turned out to be rather drinkable if one weren't too picky.
We also have "U-brew" stores, where one can get 96 pints of beer ready to bottle for $175.
As for an earlier poster's comment that he didn't have time to drink five gallons of beer: Brother, you only have to drink them one at a time!
O.H.
I tend to keep it simple, or at least what I think is simple. Dissolved carbonates in the well water mean pale ale -- and I've done some award-winning ones. I also do the occasional stout or porter -- I have one maple stout recipe I called "One and Done" that comes out strong enough to be a vacation in a bottle.
Cost-wise, for Canadian prices, I can brew good stuff for maybe one-third the cost of going to the store. I can brew swill for a lot less than that, and have. A couple of years ago my wife was looking at my brew fridge, wanting a beer to use as bait in the wasp traps.
Thus was born Wasp Trap Ale -- a truly cheap beer with just enough hops to notice and just enough malt to support fermentation. "The Pale Stale Ale With the Foam on the Bottom" as they used to say about Old Frothingslosh. It turned out to be rather drinkable if one weren't too picky.
We also have "U-brew" stores, where one can get 96 pints of beer ready to bottle for $175.
As for an earlier poster's comment that he didn't have time to drink five gallons of beer: Brother, you only have to drink them one at a time!
O.H.
I spent 5 years collecting and cleaning various shaped bottles, assembling "full sets" of 48 bottles, which is more or less 5 gallons so that I'd be able to differentiate the kinds of beers by the shape of the bottle. It was a minor obsession. Originally my plan was to label the bottles with clever labels that I design, but then quickly realized that peeling the labels off well was a huge pain, and bottling is a pain as it is, so the thought of gunking up my perfectly clean bottles with labels gave me shivers.
Anyway, I got a keg a couple years ago, and now have about 300 beer bottles, cleaned, shelved, and ready to go, that have been sitting there ever since. Kegging is absolutely the way to go. The kegging setup can get a little bit pricey (if you are a cheapskate like me), so you might want to get your brewing legs strong before you take the full plunge. I have an old fridge setup almost identical to @Slash McCoy and have been wavering between adding a second keg and putting taps on the side of the fridge, or the other option is to wait for my wife to be out of town for the day and go buy a cheap Home Depot deep freezer and convert it into a keezer. Guess which plan is winning in my head?
When you brew, there's always a new gizmo or project around the corner that will make your setup that much more awesome.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
Just remember, we are saving money on beer by brewing it ourselves. Right? Riiiiiiiight.....
On the happy side of things, GF wants to buy me a freezer and an inkbird controller. I think it is because the house is kinda chilly when I have the AC cranked up to keep my fermenter at a nice 68 degrees LOL! So the keezer will mostly be a fermentation chamber and the fridge will still be my kegerator.
More good news... all my fittings just came in a few minutes ago. Now nothing is stopping me from putting my faucet on the outside, except me.
<EDIT>Oh, and for telling batches apart, colored caps work pretty good. Just keep a post-it with the cap color and the batch number. And a database with batch numbers, recipe, etc. </EDIT>
You guys are a wealth of information, and scary, all at once.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
Lol. My nightly brew usually is accompanied by a cookie, or 4!
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
Yesterday was very much all about beer. I drank the last glass out of the "on deck" keg, batch GJJ001 in my labeling scheme. GJJ for "Gentilly Joy Juice", in homage to our neighborhood in New Orleans. GJJ002 was already kegged, crashed, and chilled and now it is the on deck keg. GJJ003 was in the secondary fermenter and I kegged that. Then I brewed a new batch, GJJ004 and it is just starting to wake up and work this morning. I pitched fresh Safale US-05 yeast instead of pouring the new wort onto the trub. Three batches from one pitch of yeast is enough I think.
The GJJ002 is the best batch yet out of all my own brews. Every bit as tasty and easy drinking as the Northern Brewer "Block Party Amber Ale" recipe kit I like so much, maybe not quite as bread-y. Lots of body, a nice belly filling liquid meal, about 6.7% ABV, so a bit more alcohol than the Block Party which is under 5%. I don't care for very hoppy or heavily bittered brews. This one definitely is neither. Preliminary tasting of the nearly identical but fresh in the keg GJJ003 indicates it will be very similar, basically indistinguishable from its predescessor. As I was gathering ingredients for GJJ003 I saw that I only had two 6lb jugs of the Golden LME, but I had a pilsner recipe kit that I never brewed and it had two 3.15lb jugs of Pils LME, so I paired each six pounder with one of the small jugs for 9lb+ LME in each batch. Very slightly more malt, very slightly lighter overall though not enough to visually detect. More care and attention was paid to the boil time in these two most recent batches as well as more complete dissolving of the extract and more stirring. So both batches had very pronounced maillard changes and that brought the flavor more in line with the Block Party that me and SWMBO like so much. The gentle hopping, one ounce Cascade for 45 minutes added to a 4 gallon boil already containing all the malt, is another key factor to this taste. This will be a bit darker than the typical amber ale, and a bit light to call it a brown ale. Well, I am not trying to conform to a particular style except my style. And I can't taste color.
I got a new faucet, one with a flow control valve, so I can carbonate the keg a bit harder but not fight a half glass of foam when pulling a glass of beer. Works great! I can adjust for just the right amount of head, and just the right amount of fizz. This is the type faucet I should have got from the beginning, and I urge all newbs to keg beer to start with one of this type.
The GJJ002 is the best batch yet out of all my own brews. Every bit as tasty and easy drinking as the Northern Brewer "Block Party Amber Ale" recipe kit I like so much, maybe not quite as bread-y. Lots of body, a nice belly filling liquid meal, about 6.7% ABV, so a bit more alcohol than the Block Party which is under 5%. I don't care for very hoppy or heavily bittered brews. This one definitely is neither. Preliminary tasting of the nearly identical but fresh in the keg GJJ003 indicates it will be very similar, basically indistinguishable from its predescessor. As I was gathering ingredients for GJJ003 I saw that I only had two 6lb jugs of the Golden LME, but I had a pilsner recipe kit that I never brewed and it had two 3.15lb jugs of Pils LME, so I paired each six pounder with one of the small jugs for 9lb+ LME in each batch. Very slightly more malt, very slightly lighter overall though not enough to visually detect. More care and attention was paid to the boil time in these two most recent batches as well as more complete dissolving of the extract and more stirring. So both batches had very pronounced maillard changes and that brought the flavor more in line with the Block Party that me and SWMBO like so much. The gentle hopping, one ounce Cascade for 45 minutes added to a 4 gallon boil already containing all the malt, is another key factor to this taste. This will be a bit darker than the typical amber ale, and a bit light to call it a brown ale. Well, I am not trying to conform to a particular style except my style. And I can't taste color.
I got a new faucet, one with a flow control valve, so I can carbonate the keg a bit harder but not fight a half glass of foam when pulling a glass of beer. Works great! I can adjust for just the right amount of head, and just the right amount of fizz. This is the type faucet I should have got from the beginning, and I urge all newbs to keg beer to start with one of this type.
Thanks!
Like this?
Getting ready to pull the trigger on a deep freezer to convert into a keezer.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
Like this?
Getting ready to pull the trigger on a deep freezer to convert into a keezer.
Yes. I do have a slight preference for the straight tube discharge, though. Makes it easy to slip a hose on the end for filling growlers or even bottles. Like this
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
I decided to put a faucet on the outside of the box. Mr Tiki was too tall to fit inside on the keg post.
Gentilly Joy Juice 002 hooked up. 003 cold crashing.
Freezer is for growlers, mugs, glasses, and hops.
Gentilly Joy Juice 002 hooked up. 003 cold crashing.
Freezer is for growlers, mugs, glasses, and hops.
Wow.
I have to figure out how to get invited to your place!
Awesome work my friend. Beautiful.
I prefer brewing the hard stuff, but the principle is the same. Mead is my demon of choice 
Old house, forgive the carpet. We're blessed with full hardwood in the new place lol.
Old house, forgive the carpet. We're blessed with full hardwood in the new place lol.
