TheFlatline
Well-Known Member
So I've been here a few days, but haven't had any final product worth mentioning. In fact, I had already bottled when I discovered this fine place, so I couldn't really even say if my endeavors were a success or not. Until tonight. I feel triumphant. I want to share the experience, but I'm afraid my history being an author has turned this post into something of a Tolstoy, and so I apologize. If you get too bored reading just nod your head and smile vaguely, I'll feel great as is. Perhaps for other newbies, they can see the process, and truly relax and stop worrying.
It started innocently enough with me thinking "I know, my dad's birthday is in a few months, I'll pick up a brew kit and make him some beer!"
After an amusing montage involving the local book store for books (I'm a geek), the LHBS for a starter kit, and other goodies, I managed to talk my friend into taking the plunge with me into the yeasty mysteries that is brewing.
We picked an amber ale to cut our teeth on, and we followed the directions, mostly those that came with the kit, followed by all the common sense advice in the Papzian book, and brewed in a mere (heh) 4 or 5 hours. The only real mistake I made, I'm afraid to say, is that I used a bag of ice in the brew tub to cool down the wort, and then topped off to 5 gallons. Later I found out this is arguably not the best idea. Wort chiller immediately went onto my wish list and is due to be delivered Thursday. We pitched at 78 degrees, a little hot, but between the ice and 2-3 gallons of water we added we figured "close enough" because we did not want the wort to sit around. I took my OG reading (15 degrees too hot for my hydrometer, and having probably not mixed the wort enough), and we both tasted the sticky stuff. Wow! The hops were there, and it tasted strange, bitter, very sweet without being cloying, and yet grainy. So we pitched (dry yeast having been hydrated. I cook, so I know it's important to activate the dry yeast), sealed up the thing, and slapped on an airlock.
12 hours later, I visited my friend's house and looked in on our bucket, and we had gone from an early morning activity of a bubble every few minutes to about 5 bubbles a second, with the airlock pegged at the cap! I was thrilled... until I checked the side of the bucket. We were nailed at 78 degrees, and even that was starting to raise a little. We opened the windows, got a good cross breeze going, and hoped for the best. With my little notebook out I scribbled down how thick the krausen was (3/4 of an inch), the smell of the outgas (granny smith apple cider), and anything else I could think of.
Two days later the bubbling had more or less stopped, and the day after there was nothing. I don't think we ever dropped below 76 degrees, and worse yet, the temperature was wanting to warm up. Still, we crossed our fingers (and wondered if we should have made an ice bath for the bucket) and figured at the worst we'd have a peculiar beer to laugh over while we drank it anyway. The cider smell had disappeared thank god.
The next day we decided to take a hydrometer reading. My recently-purchased beer thief sanitized in starsan (I still feared the foam at this point, but figured there wasn't much I could do about it), My friend carefully pried open the bucket, extra careful to not even touch the underside of the bucket with sanitized hands. I slid in the beer thief, and watched as the slightly thick amber fluid slowly filled up the tube. As soon as it was full I was out and he had slipped the top of the bucket back on. In went the hydrometer. Hmm... low enough, but still... the taste had that malt sweetness right on the tip of my tongue before the rest of the beer flavor came through. We decided to wait a few more days.
Two agonizing days later, we took another measurement. A little lower, and now the sweet twinge was gone! Excellent! The next day resulted in the same reading, and we plotted to bottle the day after. All my information went down into the little book.
We prepped with the same agonizing worry about sanitation that we had brewed with, only now we were even more paranoid about sloshing the beer around and ruining our careful efforts. We first siphoned off our beer into a glass carboy with the requisite corn sugar having been dissolved into boiling water, then poured (siphoned actually) in. I left about half an inch of beer in the bucket, on top of the yeast cake, figuring better safe than sorry. We let the beer sit for maybe half an hour while we sanitized the bottles, bottle caps, and the bottling wand.
The bottling went quick with the two of us, and we were quiet, whispering almost. If beer is the foundation of Western civilization, then we were approaching something akin to gnosis. This, here, on the table, flowing slowly from the ever-dwindling carboy, was one of the cornerstones of humanity, slowly, quietly filling up bottle after bottle, and the capping machine working it's own magic, sealing away our efforts. How could we *not* be a little silent at a moment like this? I remember the last dregs of the beer, after the last bottle had been filled (we were a few short of 5 gallons) tasted sublime, even flat. I remember the burn in my stomach too of too much yeast and the... well... gas it gave me.
We bottled, covered the bottles in the box they came in, and settled down to wait. Then the heat hit. 109 in the shade in Southern California. Disaster we thought! Over-carbonation, funky odors or worse yet tastes, mold on the surface! We had read much to pass the time, and we feared the things that can ruin beer the way a kid fears the boogie man under his bed.
Tonight though, after 2 weeks of carbing (we couldn't wait any longer, we had to try some) and 2 days in the fridge, the "pop-hiss" was welcome, the pour divine, the head already on it's way to creamy. Everything came together, and my friend, my dad, my friend's grandfather and uncle (who homebrews) all sat down to try one bottle each (the rest has to wait another week), and we tasted the fruits of labor set in motion three weeks earlier. It is cloudy, and the yeast hasn't all settled yet, but my god it tasted fantastic. My dad immediately regretted that three more weren't in his immediate future, my friend's grandfather and uncle both declared it to be excellent, and it seems that the brew-gods of old smiled on two acolytes and let us slip by with a decent brew our first time out. We'll honor our luck next time around with more patience and more love.
In the span of less than a month, my father is now looking forward to his birthday batch of beer, the first time he's looked forward to his birthday in 20 years. My friend has been embraced eagerly by the men in his family, moreso than ever before in his life. His grandfather has just invited us out to his Colorado vacation home to go to the homebrew festival the AHA throws (he goes every year it turns out, and didn't think we'd be into it). Beer may or may not be the oldest product of civilization, but it certainly has brought together a few people in Southern California.
Thursday we brew the birthday batch. I won't fear the foam. I have a wort chiller. I will keep everything sanitized. I'll be able to keep my wort cool as it ferments. I won't be in a hurry to get through the steps, I will take a moment to review each thing I'm doing and make sure it's the right thing to do. I will use a secondary fermenter, and best of all, I have patience. After all, when I get stressed or impatient now, and from now on, I can crack a homebrew. My homebrew.
So to all of you new folks out there who dropped a grommet into the wort, or pitched 10 degrees too hot, or let the bottom of the pot scorch a little, or didn't aerate enough, take it from someone who has just walked that path. Don't worry. Relax. If you don't have a home brew, go drink a craft brew. If you need some help, ask up, there is so much information here and elsewhere that you can get educated for your next endeavor. Soon enough you'll learn to stop worrying and love the brew.
Cheers.
It started innocently enough with me thinking "I know, my dad's birthday is in a few months, I'll pick up a brew kit and make him some beer!"
After an amusing montage involving the local book store for books (I'm a geek), the LHBS for a starter kit, and other goodies, I managed to talk my friend into taking the plunge with me into the yeasty mysteries that is brewing.
We picked an amber ale to cut our teeth on, and we followed the directions, mostly those that came with the kit, followed by all the common sense advice in the Papzian book, and brewed in a mere (heh) 4 or 5 hours. The only real mistake I made, I'm afraid to say, is that I used a bag of ice in the brew tub to cool down the wort, and then topped off to 5 gallons. Later I found out this is arguably not the best idea. Wort chiller immediately went onto my wish list and is due to be delivered Thursday. We pitched at 78 degrees, a little hot, but between the ice and 2-3 gallons of water we added we figured "close enough" because we did not want the wort to sit around. I took my OG reading (15 degrees too hot for my hydrometer, and having probably not mixed the wort enough), and we both tasted the sticky stuff. Wow! The hops were there, and it tasted strange, bitter, very sweet without being cloying, and yet grainy. So we pitched (dry yeast having been hydrated. I cook, so I know it's important to activate the dry yeast), sealed up the thing, and slapped on an airlock.
12 hours later, I visited my friend's house and looked in on our bucket, and we had gone from an early morning activity of a bubble every few minutes to about 5 bubbles a second, with the airlock pegged at the cap! I was thrilled... until I checked the side of the bucket. We were nailed at 78 degrees, and even that was starting to raise a little. We opened the windows, got a good cross breeze going, and hoped for the best. With my little notebook out I scribbled down how thick the krausen was (3/4 of an inch), the smell of the outgas (granny smith apple cider), and anything else I could think of.
Two days later the bubbling had more or less stopped, and the day after there was nothing. I don't think we ever dropped below 76 degrees, and worse yet, the temperature was wanting to warm up. Still, we crossed our fingers (and wondered if we should have made an ice bath for the bucket) and figured at the worst we'd have a peculiar beer to laugh over while we drank it anyway. The cider smell had disappeared thank god.
The next day we decided to take a hydrometer reading. My recently-purchased beer thief sanitized in starsan (I still feared the foam at this point, but figured there wasn't much I could do about it), My friend carefully pried open the bucket, extra careful to not even touch the underside of the bucket with sanitized hands. I slid in the beer thief, and watched as the slightly thick amber fluid slowly filled up the tube. As soon as it was full I was out and he had slipped the top of the bucket back on. In went the hydrometer. Hmm... low enough, but still... the taste had that malt sweetness right on the tip of my tongue before the rest of the beer flavor came through. We decided to wait a few more days.
Two agonizing days later, we took another measurement. A little lower, and now the sweet twinge was gone! Excellent! The next day resulted in the same reading, and we plotted to bottle the day after. All my information went down into the little book.
We prepped with the same agonizing worry about sanitation that we had brewed with, only now we were even more paranoid about sloshing the beer around and ruining our careful efforts. We first siphoned off our beer into a glass carboy with the requisite corn sugar having been dissolved into boiling water, then poured (siphoned actually) in. I left about half an inch of beer in the bucket, on top of the yeast cake, figuring better safe than sorry. We let the beer sit for maybe half an hour while we sanitized the bottles, bottle caps, and the bottling wand.
The bottling went quick with the two of us, and we were quiet, whispering almost. If beer is the foundation of Western civilization, then we were approaching something akin to gnosis. This, here, on the table, flowing slowly from the ever-dwindling carboy, was one of the cornerstones of humanity, slowly, quietly filling up bottle after bottle, and the capping machine working it's own magic, sealing away our efforts. How could we *not* be a little silent at a moment like this? I remember the last dregs of the beer, after the last bottle had been filled (we were a few short of 5 gallons) tasted sublime, even flat. I remember the burn in my stomach too of too much yeast and the... well... gas it gave me.
We bottled, covered the bottles in the box they came in, and settled down to wait. Then the heat hit. 109 in the shade in Southern California. Disaster we thought! Over-carbonation, funky odors or worse yet tastes, mold on the surface! We had read much to pass the time, and we feared the things that can ruin beer the way a kid fears the boogie man under his bed.
Tonight though, after 2 weeks of carbing (we couldn't wait any longer, we had to try some) and 2 days in the fridge, the "pop-hiss" was welcome, the pour divine, the head already on it's way to creamy. Everything came together, and my friend, my dad, my friend's grandfather and uncle (who homebrews) all sat down to try one bottle each (the rest has to wait another week), and we tasted the fruits of labor set in motion three weeks earlier. It is cloudy, and the yeast hasn't all settled yet, but my god it tasted fantastic. My dad immediately regretted that three more weren't in his immediate future, my friend's grandfather and uncle both declared it to be excellent, and it seems that the brew-gods of old smiled on two acolytes and let us slip by with a decent brew our first time out. We'll honor our luck next time around with more patience and more love.
In the span of less than a month, my father is now looking forward to his birthday batch of beer, the first time he's looked forward to his birthday in 20 years. My friend has been embraced eagerly by the men in his family, moreso than ever before in his life. His grandfather has just invited us out to his Colorado vacation home to go to the homebrew festival the AHA throws (he goes every year it turns out, and didn't think we'd be into it). Beer may or may not be the oldest product of civilization, but it certainly has brought together a few people in Southern California.
Thursday we brew the birthday batch. I won't fear the foam. I have a wort chiller. I will keep everything sanitized. I'll be able to keep my wort cool as it ferments. I won't be in a hurry to get through the steps, I will take a moment to review each thing I'm doing and make sure it's the right thing to do. I will use a secondary fermenter, and best of all, I have patience. After all, when I get stressed or impatient now, and from now on, I can crack a homebrew. My homebrew.
So to all of you new folks out there who dropped a grommet into the wort, or pitched 10 degrees too hot, or let the bottom of the pot scorch a little, or didn't aerate enough, take it from someone who has just walked that path. Don't worry. Relax. If you don't have a home brew, go drink a craft brew. If you need some help, ask up, there is so much information here and elsewhere that you can get educated for your next endeavor. Soon enough you'll learn to stop worrying and love the brew.
Cheers.
