Home Brew Beer Thread

a reply to: crayzeed

In the 1700's people also got the squirts from beer.

"Dude, where's my horse?"

ETA A name for the beer.

Read. Reading is your buddy when you are starting out.

I got to know Miller and the grand daddy of them all, Charlie Papazian. They are my "go to" like the dictionary.

You are going to have to love cleaning. You wash everything before you use it and after you use it. I put all my equipment in a couple plastic busing buckets (what bus boy and girls carry around collecting dishes to run back to the dish machine).

I have a single purpose note book for writing down recipes (and measurements, hops used, yeast used, amounts, etc.) Each one is basically the same layout. Beer name (sometimes style), grain bill, hops used, yeast used, starting and ending gravities.

I started off with a kit. I read the instructions, a zillion times, got read, and followed the instructions. I figured I would let the beer cool off in the outdoors (it is Alaska after all). It took forever! So my advice is get a wort chiller. It is that copper coil thing that attaches to your sink. You put the thing in the beer after you boil, hook up the hose, turn on the cold water. About 7 - 10 minutes to cool a 5 gallon batch of beer.

After a couple batch beer runs, go to full 5 gallon boil. Your beer will taste much better. Take the step to liquid yeast. Heck, if you are friends with brewhouse/pub, you can just show up with a clean jar and get a pint for free!

I do 5 gal., full batch boils, half-mash (doing it from all grain is a headache I do not need! Then you need to dump the grains, a huge mess), glass carboy fermenter, stainless steel converted soda kegs (bottles, what a thing to relegate to the past!), is where I am at. I really like my "house" Pale Ale which is more like an IPA but not as hoppy. A crowd favorite that never last too long.

One more thing, as Papazian says... Relax, have a homebrew!

Couple things.

1. Find a friend to brew with. Split the cost and it's bro/man time.

2. Start hiding money from your wife for expanding your gear. Maybe some short sales.

3. Start collecting things you also may need to hide from your wife, like rheostats, propane burners, deep freezes that no longer work, glass bottles, stainless pots...

If your an engineer your doomed...

Edit...

Cider is also awesome and very easy, but takes a while to ferment.

Not the sweet girlie stuff but the funky dry bitter. Can also add hops etc....

This is very important. Your wife may also prefer cider. It is kind of champagne like and can have all kinds of fruity things added. You can hide your beer making equipment saying it's for her cider. You know like the bowling ball gift. Hey honey got some new fermenting valves.

a reply to: LightSpeedDriver

I created a coffee stout with an appropriate for ATS name:

Black Helicopter Stout

I use about a half pound of really coarse ground coffee that goes in a mesh bag after the boil but before the cool down. Let it sit for five minutes, then cool as normal.

First batch I made, I thought I had a bad strain of yeast. Then the whole thing took off! The coffee oils kept the yeast from breaking the surface but when it did... man that is my favorite beer!

Now, I make the wort a bit stronger and a little more hops to balance out the coffee taste.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Yum.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

I bow to your superior knowledge speaking in a language I find hard to understand but must raise my eyebrows at coffee-beer.

originally posted by: DBCowboy

originally posted by: AugustusMasonicus

originally posted by: DBCowboy
My family (evil disrespectful ungracious parasites!) are having a field day picking names out for my beer.

List some of them here.

Sharing is caring.

Big Fat Daddy's Brew
Fat Man's Ale
Pale Spleen
Crippled Craft
Oh God, My Husbands Gone Insane Beer

I like...... DBs Fat Arse Beer
Comes out the same way it goes in.

I was really big into home brewing for a while. After I started having health problems, I quit drinking and so I quit brewing.I continued to make wine for my wife but she quit drinking shortly after I did. I made my own soda too.

I have a storage unit filled with brewing stuff that I just can't let go of. I have a chest freezer with 5 taps and a customized premix soda machine which had 6 more taps. I had my own yeast bank. Made my own stir plates etc...
I went way overboard. You could say it was an obsession.
Now it's just more junk I don't use anymore.

I really miss it at times. The brewing, not the drinking.

a reply to: luthier

My upstairs neighbor tried some. We sitting there watching ST:TNG late at night. He said he was sleepy before we had a glass. Three glasses later, morning is breaking. He looks over and says, "I've done [illicit combo of drugs, think Belushi] before and this is pretty close."

Wide awake drunken feeling! LOL!

a reply to: LightSpeedDriver



The language part came from reading and from interacting with other home brewers. When the big beer festival hits in January, the big boys show up (Deschutes, Sierra Nevada, Left Hand, etc), they are amazed that a pleeb like me can not only know what they are talking about but know which hop variety they used!

It is a fun hobby. You can go overboard. I have a bottle capper that is bench mounted that I never use. I have a bucket that I drilled a bunch of holes in to separate out the grains from mashing which was quickly upgraded and is now a trash bin (lined with garbage bag).

a reply to: DBCowboy

What temp issues might I face?

You should do your best to keep constant temperature. Look at the yeast you're using to find the optimal temperature range and try to stay right in there with as little fluctuation as possible. Of course, most people don't have the equipment to control it that way, so don't stress over it. The beer will likely be fine unless you let the temperature get too far out of range. Where you are, is it cold now? If you are fermenting in a cold garage you might want to do what I did. I built an insulated box and used a temperature controller with a small heater to keep it steady. If the insulation is really good a light bulb will work. I got my temperature controller from amazon for something like $17 iirc. Lerway STC-1000 is what I have but there are lots of them. Sorry to ramble...

a reply to: wtbengineer

I appreciate the insight and info!

originally posted by: wtbengineer
a reply to: DBCowboy

Been brewing since the '80s, cleanliness and temperature control are big. Recipes are a secondary concern.

Take heed!! Brewed a dirty batch once and our gonads shrunk to the size salted peanuts and gave us tunnel vision for days.

a reply to: wtbengineer

Have you tried an electric brew kettle or mash pot?

It was a game changer for me. I still have some propane and thermocouple digital units I tinkered with but that thing is easy to just make beer on the weekend and be done and clean. Especially with a full grain mash.



Yep, it infected my life. In fact it may be the yeast talking at this point.

a reply to: olaru12

My second batch with my buddy 25 years ago had a house party running for the bathroom....people were going to the convenient store about 2 hours in. Luckily we were able to salvage our reputation...

a reply to: luthier

Hey man, yeah, I use electric. Also a stainless fermenter was a big step up for me. Unfortunately, I've been having to take a little break from brewing since we built a house this year and am trying to get my brew space and shop and jam room set up. So do you make guitars or what?

a reply to: wtbengineer

Awesome man congrats on the new house. The high density vinyl rolls are great for jam rooms. And keeping any family members happy.


I do make guitars. Electrics at the moment. Worked for a very high end manufacturer for years making acoustics. Use vintage pick ups from gold foils to low output buckers...

a reply to: luthier
I was looking at those, so they work well? Thanks for the heads up!

I have made a number of guitars myself, the first in around 1977-1980. Sold a few, the latest for $5000. Wish I'd taken pics of some of them. Who did you work for?

Oh yeah, mine were all electric too, I made an acoustic about 20 years ago but never quite finished it. I need to get back on that...

I don't know if this will work but here's a pic of one that I kept.

Not to derail the thread, apologies for that.

a reply to: wtbengineer

I worked for Collings.

Nice work! U2u me anytime I. Will upload a few later...

Yes they work. But you also should use some foam sound trearment or it can sound like playing in glass. Especially in the corners.