School me on home brewing

[BarManBean]

Can I double up on extract kits? Our 15gal pot easily has the room to do it, just wondering if you have to tweak the recipe / brew schedule at all. I know that you would need to adjust if using all grain due to efficiency and what not, but with extract I would think that we could just double up.

[DeltaNu1142]

Pffft... I can't imagine one reason why not. But I'm not very imaginative.

[jasejase]

I agree. cant see why not

 

edit - I searched... seems legit. http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f14/doubling-5-gallon-extract-kits-386865/

[seabass07]

You're good. Just making a double batch. Just keep in mind that you'll have double the extract in the pot, so there's more chance of scorching if you don't get it all dissolved quickly.

[stm25rs]

Most instructions I've seen say to warm up LME by running hot water over the containers.

 

Instead, I put the jugs/cans in a hot water bath on the stove. Low-medium heat - I get the water to around 150 F.

[BarManBean]

Just kegged our Heffe on Friday night, new kegerator is up and running and it's awesomely huge and easy to work with

 

Also realized that with kegs we really don't need a secondary for much of anything so we chose to leave our IPA in the primary for another week or so--will rack it right over to a keg and do the dry hopping in the keg. Win.

[cryo]

My hefewiezen ended coming out better than I could have hoped for. Not sure what we will be doing next but plan to get another batch in the process in another week or so.

 

I'm addicted to the process now, wished I would have started years ago.

 

Dave

[DeltaNu1142]

I'm planning for a Victory Summer clone sometime soon. Unless it gets too late... early August is probably too late to start brewing that one.

 

School finishes up August 9th. I can't wait to be done with that & get my weekends back.

[HipsterDoofus]

I'm planning for a Victory Summer clone sometime soon. Unless it gets too late... early August is probably too late to start brewing that one.

 

School finishes up August 9th. I can't wait to be done with that & get my weekends back.

 

Summer Love?

 

I ******* love that beer.

[jasejase]

Me too. Drank a shit load over Memorial Day weekend.

[DeltaNu1142]

Summer Love? I ******* love that beer.

That's the stuff. It's the one I should've started out with. My coconut IPA didn't turn out like I'd hoped.

[jayway]

Homebrewing quickly overcame my car hobby and has taken over my life! Not that having gallons of beer in the pantry is a bad thing.

 

I entered two beers into my first homebrew comp a couple weeks ago at our local fair. My rye saison took the third place ribbon in the Belgian category. My pale ale took the blue ribbon in the pale ale category (included IPA and IIpa) and got second in best of show. I'm sure there wasnt a huge amount of entries but pretty awesome for my first comp nonetheless.

[SneakyFast]

Congrats, man. That's awesome.

[jayway]

Congrats, man. That's awesome.

 

Thanks! Hey you must be a regular at Sante Adairius Rustic Ales out there in Capitola. I'm jealous, anytime we go anywhere close to the area I make it a point to stop and have some beers. Has to be my favorite brewery, they have some amazing and inspiring beers.

[SneakyFast]

I love the place. Tim is such a talented brewer and he isn't shy when it comes to talking about recipes or process. He has an incredible memory, too. If you've been there more than a couple times he probably remembers your name.

[05LGTLtd]

Cherries are in season, if I were still brewing a cherry wheat or cherry chocolate stout would be tempting.

 

Once did a Strawberry wheat, and it was epic. The look of Pale white/grey strawberries when you transfer off the fruit is a bit disturbing. It's like some kind of mass grave scene or something...

[jayway]

Which variety did you use? Tart or sweet cherries? I've done a mandarin pale ale that was damn good but no other fruit beers. I've thought about something on cherries with some oak chips but have yet to try it.

[stm25rs]

Last weekend I picked up a bottle drying tree and a vinator, and bottled my Saison du Vin, from Northern Brewer's Antithesis kit.

 

The new gear made the bottling process a lot smoother.

 

I've had two empty 750 mL bottles of Dogfish Head's Noble Rot sitting around. I forgot about them until I had already started bottling, so I didn't have time to de-label them. Noble Rot's a saison brewed with grape must, so it and my brew should taste pretty similar. This wasn't intentional, but I think I've effectively made a couple bottles of counterfeit Noble Rot.

[BarManBean]

Tapped our "dead ringer IPA" this week. It's extremely one dimensional--basically no real malt profile, very thin, hop forward. That said, this is following our Pliny clone, and it's also growing on me--seems to be a great summer IPA for hot days, nice and refreshing.

 

 

I have a "converter" for tapping standard sanky kegs using our homebrew setup. Honestly though, I'm having trouble finding the right keg to supplement our homebrew. The cheap stuff is cheaper in a can / bottle, and the more expensive stuff offers nearly zero price discount, so why not stick with six packs and enjoy the variety. Guess I thought keg beer was cheaper, but I guess that's only when you brew it yourself

[cryo]

So we have a Oktoberfest brewing now, didn't think about the temp issue before purchasing and starting the process so I'm hoping it wont effect it too much.

 

The cabinet I ferment in is about 10degree's warmer than the recommended fermenting temp. any opinions?

 

Dave

[SneakyFast]

It will be beer but probably not very good beer.

[BarManBean]

So we have a Oktoberfest brewing now, didn't think about the temp issue before purchasing and starting the process so I'm hoping it wont effect it too much.

 

The cabinet I ferment in is about 10degree's warmer than the recommended fermenting temp. any opinions?

 

Dave

 

If you are serious about fermenting stuff at cooler temps you'll need some sort of fermentation chamber. Track down a fridge, add an external temperature control unit.

[cryo]

Thanks for the input. The last couple batches were not requiring a low fermenting temp so I didn't even think about it.

 

I will see how this comes out and keep an eye on the temp required in the future.

 

We are actually looking at building a kegerator setup first.

 

Dave

[stm25rs]

As a cheaper alternative to a fermentation chamber, you could use ice. Put your fermentation vessel in a tub of water. Freeze a bunch of water bottles, then put the frozen water bottles in the tub of water, and put more bottles in the freezer.

 

A slightly more advanced take on that would be to use a tub of water, a cooler, and a circulating pump. Keep the cooler stocked with ice water, adding ice or frozen bottles of water as necessary, and only put water in the tub of water with the fermentation vessel. Use a temperature controller with probe in the tub of water to control the pump, exchanging the tub water with the cooler water.

 

I've seen this Johnson temperature controller recommended on a lot of forums. A brewpub I visited even used these: http://www.amazon.com/Johnson-Controls-Digital-Thermostat-Control/sim/B00368D6JA/2

 

You could use the same controller in the future for the kegerator or a more advanced fermentation chamber.

[seabass07]

Or go with an stc1000. Cheaper and reliable if you're willing to put it in a project box or mount it in a keezer collar. There's also the son of fermentation chamber which could be controlled by an stc1000. I did the ice bath for a long time. It keeps temps down, but in no way keeps a stable temp unless you have time to babysit it.