I'm sorry for the off-topic post, but I thought that some HAMBers would be into making their own beer and wine, and could share their knowledge. I'm not distilling; I'm strictly legal. I made one batch of beer, and it turned out flat. (I think I didn't bottle it quickly enough after adding some sugar for CO2, or I didn't add enough.) I'm working on my first 6 gallon carboy of wine. (Which seems to be going well.) I was wondering if you guys had any tips or tricks, websites or books, or other help for brewing beer or making wine. Thanks, Matt
I've stuck to wine making because it's easier, You don't have to be as anal about cleanliness and can take your time with it. My next batch of wine is going to be onion. And I've been meaning to make some dandelion wine for years...I've been thinking about planting a dandelion garden in my yard. I figure beer and grape wines are cheap enough to go and buy...but where do you go and but onion wine?
I did a batch of beer several years ago, no kidding all it was good for was removing oil of my drive way.. As for the wine. during your primary, try to keep it at a constant temprature, and yes everything MUST BE CLEAN. Once you get to your secondary follow instructions on all steps except when it is complete, let it age a month in the carbouy, it ages better bulk.
I have actually had better luck with my old beginner plastic kit then when I switched to a glass carboy.
Thanks for the replies. Tman, I just washed out my plastic "starter kit" bucket (which I could have bought at the hardwarestore), and it still smells strongly of the first fermentation. Will that effect the flavor of future batches? I like the idea of keeping it in the glass carboy for as long as possible. The wine-to-be keeps bubbling up CO2, which I assume means that there is more and more fermentation going on. I think that if I would bottle it soon, I would get glass fragmentation grenades going off at all hours of the day...
Look out for a copy of "Brewing Better Beers" by Ken Shales - very thorough, including methods, and recipes on a grand, at home scale. Think it was last reprinted a few decades ago though... There's a copy on eBay right now.
Home brewing is great. I did it for roughly 6 years until I had to give up our extra room for the kids playroom That's OK, I'll get it back one day. If you have a home brew store around...visit often. Those folks are a huge wealth of knowledge. Not one around? Find one somewhere else and call them. Cleanliness is everything. I stated with plastic, moved to glass carboys. Almost everthing you do can effect the final flavor. Heck, in essance it's cooking so, little changes make a difference...good and bad. Get a journal. Write down everything, boil time, specific gravity, exact ingredients (measure them). Once you hit a winner and adjust it the way you like, move to a different style. http://www.realbeer.com/ http://www.defalcos.com/
Ive been brewing for little over a year now. I mostly get my stuff from annapolishomebrew.com They're in Maryland and it gets to jersey pretty quick. After the beer ferments in the carboy you have to prime it(add little more sugar) before you bottle it. That will carbonate it in the bottles. no sugar its flat, too much and alot of blown up bottles. Im planning on kegging my next batch and getting away from bottles. all my freinds are drunks anyway. it'l be less work that way.
Oldsguy and I have a small brewery, 'Motorhead Brewery'. We started with kits from Midwest Home brewing out of Minnesota ( I think St.Louis City). Those guys are great and have a FREE video with purchase. Go to their web site. Hang in there craft beer is far,far better than the Big rice beers. Mick This is our Wheel Bearing Wheat, as clear as ant beer out the
I used to brew quite a bit when I was in college. I even took a class called Wines and Vines which was college credit for learning how to grow grapes and make wine.As far as the carbonation thing, what did you use for priming sugar? I always had the best luck with using 1 cup of light dry malt extract for the priming sugar instead of the traditional corn sugars that came in the kits. I was fortunate enough to live next to a guy that really did some fun recipes. He made a smoke flavored beer which was strange but good. He also did a pumpkin spice ale which was fantastic. He taught me how to make Mead which is some really good stuff. Simple too. I think it was 3lbs honey to 1 gal. water and ferment for a month with champagne yeast. We tried adding all kinds of different flavors too...ginger, concord grapes and orange juice. I miss brewing but all the constant cleaning was too time consuming.
Here is my recipe for straight skanko wino wine. It's actually quite tasty if you like a sweeter wine. This will not impress your snooty connissour friends but your PBR friends will dig it the most. 1 - 12 ounce can of 100% Grape Juice concentrate 4 cups of sugar 3 1/2 quarts of water 1 packet of wine yeast or you can use about a table spoon of bread yeast in a pinch. combine all in a 1 gallon container, stir, slap a ballon and rubber band over the top of the container and set in a cool dry place for about 30+ days. When the ballon quits inflating your ready to enjoy. there will be a lot of sediment at the bottom so you could stain into a new container if it bugs you. Good stuff. Experiment with diffrent grape concentrates like rasberry grape, cranberry grape, etc.
Flat beer sounds like a yeast problem...did you use dry yeast or liquid? Did you take hydrometer readings? Might have transfered the beer to the secondary fermenter to soon...and everything has to be clean...
OK, this whole topic works with many of us but is there a message board devoted to brewing? We might wanna save Ryans Bandwidth.
I started homebrewing in 1991, owned a Homebrew supply store for awhile and then became a professional brewer a couple years after that. I "retired" from brewing in 2004, though I occasionally brew a batch at a local brewpub, Max Lagers (theres a Barleywine on right now in fact) For the locals, I was the brewmaster at The US Border Cantina and Brewery in Alpharetta until it the owner decided to close it after coming into a very large inheritance. We were particularly known for robust, hoppy India pale ales, cask-conditioned ales and Belgian Ales. My tastes tend to fall on stronger in-your-face styles and my beers tended to follow my tastes, though I always found the more delicate styles to be a bigger challenge, as more finesse is required. I'd shy away from "strong bleach" as a sanitizer as a weaker bleach solution is nearly as effective and is less likely to taint the beer.....but like Tman said, we shouldn't use Ryan's bandwidth to talk about OT stuff. There are two excellent forums that cater to homebrewers and they are here: http://forum.northernbrewer.com/ http://www.brewboard.com Deuce, If there is a decent HB supply store in your area get to know the owner and pick his brain for advice...these guys usually live for this kind of thing and its worth giving them your business (as opposed to ordering online) in exchange for their advise and guidance. Also wouldn't hurt to get to know the brewer at your local brewpub (if the beers are worth a damn) for the same reason as well as access to large quantities of free yeast. I'll also say this as you embark on this hobby...theres no reason your homebrew should taste like homebrew....aim to make it taste as good as or better than the best commercial stuff on the shelves...Anchor, Sierra Nevada, Rogue etc, these should be your guideposts. Theres alot to learned along the way for sure, but the results are worth it (just like building hotrods) If anyone feels inclined, I'll be more than happy to answer any questions about brewing (or winemaking or distillation for that matter) via email or PM. Chris crterenzi@gmail.com
Ok, I am guilty of perpetuating this thread! When I said "strong bleach" I was general. My normal deal was a 50 gal plastic Rubbermaid garbage can full of bottles and water with a CUP of bleach. Lots of hot water rinses before bottling, no time to really go into detail here. Cool to see a pro brewer among us!
I have a HUGE dandelion garden that you can just have! Take it all! My whole yard is full of the damned things!
I tried brewing my own for a while, with mixed results. It was fun and I might try again because of all the money I spent before. One of my friends told me you can buy some really good beer for a lot less money, he is probably right.
No worries man, didn't mean to come off like I was calling you out or something. Just when it comes to chemicals, less is definately more...unless we're talking about hops...then more is good!
Me and the wife buy a wine kit. It has all the flavoring and ingredients you need (many flavors to chose from). Its called Island Mist and can be purchased at any wine/beer makeing supply store. These kits are really easy to do, just follow directions and it turns out good every time. I'll go to great lengths to get her drunk!!!
Unless you have a lot of time on your hands the Kit Beers are an easy way to go. A friend of mine makes several batches of the kit beers a year. He uses the old soda fountain stainless kegs to put his in. I haven't had a bad beer yet that he has made.
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