has anyone here brewed their own booze

cm1179

cm1179

cm1179

Soldato
Joined
30 Sep 2009
Posts
3,626
to a success level where you could've bottled it for purchase? i'm particulary interested in cider, my friends dad has a lot of apple trees that we are thinking of having a go at making our own cider with when the season is right. not quite sure what's involved though.
 
I dont know about selling it but I remember when I was 15 or 16, my mates brother used to make his own home brew and we stole a bottle :o

It was a 1L bottle I think and 3 of us were wasted off it!
 
I don't but would like to. Years ago I was bang ... eh .. seeing this girl from Czech whose dad used to make his own vodka. Pear flavoured, Banana flavoured, Strawberry flavoured, you name the fruit, her old man used to brew it into vodka. One shot and we had a fun night, two shots and she went at it alone with me passed out and drooling next to her.

I want to make my own liqueurs, but not sure if it's possible. To be honest, never looked into it
 
Spirits require distillation and thus are not allowed by the general public due to the many risks associated with it.

Beer and Cider should be fine though!
 
Again, distillation isn't particularly difficult or dangerous. You can make a very simple distillation setup for less than £50. A small still would be more ideal, quite simple to make and you could do it for less than £100. I guess you're asking, because you want to make ethanol for bio-diesel, right? ;).
 
Ahleckz said:
To make cider from apples, all you need is a press and somewhere to store the apple juice which you want to ferment. Making cider from apples is terribly easy if you have a decent press.
Click to expand...

Completely agree. Used to spend summers making cider at a neighbouring farm in Devon on a large scale with a traditional 350 year old wooden cider press. It used to sit in tastey sherry barrels and the end product was awesome :)

Does depend on the apples you use though. Happy days.
 
To make cider from apples, all you need is a press and somewhere to store the apple juice which you want to ferment. Making cider from apples is terribly easy if you have a decent press.
Click to expand...

That's pretty interesting. Don't you need to add yeast to start the fermentation? And then filter or clarify it somehow?
 
Saetia said:
That's pretty interesting. Don't you need to add yeast to start the fermentation? And then filter or clarify it somehow?
Click to expand...

I always thought "proper" cider was the press and store method and when ready for drinking was the colour of cloudy ****. You can't see through it. All the stuff you get that's clear is loaded with or made only from chemicals and extracts.
 
My friend did it one year, waste of money and time. By the time he got all the bottles, kit and ingredients, he could have bought a LOT of beer from the supermarket.

Not to mention it tasted rank.
 
Saetia said:
That's pretty interesting. Don't you need to add yeast to start the fermentation? And then filter or clarify it somehow?
Click to expand...

Nah, they'll naturally ferment given the right conditions. You could add extra yeast yourself if it wasn't doing much or to get it to a higher strength. You could 'rack' it, which just means drawing off the majority of the liquid but leaving some solids behind a few times which will clear it but it really isn't necessary most of the time but each batch is different. But that only requires a pipe which costs a few pennies.

Raymond Lin said:
My friend did it one year, waste of money and time. By the time he got all the bottles, kit and ingredients, he could have bought a LOT of beer from the supermarket.

Not to mention it tasted rank.
Click to expand...

He got ripped off then, and didn't do it correctly. Generally, if it tastes awful then it's because there was an issue with cleanliness and bacteria got in somewhere.
 
Cloudy cider is better and easier to make anyway.

You can, with decent apples, just press them and store the juice in a bucket. Keep taking the froth off till it froths no more.

Then drink and enjoy.
 
We used to make mead at uni. Although it was cheap, easy to make, got you pretty drunk pretty quickly and created an interesting conversation piece at parties I would not recommend it on taste!

Once yeast poisoned never forgotten, those are my words of wisdom! It is fun and a good little project though.
 
I used to make wine and one of my friends used to brew tons of beer. It was ok for friendly consumption but not for the public. I gave up because it was just too much of a hassle.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom