Home brewing kits ....

Next kit try a "brew enhancer" rather than plain sugar. See if you notice a difference. I suspect you will. I know it's about a fiver more than just using a bag of table sugar, but that's what, 12p extra a pint, for beer that should have more body and a better taste.
 
Finally made it to my local brew shop yesterday and they have a great stock of kits so glad i found it and feel i might be in there a lot :).

So the other half wanted to get into wine making so also grabbed a kit for her to get going.

My gravity on the razorback was 1.050, actually remembered to take it this time round :)

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seabiscuit said:
Oooh nice. I keep getting told good things about the Festival Ales range, so look forward to hearing what you think of it.
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Will keep you updated :), Been told to let it condition for 5-6 months for best results though. So might bottle half and just hide a lot of them, feel i might start buying more kits and getting stock piles. Suppose ill be stocked up for Christmas by then, time for giving right ? :D
 
My brew is still fermenting, has taken a lot longer than the instructions suggested, I'm nearly at 2 weeks now and it's still a long way off the recommended 1.010 or below. At present its around 1.024 so I'm thinking it'll probably be another week at least yet before it's ready for bottling
 
The Hop Progression.

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Measured the gravity of my brew again last night, having dropped quite a bit over the weekend, it's barely dropped at all since Monday. It smells a lot more beer like now whereas it has been smelling very yeasty.

Hopefully it'll continue doing it's thing and eventually get down to a point where I can bottle it...
 
Looking good Etheco. So I take it that was dry hopped with pellets? With the couple of kits we've done that dry hopped with pellets, the first one we barreled straight into the barrel and primed it. It took ages to clear. So for the second one we syphoned it into a secondary fermenter to try and have less pellet detritus, left it in a second fermenter for a few days before barelling. Cleared much much quicker and is clear and amazingly hoppy.
 
seabiscuit said:
Looking good Etheco. So I take it that was dry hopped with pellets? With the couple of kits we've done that dry hopped with pellets, the first one we barreled straight into the barrel and primed it. It took ages to clear. So for the second one we syphoned it into a secondary fermenter to try and have less pellet detritus, left it in a second fermenter for a few days before barelling. Cleared much much quicker and is clear and amazingly hoppy.
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Yeh drop hopped with pellets.

Ah good to know, i am putting it into a secondary to bottle, so might transfer and leave it a few days then put the priming sugar in to bottle it after, Just buying stock of grolsh bottles to bottle the lot 48 bottles :o

Cheers for tip buddy :)
 
Are you putting the priming sugar into the bottles, or are you mixing it into the batch of beer then bottling it? If it's the latter, I'd almost rack it into your secondary bucket for a few days, let more of the yeast and hop bits drop out, then rack that back into your first bucket to batch prime it for bottling. Only problem is the more times it's "messed" with, increases the chances of an infection slightly.
I think if I were bottling, I'd maybe make a syrup and measure that into the bottles maybe. Just so the beer isn't being transferred lots of times, and so you're not stirring up all the hops and yeat when you batch prime.
I'm sure other people will also have suggestions though that are better.
 
seabiscuit said:
Are you putting the priming sugar into the bottles, or are you mixing it into the batch of beer then bottling it? If it's the latter, I'd almost rack it into your secondary bucket for a few days, let more of the yeast and hop bits drop out, then rack that back into your first bucket to batch prime it for bottling. Only problem is the more times it's "messed" with, increases the chances of an infection slightly.
I think if I were bottling, I'd maybe make a syrup and measure that into the bottles maybe. Just so the beer isn't being transferred lots of times, and so you're not stirring up all the hops and yeat when you batch prime.
I'm sure other people will also have suggestions though that are better.
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I was planning in putting the priming sugar into the bin, but issue is my secondary has the tap, so id be at a loss come bottling lol, would mean a 4th transfer to bottle properly.

I was only going to stir it gently in and leave it 30-40mins then start bottling it shouldn't stir up to much extra id hope.

Ill have a think, will see how difficult it is to make a syrup and split that up evenly across 48bottles.
 
A 5ml syringe from boots or somewhere should make it easyer to evenly measure a sugar syrup for priming.
Unless, as happened to MrsSeabiscuit, you go to your local pharmacy to buy a syringe (to measure starsan for sanitising) and they tell you homebrew isn't legal, and they should call the police on you. To say I was a bit cheesed off would be quite an understatement. Nah, I'd say livid summed it up better.
 
seabiscuit said:
A 5ml syringe from boots or somewhere should make it easyer to evenly measure a sugar syrup for priming.
Unless, as happened to MrsSeabiscuit, you go to your local pharmacy to buy a syringe (to measure starsan for sanitising) and they tell you homebrew isn't legal, and they should call the police on you. To say I was a bit cheesed off would be quite an understatement. Nah, I'd say livid summed it up better.
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Ommm I'm calling police!!! :D
yes I can confirm Simon was a lil cross :D
 
seabiscuit said:
A 5ml syringe from boots or somewhere should make it easyer to evenly measure a sugar syrup for priming.
Unless, as happened to MrsSeabiscuit, you go to your local pharmacy to buy a syringe (to measure starsan for sanitising) and they tell you homebrew isn't legal, and they should call the police on you. To say I was a bit cheesed off would be quite an understatement. Nah, I'd say livid summed it up better.
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Mrs Seabiscuit said:
Ommm I'm calling police!!! :D
yes I can confirm Simon was a lil cross :D
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Oh my, I feel almost tempted to now go to my local pharmacy xD, What did the police say? did they actually show up.

So is it a case of saying, So id have to make say 240ml of syrup with the right amount of sugar, and put 5ml in each. Might be a good way todo it tbh, and also means reduce the 3rd transfer in the fermentation buckets.
 
Checked the gravity of my beer again this morning, another week on and it's dropped ever so slightly. but it's still a fair way off where it's supposed to be getting too, I fear the drop in temperature over the last few days has slowed this down immensely.

What's a good way or increasing the temperature safely?
 
So i got myself a 5ml syringe today ready, The beer looks lovely and clear in the 2nd bucket now ready.

Any rough guides on converting the sugar to syrup? is it a case of just making 240ml of syrup for 48bottles? is it a direct conversion to that.
 
I missed the discussion above but regarding priming sugar and bottling.... It's *SO* much less hassle to rack to another container and then mix in the priming sugar (well, a syrup you've made from boiling water and priming sugar at least) than it is to add sugar to bottles individually.
 
FrenchTart said:
I missed the discussion above but regarding priming sugar and bottling.... It's *SO* much less hassle to rack to another container and then mix in the priming sugar (well, a syrup you've made from boiling water and priming sugar at least) than it is to add sugar to bottles individually.
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Yeh i have already transferred once, and sadly the bucket i have left does not have a tap for the bottler.

So i planned to make a syrup and syringe 5ml in each as this be much more precise and slightly quicker then messing with spoons of sugar.
 
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