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Jahoodie posted:I'm making some cheap BJ's apple juice wine (5 gallons with 2lbs of added honey), with redstar blue packet champagne yeast. I just came into a crapload of champagne bottles and want to try my hand at making some apple bubbly for new years, but it's quite cloudy after a month. What I'm thinking of is to rack it to a secondary to clear, but I've never racked to a secondary before except with still meads. Will it still have enough yeast after racking and sitting for a month to get carbonated? Definitely rack it. Champagne yeast makes a very crisp cider, and in my last few batches, the ones that have sat on the yeast cake for more than 2 weeks have had a bit of a yeasty aroma to them. There will be plenty of yeast in suspension for carbonating, especially since the racking process will stir some up. Be sure to chill the bottles at least a week in advance, too. I've found that it helps build up a very solid cake on the bottom of the bottle that stays put when you pour.
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Oct 16, 2008 11:10
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Since we have a dedicated booze forum, might it be time to break apart from the megathread? It'd be a lot easier to follow specific recipes people are discussing.
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Oct 20, 2008 07:28
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BerkerkLurk posted:Well it's news to me, why shouldn't you pitch right on top of a yeast cake? Hop and other wort debris are settled down there, along with dead yeast. It works,m but I imagine it would make a cleaner beer if you could separate out some of the yeast and the trub before adding fresh wort.
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Oct 22, 2008 08:04
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yello posted:Yup, that's it in a nutshell. There's no point in waiting for the wort to cool - let it get cool enough to handle with potholders and pour it into your carboy. The extra water should bring it down to pitching temperature if it's been refrigerated. Glass carboys are big enough that cracking the glass from thermal shock is not really a big concern. Add the hot wort and cold water gently and it should be find.
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Nov 17, 2008 23:10
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il serpente cosmico posted:No, No, NO. I have an exploded carboy that resulted from this method. Cool the wort first. In addition to preventing against thermal shock, you'll also get the added benefit of a "cold break," which will get some proteins to settle out of your beer. OK, so maybe not boiling wort, but it certainly doesn't need to be 85 degrees. I can't imagine being able to pour wort through a funnel fast enough to do serious damage. I suppose you could add one or two gallons of water to the carboy first to add some extra mass if you're worried about the integrity of your carboy's glass.
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Nov 18, 2008 00:24
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tonedef131 posted:Can you post the full recipe?
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Nov 19, 2008 17:19
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6174 posted:It isn't sulfites you need to worry about, but sorbates. Sulfites come from using sodium metabisulfite or potassium metabisulfite. These both create sulfur dioxide which kills off wild yeasts and so forth to give a good starting point for the yeast of your choice to thrive. The sulfur dioxide dissipates relatively quickly (on the order of 24 hours at most), but leaves behind sulfites which some people are allergic too. Sorbates are a type of preservative which inhibit cell division (generally it is potassium sorbate that is used). In the presence of sorbates the yeast won't multiply like they should which leads to a lackluster fermentation, and potentially a bad batch. The ingredient list should say if sorbates were used. I know we've had this fight before in this thread, but sorbated juice is useable with a healthy starter. My last cider was with sorbate-free apple juice, and I saved a half-gallon of yeast slurry (Wyeast English Cider). I just pitched that into my new cider, which is 4 gallons of sorbated, but very very tasty locally-pressed cider, 2 cans of apple concentrate, and some extra sugar and spices. It's bubbling furiously after 48 hours and I expect it will be a much more appley-tasting cider than my store-bought juice batches. Actual sorbate levels might vary from brand to brand. I'd love to see someone do a comparison. In the past, I've had some brands of cider sit out for weeks without doing anything, and others that start swelling within days (and that taste great!).
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Nov 24, 2008 03:02
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6174 posted:I've never disputed that it could work. My point is more, why risk it when sorbate free juice is readily available? It doesn't have preservatives that specifically are there to prevent cell division that the yeast need to do. Sure with a large enough starter you can overcome this, but it is making it harder than it needs to be. It is much easier to just get the right juice from the start. The right juice is not always easy to find. Pasteurized, filtered apple juice makes decent cider, but in my experience it doesn't have the apple "body" that fresh(er) pressed ciders have, and those almost always have sorbates, unless you get them straight from a press that does UV pasteurization.
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Nov 24, 2008 15:00
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tonedef131, your pumpkin beer is great. I tweaked the recipe a bit for my 4.2 gallon batch and to suit what I had on hand: 5 lbs Maris Otter 8 oz Vienna 8 oz Crystal 60L 8 oz flaked rye (from the local health food co-op, cheap!) 8 oz flaked wheat (ditto, to top up the grain bill) 1 lb rice husks ~ 4lb. roasted pumpkin, pureed. 1/2 oz Galena pellets @ 60 a few leftover Cluster pellets at 15 Irish Moss Fresh ginger, Allspice berries, cinnamon (ground), ginger (ground), cloves, nutmeg - about 2 tsp each or their whole equivalents. I added even more spice as a tea during racking to secondary, and it paid off. S-04 yeast OG was around 1.048, FG seems a little high at 1.015, but that's as low as I've gotten since I started using a hygrometer. The pumpkin was mashed with the grains, but I don't think it added much flavor. The pumpkin pie taste really is in the spices. The beer is a little cloudy, but that's in no small part because I'm still playing with my cheap Corona hand mill - it makes a lot of flour, or else risks leaving 1/3 of the grain uncracked.
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Dec 17, 2008 02:01
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tonedef131 posted:That's great, I would like to know how it turns out with the S-04, what temp are you fermenting at? I got my results back from the competition I entered it in and I got a 33.5, alright I guess for the first time brewing the recipe. The judges seem to think that the pumpkin flavor did come through and liked the spices a lot. I think the pumpkin is more of a novelty than anything, but probably does have a positive effect on the mouthfeel and color. I had S-05 and S-04 on hand, and used the S-04 this time because it does slightly better at lower temperatures - I keep my apartment around 60-62. I did put the bucket in the closet (which has the heat pump AND electric water heater - it only tops out at 70 F!) for primary fermentation because there was very little krausen and almost no airlock activity for the first few days. The bucket went back to around 60 for secondary. S-04 also seems to flocculate (if that's a real verb?) more reliably than S-05, which I think helps given how cloudy the wort was. Irish moss, some cold break skimming/filtering, and racking seems to have cleared it up nicely though, at least by my rather low standards.
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Dec 18, 2008 19:25
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I started drinking my first Wyeast English Cider batch this week too. This round was made with sorbate-free apple juice and some extra concentrate. I sweetened half with a little Splenda, but I can't tell the difference. The cider tastes good - dry but smooth, clean tasting. But it has a strange aftertaste - almost woody? It might just be what apple is "supposed" to taste like when crazy champagne yeast isn't devouring it. After New Year's I'll be bottling batch 2, which used the yeast cake from #1 with 4 gallons of reasonably fresh local cider (with sorbates) plus some water and concentrate.
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Dec 28, 2008 03:50
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I don't see any compelling reason to use a racking cane with buckets. Drill both and add spigots. Ferment in one, rack through the spigot to secondary, and then rack again to the bottling bucket (the original fermenter). No siphoning, no trouble, little mess.
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Jan 14, 2009 03:25
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Use one of many online CO2 volume tables to prime. I've found that 1 ounce per gallon is usually too high for stouts and other things that need a creamier head and smoother mouthfeel. Overcarbonation can leave a "sharp" taste in the beer that fades as it goes flat.
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Jan 20, 2009 05:02
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ashgromnies posted:How do you guys clean out gross bottles with mold and poo poo at the bottom? My roommate is really bad at rinsing out his bottles after he drinks them. Bleach is the only reliable scum cleaning method I've found. Caked on mold literally floats away as soon as the bleach hits it. I add about 1 cup bleach to something in the neighborhood of 4-5 gallons of water and immerse my bottles in it overnight. Also dissolves most label glues very effectively. I've recently been adding washing soda as well, and have heard that it works on its own without bleach for simple label removal.
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Feb 5, 2009 17:19
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Upside Potential posted:I love their kits and all their equipment. My favorites have been the Dry Irish Stout and the Honey Brown Ale. Their Cream Ale extract was amazingly crisp and clean tasting. I just ordered the all grain today, along with the Irish Red kit. I almost bought 2 of each - I can't even buy the grain for much less than the kit costs, and then there are the hops at $3-4 a an ounce...
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Feb 6, 2009 23:07
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I get something like 80-85%, based on hydrometer readings anyway, with my Corona corn mill, but it makes a ton of flour. My beers have been clearing up nicely, but I think I get a lot of unfermentables from the process (FGs always above 1.010 and usually in the teens). I think I've been mashing too hot though, in my worries about the heat retention of my cooler setup.
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Feb 20, 2009 16:30
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If one of your cans is pre-hopped, don't boil it. It'll kill what little flavor there is.
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Feb 27, 2009 16:33
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What kind of fruit are we talking about? If it's in a can, it's already sanitary enough (if you're a real clean freak, you could sanitize the can opener and the can exterior before opening). If it's not in a can, you really should puree it if you actually to get some flavor in. Consider using a fruit extract, too. I found a blackberry syrup (used for mixing with water to make soft drinks - blackcurrant is also popular), and it worked very well - and probably added more berry flavor than smooshed blackberries would have. Edit: also, obligatory "beer finds a way" note for this page. In some parts of the world, a tasty brew starts with sorghum mush and a good dollop of spit to get things going. By adding a packet of yeast you've already got a leg up on hundreds of years worth of cellar-brewing Europeans.
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Mar 3, 2009 03:55
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Bad Munki posted:Seriously, I've been trying the welding shops. None of them around here will fill. The few that will have anything to do with the process will only exchange. Swear to goodness, I've tried. Fire extinguisher shops, and sometimes even friendly fire departments might fill it. The right paintball store should also fill a bulk tank, though I doubt the Wal-Mart gun counter guy would go near a tank like that. By the way: is the tank new? If not, is it still in hydro[static testing]? (there should be a date stamped on it). Nobody who does fill it will touch it if it's out of hydro, and testing often costs more than a tank is worth. And it might blow your tank up, too. (which is kind of the point - blow it up before it blows you up) jailbait#3 fucked around with this message at 01:49 on Mar 5, 2009 |
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Mar 5, 2009 01:47
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Timo posted:I tried making a maple beer with Wyeast's 3056 Bavarian Wheat yeast. The OG was a bit above 1.100, and after a week of crazy bubbling, I thieved some beer to test the gravity. It's down to about 1.025. I'm not sure why you went with a wheat beer yeast - something like a subdued ale yeast (even US-05) would let the maple stand out a lot more.
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Mar 7, 2009 18:43
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I followed the earlier "hopburst" discussion, but I'm wondering about how much dry hopping is too much. I'm planning on making something like an American IPA out of odds and ends I have laying around, but I don't have any proper high-alpha bittering hops laying around (inventory = some Kent Goldings, Spalt, Argentina Cascade, and Styrian, all in pellets). Would it be gross to have something like 20-25 IBUs from the boil, and then add an ounce or two of hop pellets dry for flavor and aroma? My only judges are myself and my friend, so styles be damned - but does a strong dry hop need a strong bitter background to work properly?
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Mar 8, 2009 04:16
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melon posted:I've had a Dark Ale in secondary for about a month now because I haven't had time, or enough bottles to be able to bottle it. I'm collecting them as quickly as I can, but will there be enough yeast still in solution to bottle condition? I've never left a beer in secondary this long before. Yes, it'll be fine. I've bottle-conditioned cider that was resting for 2 months in a cool closet. If you're worried, you can always stir a little of the yeast cake up when you rack to the bottling bucket.
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Mar 19, 2009 17:03
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ashgromnies posted:No ring. I don't think it's an infection, the beer seems to taste fine after it settles down. Actually the beer itself isn't so carbonated but fizzes like crazy - I read a post on homebrewtalk that said if that happens that the CO2 may just need more time to dissolve into solution. 5oz is too much for many styles, and thick beers tend to gush more (I had an oatmeal stout do some exciting things). Also, were the bottles cold? Leave some in the fridge for a week or two to settle if you haven't already. As long as it tastes good, just drink it with caution.
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Mar 26, 2009 13:00
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From what I've seen, making a lot of money in a completely unrelated field is the best way to get into microbrewing. Of the few brewpub/small brewers I've met, all have had 10-20 years in a business career where they made enough money to at least live on, and in some cases, to self-finance their start-up operations. There are a lot of mediocre brewpubs around - big yeast and malt companies even offer recipes for them. There's supposedly one in Ithaca, NY, that is strictly extract-brewing! It's the money that matters first and foremost.
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Mar 30, 2009 12:54
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Ajaarg posted:I was in a pretty good mood, despite a total failure of a triple decoction mash, until I read this post. Now I'm going to smoke a big bowl and cry myself to sleep, dreaming dreams of burning bankers. Google around for news stories on the Switchback brewery in Vermont. It's more or less a one-man show, and he got started by doing one beer, very well, on a very modest scale. (there's a seasonal now that comes out occasionally) edit: here's a starter story: http://www.glidemagazine.com/articles/47583/prepare-to-switchback.html I think I've seen interviews where he talks more about the business side of things, too.
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Apr 4, 2009 17:27
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Ajaarg posted:
You are one arrogant fucker. Some people don't want a 10lb sack of malt sitting around because it was "such a good deal" instead of buying what they actually needed for the brew session. For the record, Northern Brewer kits actually cost the same or even less than buying the ingredients individually (the savings is in the hops, by a few cents or a buck usually). edit: beaten, but just re-stating the point. Maybe the moral here is that your LHBS is run by shitheads who truly don't appreciate brewing geniuses like yourself.
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Apr 9, 2009 14:40
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Off-flavor guessing game: I have a failed "Octoberfest Ale" that I'm working my way through, and it seems to have picked up an odd flavor. It might just be that it's not suited to aging (about 2 months in bottles now), but I want to try and pin down what I'm tasting. My first thought is "cigarettes." Not literally smokey, but vaguely reminiscent of a cigarette taste in the mouth you can't get rid of several hours later. It's drinkable, but not nearly as tasty as when it went in the bottles. I'm tempted to blame it on the hops, but it doesn't taste skunky in the traditional sense. The sides of my tongue get tingled a bit at the end of each sip, but it doesn't seem very sour up front. The recipe wasn't anything special - just some munich malt, a few bits of crystal I had laying around, and some Tettanger & Styrian Golding hops. Fermented with US-05 at about 60 degrees F. Racked to secondary after about two weeks, and bottled on week three with dextrose (boiled in solution). The bottles carbonated fine, and there are no gushers or phenolic flavors, so I'm not thinking it's an infection.
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Apr 11, 2009 20:43
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Bad hops is a definite possibility. My LBHS does not move a lot of inventory, although stuff is stored at proper temperatures, and I tend to save 1/2 packets of hop pellets wrapped tightly in the freezer. I thought about DMS, because my homemade chiller takes quite a while to work and I tend to cheat a bit on boil times, but none of the flavor guides seem to fit what I'm tasting. The only thing that I've done different recently is adding a Campden tablet to my brew water, which might be too much - I see some people recommend only a half tablet for 10 gallons, vs my 1 tablet in 5! (oof, just remembered I also started using my wort chiller at this point. The fresh beer doesn't taste the least bit coppery, but a vaguely metallic mouthfeel {reminds me of Otter Creek's execrable Copper Ale} is a part of this off-flavor in question. Too many drat variables!). I hadn't thought about Brett. I might have gotten lazy and used my trusty wooden spoon cooking spoon when adding priming sugar to the bottling bucket - if I did use it, it was probably "steamed" in my electric kettle a few times, like I do with my plastic spoon, which I'm guessing is not sufficient to take out spores. I'll have my fiance taste some, but something between "wet blanket" and "barnyard" might be fitting. My Irish Red (bottled about a month later, same buckets) is also not tasting so great. The ingredients came from Northern Brewer, so a run of bad hops from the LHBS is unlikely. Edit: according to this thread: http://forum.northernbrewer.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59952 , spigots can be a problem spot. I know I've never taken the time to disassemble mine. I'm going to toss the tubing, and give the buckets a few rounds of scrubbing and bleaching. Edit 2: The spigots were appalling  I cracked open a cream ale (brewed after both suspect batches in question), and it tastes OK. I've got as much of my new beer as possible in the fridge to slow things down, and will try to drink it fast....
jailbait#3 fucked around with this message at 22:29 on Apr 11, 2009 |
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Apr 11, 2009 21:47
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Ajaarg posted:4.5 gallons of wort I didn't use because I didn't want to boil it down. You need to start English brewing! Use those second and third runnings for a completely different beer, if you can find an extra kettle or add another two hours at the end of your first boil for the next one. Keep it simple, toss a dry yeast, and make a nice ale.
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Apr 16, 2009 13:23
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I think I kicked my infection - retired the buckets and tubing, nuked my glass carboy (which previously only saw cider anyway) with soap, bleach & vinegar, and iodophor. I also finally splurged on an auto-siphon - hooray! (sanitizing is a pain in the rear end - nothing I have is tall/long enough to totally submerge the parts) I've got a Belgian golden ale merrily bubbling away, but I'm trying to find a good wheat recipe for early summer drinking. I have White Labs American Hefe yeast, about 2 lbs of malted white wheat, plenty of 2-row and 6-row, and a pile of specialty grains. Would something along these lines work? 3 lbs barley (2-row, 6, or mixture?) 5 lbs wheat berries OR flaked wheat 2 lbs wheat malt 4-8 oz Crystal, etc. My concern is not so much with conversion of the unmalted wheat as it is with flavor (would pre-mashing the wheat with amylase powder help?). I think the flaked wheat my local food co-op carries is red wheat, and I'm pretty sure the wheat berries are too. Is there a big flavor difference between red and white?
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Apr 18, 2009 16:14
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Mini yeast review: White Labs Belgian Golden Ale is truly magnificent. A great "entry level" Belgian for getting people into the genre. Fermented @ 65-70 F (ambient closet temperature here), and took 12 days to munch a fairly simple pilsner-based brew from 1.090 down to 1.015, and the flavor is fantastic already - hints of spice, and a very tasty orange/citrus flavor. No peels or spices went into the kettle or fermenter, so I'm pleasantly surprised with the taste. Flocculation left something to be desired, but I didn't do a protein rest so I'm not surprised that the beer is still somewhat cloudy in secondary.
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Apr 27, 2009 18:39
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Gas or electric stove? I'm suffering with an electric stove now, but it gets 4.5 gallons to a rolling boil in a reasonable amount of time. If it's an electric stove, you might look into new burner coils if they haven't been replaced in a while.
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May 7, 2009 22:49
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2 new endeavors for me: First, I tried malting some wheat. I can't find much info on this - everyone does barley, which seems to take a lot more time. My local co-op has soft white winter wheat for 79 cents a lb (and rye!), and I've already used it straight as an adjunct, but wanted to give malting a shot. I got a pound of it to sprout fairly easily, but I think I may have started drying it too soon. I was going by root length and not really dissecting the grains and looking at the acrospire inside. How many days is needed for wheat? What's a good hydration schedule? What should wheat be kilned at? And how the heck do you get rid of the dried roots? Second, I finally got a co2 tank and regulator and promptly made a soda-bottle force-carbing setup (like this guy's: http://www.truetex.com/carbonation.htm ) I'm going to find a corny keg or two eventually, but right now I'm space-limited. The maiden voyage of club soda turned out well, and I have a gallon of cider to do next. Are there any brands of soda that come in brown PET bottles?
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May 29, 2009 21:59
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ScaerCroe posted:No one has responded to my corn question, so I will ask again. The ONLY reason to add corn is to get gravity points without adding a lot of body. Corn makes a hideous beer - it's fit only for whiskey. Corn on the cob or frozen corn will just be a waste of time. Flaked corn is cheaper, has less wasted water, and has already been gelatinized. And to get on the whiny bandwagon: nobody responded to my post about malting wheat or rye. I have approximately 1 lb. of malted winter white wheat now. It's been dried and vaguely kilned. What kind of experiment should I run to check its modification? Mash the malt alone and check gravity? Mash with unmalted wheat? Will I need to ferment and check final gravity to find out if the initial gravity points are coming from sugar or other unfermentables in the grain? jailbait#3 fucked around with this message at 02:41 on Jun 10, 2009 |
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Jun 10, 2009 02:39
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I added good, dry cocoa when I racked to secondary on my chocolate porter. Came out very nicely - use a chocolate malt as well to help get that flavor profile. I think cocoa alone might not do the job.
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Jul 3, 2009 06:05
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FWIW, I can boil 5 gallons on my run of the mill electric stove. Unless you have a kickass gas stove, electric will probably put out more BTUs. You can speed up the mash by running 2 pots - I do 4 gallons for mash-in, and keep another 2 gallons warm or simmering for infusions or sparging. I've also done the wort in 2 pots, though only to reduce excess volume from collecting more runnings than expected.
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Jul 15, 2009 01:23
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mercenarynuker posted:I hope you'll forgive me for just jumping right in and posting this, but 85 pages is a little daunting to try and skim through for an answer :\ There is nothing inherently wrong with a Mr. Beer - the problem is with the kits they sell. You can do much better, and cheaper, using pellet hops and dry malt extract from the homebrew shop. I've used one my parents got to tinker around with. It's just a 2 gallon fermenter with a clever airlock system and an annoying spigot (hard to get a hose on it for filling bottles without foam).
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Aug 13, 2009 02:21
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il serpente cosmico posted:Don't bother getting two packs. You can always make a starter if it's too high. I'm not sure about pears, but I believe most apple ciders are in the 1.050~ range. Perry is tough; the flavor with just yeast is very sharp, so you'll need a secondary malo-lactic fermentation to make it taste good.
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Oct 12, 2009 13:05
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Nelsocracy posted:I was about to pitch yeast into my perry, and I noticed there's something in it. It is about the size of a quarter, white around the edges and green in the middle. It's also bubbling a tiny bit, although very slowly. It's mold. Not the end of the world, but not a good sign. Try to take it out with a wine thief and pitch, pitch pitch. You shouldn't have waited this long for the yeast anyway.
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Oct 22, 2009 14:00
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I'm still not quite getting a handle on force carbing. I can't effectively chill my corny before serving time, but I left my last keg under 20 PSI for a whole week at cellar temperature (about 55F). It was sort of fizzy, but still not what I expected. And that was after an initial round of gas-through-the-liquid-line at 40 PSI and a few minutes of shaking! I think I'm going to try sugar priming next time.
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Nov 3, 2009 14:30
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