Homebrewers

[DangerDanJD]

Any other homebrewers here in TGO? Now that fall is here, I will be bringing out the ol brew pot. I normally brew half a dozen or so beers through the fall and early winter. I have a flanders red that has been sitting the secondary for 12 months that I will be trying next weekend. Probably brewing up a pumpkin ale and also have a recipe for a coconut IPA that looks interesting. 

[DaveS]

I'm an avid homebrewer. My favorites are Stouts, Bitters, Porters and brewing Marzen (October fest style beer) with Ale yeast and Ale temperatures. Makes one A** kicking Ale! Simular to a steam beer.

 

DaveS

[DaveS]

Any other homebrewers here in TGO? Now that fall is here, I will be bringing out the ol brew pot. I normally brew half a dozen or so beers through the fall and early winter. I have a flanders red that has been sitting the secondary for 12 months that I will be trying next weekend. Probably brewing up a pumpkin ale and also have a recipe for a coconut IPA that looks interesting. 

I can't imagine "coconut" in beer. However, Vanilla is awesome!

 

DaveS

[RichardR]

I used to have a couple primaries & several secondaries, brewed mostly honey-meads with the occasional ale or stout run, I only made beer when I couldn't get honey for a good whole-sale price though.

I sold all of it off over a decade ago because I got into racing nitro-powered RC's pretty seriously & needed the dough & space to work on the cars & trucks, both are great hobbies maybe eventually I'll get back into homebrewing in the future.

Not sure how coconut will taste but what the heck man give it a try!

[dralarms]

I dont "brew" but make a bunch of wine.

[daveW]

I make wine and mead...I typically start 10 gal of pear mead in the Fall but I'm taking this year off due to an impending move.

[Metalhead]

I've always wanted to, but never knew anyone that did or that could give me advice on where to start. Is it better to start with one of those kits you see on the internet or have your own kind of setup?

[RichardR]

The kits are crap, piece it together & only use glass carboys.

[Metalhead]

The kits are crap, piece it together & only use glass carboys.

 

That's what I thought.

[runningfree]

I was an avid homebrew for many years. With the cooler days it does make me want to brew again.

When I first stated brewing there was mostly domestic beers around so homebrewing was one of the only ways to try different beers.

Kits are not the best becuase you never know how old they are.

The best way to homebrew is all grain. Also keg your beers if possible. I used the old coke five gallon cornies.

Wash one keg or wash around 50 bottles.

Some of my favorites to brew were Alts, Kolsch, IPA, Stouts, Porters and wheat beers all Ales.

The only Lagers I brewed was a Dopple Bock but the only way to get a good DB was doing a triple deccoction mash.  Talk about a long day of brewing.

With all the beers around now is why I have not brewed in a long while.

[analog_kidd]

Have never tried brewing beer, but I do enjoy making wine. I usually have a couple carboys full going at any time.

[DangerDanJD]

I enjoy brewing beer more then wine, quicker results. I really like experimenting with odd/unusual recipes. The Flanders I have in the secondary is a sour. I have a recipe for a mead/wine/ale brew that is really good. I also made a pretty decent chocolate coffee stout and a serrano peppered cream ale that tuned out well. 

 

We always do a few IPA's every year too but I don't really have a "go to" recipe that I really like. This time of year is definitely great for brewing. We hook up a bigscreen in the garage and brew on sundays normally. I have an all grain set up but haven't made the move to force carbing/kegging. Hoping to get some new equipment this year. 

[DangerDanJD]

As far as starting out, unlike a lot of the guys, I think the kits are actually a good thing. My first brew was a brewers best extract ingredient kit and it turned out great. Very easy and all you really needed was the brew pot and a carboy or an airtight bucket with an airlock. You can get some really good results using the extract kits while learning a lot before moving to using your own or other people's recipes and going all grain.  I can point people to a really good homebrewing forums if anyone wants to look into it some more. 

[vontar]

I keep wanting to get in on home brewing but just don't find the time.  I need to double my efforts.

[TMF]

I'm going to start homebrewing in November with focus on Ales.  Been looking into it for a while and now I'm finally gonna pull the trigger on it.

[RichardR]

As far as starting out, unlike a lot of the guys, I think the kits are actually a good thing. My first brew was a brewers best extract ingredient kit and it turned out great. Very easy and all you really needed was the brew pot and a carboy or an airtight bucket with an airlock. You can get some really good results using the extract kits while learning a lot before moving to using your own or other people's recipes and going all grain. I can point people to a really good homebrewing forums if anyone wants to look into it some more.

[RichardR]

As far as starting out, unlike a lot of the guys, I think the kits are actually a good thing. My first brew was a brewers best extract ingredient kit and it turned out great. Very easy and all you really needed was the brew pot and a carboy or an airtight bucket with an airlock. You can get some really good results using the extract kits while learning a lot before moving to using your own or other people's recipes and going all grain. I can point people to a really good homebrewing forums if anyone wants to look into it some more.

Welp the kit's I have seen generally include a set of plastic buckets & really cheap/garbage hydrometers & crappy sealing plastic gas locks, I dunno what sort of ingrediants they toss into them but I'm sure they are using a dry yeast & even that they can't be all that "fresh" if they are packaged up like that.

Sure you can brew alcoholic beverages with the kits but you're not going to come close to the taste of the brews you could produce using glazed ceramic primaries & glass carboy secondaries, a quality/accurate hydrometer, live/liquid cultures of yeast & solid sealing glass-gas locks.

At least that's my .02

[DaveS]

I used to keg everything, but now, I'm back to bottles. All grain brewing is a lot of fun, but you can make some amazing brews with malt extract and a few specialty grains. Homebrewing is a fun and relaxing hobby to have no matter how you do it.

 

DaveS

[RichardR]

Kegs are definately easier, I used a half-dozen 1 gallon mini-kegs just because they were easier to toss in the refrigerator (I didn't have a keg cooler).

Anyway I'd keg up half, then get out my racking cane & bottle up the other half of the batch because bottles were easier to toss in a cooler & take fishing, picnicing, etc, I had about 300 Grolsch flip-tops, they were very heavy duty glass & very stout flip-tops so no worries about any of them popping while they were finishing up, learned that lesson early on using regular bottles & caps (hahhhahhhahaaa what a freaking mess that was!).

[DangerDanJD]

When I referred to "kits," I meant ingredient kits as opposed to equipment kits. Basically, the ingredient kits include a recipe with all ingredients necessary to brew a specific beer. As far as equipment kits, they are ok, but you can probably do better buying the parts individually. 

 

I have only been brewing a couple of years, but I have never heard of anyone using "glazed ceramic primaries." I will have to check those out. I don't find I get any difference between using a food grade plastic bucket or better bottle as opposed to a glass carboy. I have both. I definitely agree that doing a yeast starter is superior to using a dry yeast, but for the beginner, dry yeast works fine. 

 

My point is that it is fairly easy to brew your first beer using one of the extract ingredient kits and in my experience they normally turn out pretty good.  

[RichardR]

Welp growing up my grand-dad taught me to brew (and distill) & he took it very seriously, I guess that kind of rubbed off on me.

Anyway he was a big anti-plastic advocate, he said that they'll eventially scratch up & even itty-bitty teeny-tiny scratches in the plastic will be breeding grounds for bacteria no matter how good you steralize your equipment, fouling the taste of the brew (if not potentially making you ill).

He always used big'ole glazed ceramic primaries so that is what I always used, I have no idea who or where they sell them though, I got mine from him.

I'm not sure how scientifically accurate that actually is, but I've never met anyone else who knew more about making beer & corn whiskey that he did, so I've always took it as gosphel.

The rest is obvious, cheap/garbage hydrometers will give you inaccurate gravity readings, bad gas locks will bleed off to much pressure, etc.

I've never used an "ingrediant kit" but I'd imagine they'd be hard to screw up iffin everything is already pre-measured so that's a plus for beginners, the only problem I could see would be the dry yeast, but a newbie pallet might not notice any difference anyway ...

It's a great hobby though, very enjoyable especially the drinking it part! Edited September 24, 2013 by RichardR

[DaveS]

When I referred to "kits," I meant ingredient kits as opposed to equipment kits. Basically, the ingredient kits include a recipe with all ingredients necessary to brew a specific beer. As far as equipment kits, they are ok, but you can probably do better buying the parts individually. 

 

I have only been brewing a couple of years, but I have never heard of anyone using "glazed ceramic primaries." I will have to check those out. I don't find I get any difference between using a food grade plastic bucket or better bottle as opposed to a glass carboy. I have both. I definitely agree that doing a yeast starter is superior to using a dry yeast, but for the beginner, dry yeast works fine. 

 

My point is that it is fairly easy to brew your first beer using one of the extract ingredient kits and in my experience they normally turn out pretty good.  

I started using "White Labs" yeast several years ago, and does do wonders for your beer. I used to use another brand of liquid yeast but quit after I tried White Labs. A good extract kit, with a few specialty grains is a good way to get started. It's not complicated nor time consuming, and you'll amaze yourself. I think most folks would do well to start with a fast maturing brown ale or bitter, that can be drank in a month or so. Build your kit as you go!

 

DaveS

Edited September 25, 2013 by DaveS

[JAB]

 The Flanders I have in the secondary is a sour.

 

You mean sort of in the style of a Monk's Cafe Sour Flemish Ale?  That stuff is delicious.  Expensive so you want to just 'sip' it but tastes so good it is hard not to just gulp it down.

 

I have one of the kits I got at Fermentations (aka Fermentation Station) in Knoxville last year.  I've had my buddies saving up 'pry-off' bottles for me and finally have just about enough.  Now I just need to get off my butt and actually brew my first batch.  I have made home-made wine off and on since well before I was old enough to legally drink my final product (I think I was around nine when my dad first let me help him and maybe 14 when I made my first batch on my own.)  We always used just the old 'country' method, though.  In the intervening years, I began using different wine-makers yeasts and using a hydrometer for more specific alcohol content control as well as devising different ways to limit exposure to O2 (thereby increasing alcohol content) but I have not used a carboy or a bucket with airlock, before (the kit I have has the bucket/airlock.) 

 

The first one I plan to make is a wheat beer, sort of a hefe weizen style.  I love darks (especially porters) but I also really like hefes.  I don't care much for IPAs or Nut Brown Ales but I really like that Monk's Cafe I was talking about, above.

 

Some friends used to say that the wine I made was 'dangerous' because I was getting pretty high alcohol contents (one batch was 15% or 30 proof according to the hydrometer I was using.)  They said it was smooth and sweet going down and tasted about like grape juice.  It somehow managed to not have much of an alcohol taste or burn so you'd drink it fast and then the next thing you knew it hit you like a sledgehammer.  I haven't made much wine in the last, few years though.

Edited September 24, 2013 by JAB

[DangerDanJD]

Yeah, the flanders red is of the same style as the Monks. I really enjoy wheat bears, especially in the summer and early fall, great choice to get started. I just bottled four gallons of cider that I had been neglecting for a couple months. It is my first attempt at a cider so we will see how it goes in a couple weeks. 

[Andyshowfan]

I keep wanting to get in on home brewing but just don't find the time.  I need to double my efforts.

I am looking to start myself. I have all the stuff needed to start from my days of making hard cider. I want to make some hefeweizen