Tag Archives: home brew

22 Sep 2013
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Uncategorized

Taking Inventory

As mentioned in my last post, I’m back from my trip!

I meant to do an inventory last weekend, as mentioned in my last post, but jet lag got the better of me.  I had a ton of other stuff to catch up on as well so there was no beer related activity.  Fortunately, Mikey and I got back into it with an easy kit IPA; I’ll be writing this up later.  We also managed to taste a couple brews.

I did this inventory because I had a lot of home brew floating around the house, stored in different places.  I also had stashed empty bottle in various places.  It was good to pull everything out, get everything organised, and see what I had left.

What I found was:

inventory

That’s 58 bottles of beers (including the Little Creatures) to work through!

I have a habit of avoiding drinking the last few beers of batch, so they get put into the back of a cupboard and forgotten about. Unfortunately I’m going to need about 60 bottles for the brew I did yesterday, So it looks like I have some work to do in order to get more bottles!  Fortunately there is plenty to choose from…

Finally, let us all take a brief moment of silence for all the tasty home brew that was so good I drank it rather than saved it.  It will be missed until I make it again.

Anyway, I’ll be posting up yesterday’s brew soon, and there are some reviews coming as well.  Stay tuned.

-Chas

 

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16 Sep 2013
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Home brew kits

Bottling day, and not much more

Mildly Dark #1

Mildly Dark #1 in bottles

Saturday was going to be a full brew day. Due to a few different reasons the brew didn’t go ahead. Ended up being just a bottling day.

Ian was going to join, but was heading out of town. Chas got back, but still has a lot of things to sort out. And I was sick last week, so didn’t have much energy to do a brew by myself. That’s also why there wasn’t a new 101 last week. This week we should be back on track.

Ended up taking me three hours. Was a slow sort of arvo, sanitising bottles in two batches. Two slabs of stubbies and an extra 12 mixed. Total of 60. Lucky ‘cos those were my last bottles. Every single one now full of beer. Probably a good thing I didn’t do a 23L brew like planned.

Final gravity reading came in at 1.024. That means after bottling it should sit at 4.7% ABV. Not as high as I was pushing for the last few beers. That said I’m happy with this as the Mild style isn’t meant to be that strong. Flavour wise it was a mix. I was hoping that it could be enjoyed as a young beer, as the style is suppose to be. My gut feeling is that this would take more than two weeks. That’s likely due to the dark malt that was added.

On a side note, tried out a bottle of the Baltic Porter #1 last week. Given it was less than two weeks in the bottle I was impressed. Should be quite a good drop.

-Mikey

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5 Sep 2013
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General tips

New 101 – brew types

Another Thursday and another 101. This week I’ve put up some information on the four brew types; Kit & Kilo, Extract, Partial Mash, and Full Grain.

A quick note. Some people think that Kit & Kilo (K&K) brews are just Extract brews. I’ve provided a bit of background as why we’ve kept them as different types of brew.

The 101 on equipment has been pushed back a week for this one to go up. I felt it was important to cover off the brew methods first as this impacts the processes, what ingredients are needed and what equipment you use.

This weekend there’s no home brewing as Chas is glob trotting. I’ll get one or two home brew reviews up over the next few days.

-Mikey

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2 Sep 2013
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Home brew kits

Brewing alone, and making a mess

Chas is still overseas, and will be for a couple more weeks. So this week’s brew, and next one in two weeks time, will be sans Chas. Next brew I hope to be joined by Ian, but this week it was just by my lonesome.

Like any normal brew day first thing is to bottle the last batch. So, most if the 10 litres of Baltic Porter #1 made it’s way into bottles. I say most because, (1) there was a gravity reading sample to be taken, and (2) there was an accident. The little thing that regulates the flow of beer (aka the bottling valve) fell off into one if the bottles as I was filling it. I freaked out a bit, thinking to get as much as possible into bottles before remembering there was a tap! Once things were under control again I reattached the bottling valve and had no more problems. Needless to say I’ve got some bottles that I’m not sure how they’ll condition, and they all marked with a question mark.

Final gravity came in at 1.021. That means after bottle fermentation it will sit at 7.2%. I’m very happy with that.

Mildly Dark #1

The Mildly Dark #1 sitting in the fermenter.

As this was a solo affair, had a sizeable break before brewing.
Back a few weeks ago when I picked up the ingredients for the Baltic Porter #1 there were a couple other things I picked up as they were on special. The main thing was the Mangrove Jack’s Mild kit. It’s a liquid malt extract and known for having some decent quality.
I also picked up some “factory second” dry malt. It was recommended to boil up the stuff for use. I just threw it into boiled water, and had a little problem getting it to dissolve.
Finally, had a can of dark liquid malt extract that I bought by mistake earlier on.

All up this was a kit with a lot of malt additions, both dry and liquid. Given the mistakes of the Australian Pale Ale #1 and Australian Amber Ale #1, I’m feeling a lot better about this brew. Given the extra dark malt I’ve dubbed this beer Mildly Dark #1.

Ingredients:

  • Mangrove Jack’s Mild kit
  • 500g “factory second” DME
  • 1.5kg Black Rock LME

Gravity ended at 1.056. Happy with that. If it ferments down to around 1.020 then the final ABV will come in around 5%, and that’s something to look forward to.

-Mikey

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28 Aug 2013
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Home brew reviews, Uncategorized

Australian Pale Ale # 1- Review

So, the Australian Pale Ale was ready for drinking.  Kind of…

This brew was Mikey seeing what would happen if he added a full can of malt (usually for a 20 litre brew) to only four litres of waterAus pale ale.  It didn’t turn out too well.

Firstly, it was very dark for a pale ale.  The malt hadn’t been diluted enough so it was still fairly dark.

In the smell, it was very sweet and very malty.  A few floral smells managed to make it through, but it was tough to find them through the sweetness.

This continued on through the taste, which was extremely overpowering.  As mentioned, this was a whole can of malt for a very small batch.  The beer was excessively malty and very sweet.  It was also very thick.  It was not unlike cordial when not enough water is added; still much too concentrated.

Unfortunately there isn’t much else to say about this beer.  The malt and sweetness was so overpowering, there just wasn’t much else there.  Mikey insists that he was able to find some hops tastes in there, and granted, there is a little bit of bitterness coming through, but not much.

Anyway, adding way too much malt  does not bear the best results.  Sorry Mikey, this isn’t the best creation…

– Chas

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23 Aug 2013
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General tips

New 101 – beer ingredients

So, far so good. First 101 went up last week and a week later second one is going up.

This week we’re looking at the basics of beer ingredients. There’s a lot of detail behind it all, but really there’s four main ingredients  Malt, Hops, Water and Yeast.

Page is under the 101 section. Hope you like it. Let us know if you think something else should be added, removed or fixed.

-Mikey

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21 Aug 2013
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Experiments

Lesson learnt, a bit too late

On Sunday we had another brew day at my place. Was time to do another Porter and a using some grain for the first time since the Brewsmith kits.

There was bottling of the Australian Amber Ale and tasting of the Australian Pale Ale. Both are a lot darker than ‘amber’ or ‘pale’ and should be renamed ‘dark’ and ‘amber’. The tasting of the Amber was, how should I put this, bad. The idea behind the two brews really wasn’t thought out well enough. I had assumed the sugars in the liquid malt cans would mostly ferment leaving only a slight sweetness. I was very wrong. And I should have realised it when we did the gravity readings. Chas has a review that will be going up, but to summarise… it’s bad. The amber came in at lower gravity than the pale, so that might be worse. I’m not going to even attempt tasting the Amber Ale in two weeks. I think both beers need to condition for a number of months, maybe six or more.

So, with that in mind I’m very glad we did a brew of something that should turn out a fair bit better. Or at least in theory. The brew can’t be classified as a ‘Partial’ because the grains used were crystal. That means no enzymes to convert starch into sugar, aka a mash. This was Steeping of the grains, and therefore this brew should be classified as an extract. Plus a can of amber liquid malt extract was used. There was 500 grams of Crystal (ebc 115-145) used.

Baltic Porter #1

Grains for Baltic Porter #1 steeping in the pot

I wanted to get the most out of the grains so steeping occurred for a full 60 mins at around 80C. I say around 80C as the temperature wasn’t fully controlled the whole time. It dropped down to around 77C and was as high as 86C at one point. Not great. But, in defence it was only steeping and not mashing.

And so the Baltic Porter started.

After steeping there was a sixty minute boil. The can of liquid malt and the liquid from steeped grains were all thrown into the wort. Once the hot break occurred in went 7 grams of Warrior hops.

After 30 mins there were 3 grams of Fuggles added. Then finally another 2 grams five mins before flame out. This was then put in the big 30L fermenter and topped up to the 10L mark. Windsor hops were added and fermenter given a good shake to get more oxygen due to the expected high alcohol.

  • Crystal grain (ebc 115-145) – 500g
  • Black Rock Amber liquid malt extract – 1.7k (cans are now bigger)
  • Warrior Hops – 7g
  • Fuggles – 5g (split 3-2)
  • Danstar Windsor yeast – aprox 5g

The original gravity was calculated at 1.081, but only came in at 1.072. That’s probably a good thing considering what happen to the two Australian Ales recently brewed.

The day had some painful lessons. And they were kept to small batches so there’s not too much pain. If this Baltic Porter turns out bad I think it might be time to return to some kits for a little bit.

-Mikey

PS. Forgot to mention we tasted the Black Rock Miners Stout and Gauss’ Law hopped cider. Review for stout is up and review of Gauss’ Law will be coming soon.

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19 Aug 2013
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Home brew reviews

Black Rock Miners Stout – Review

Stout, stout, stouty stout stout.

Yesterday we tasted the Black Rock Miners Stout in addition to doing a brew that I’m sure Mikey will write up.  We also tasted the Gauss’ Law Hopped Cider as well as Mikey’s Australian Pale Ale.  Reviews of these will be coming as well.

Anyway, the stout!

First of all, it looked very much like a stout.  Very dark, decent head while pouring, although the head retention was lacking a little bit.

Unfortunately there wasn’t a whole lot of aroma; the aroma was there, but quite very subtle.  I wasn’t able to get much out of it, but there were hints of brown sugar, chocolate, general sweetness and some malt and sticky smells as well.  There wasn’t much in terms of overt hops smells, but that is where some of the sticky sweet may have been coming from: floralStout mixing with the malt perhaps.

On the first taste, it was apparent that this is a weaker stout of 4% ABV with very little body, especially for a stout.

The subtle chocolate flavours continue as well as the subtle malt flavours, but other than that, the flavour is just “there.”  There wasn’t much to put my finger on, nothing obvious coming out to set it apart.  All the fairly standard stout flavours were there, but nothing to talk about.

As it was a stout, I wasn’t expecting any wild hops tastes, but, that being said, I couldn’t find much hops in there except for a mild amount of bitterness.  I would have liked maybe some floral or spicy flavours in there, just to add a bit of a twist.  Then again, I’ve been drinking a lot of imperial stouts lately, so maybe my pallet for stouts is a bit off…

Overall, it’s a good beer, but not great.  It’s very accessible but very middle of the road.  Because of this, it would make a fairly sessionable stout.  It would also make a good introduction to stout for those who don’t usually drink it.

In relation to food, these heavier beers generally go with heavier, meatier dishes, and this is no exception.  I think stouts are always good with barbecue, but I’d reserve this for a barbecued white meat like chick.  I also think that this stout is light enough to enjoy with a relatively hardy pasta with a good thick red sauce.

-Chas

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16 Aug 2013
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General tips

Brew 101, it’s what you want

For the past couple months we’ve been letting you all know what we’ve been up to. What we brew. What goes in. What it ends up like. And that’s been great. We have even touched on what’s involved in the brew process.

The feedback has been that people want more. Friends, family, work colleges, barristers that we visit regularly, and random strangers out and about. Its something I was planning on doing after the Journey To Home Brew series. Its something Chas wants to do. And the time is now right.

So with that in mind we are proud to present… (drum roll) Brew 101!

We’ll aim to get a new one up every week (or so) over the next few months. The start will be on the very basics and we’ll work our ways across different brewing methods, styles, ingredients, equipment, bottling, cleaning, and everything else brew related. We won’t get it right first time for everything. We’re learning a lot of this stuff too. So, we’ll fix and add things over time.

First cab off the rank is 101 Brewing concepts.

-Mikey

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10 Aug 2013
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General tips

Search engine terms #1

Howdy!

I’m really into data and numbers, so I spend a good amount of time checking out the stats for We Make Home Brew.  One thing I’ve found interesting is the search engine terms; what people are searching for when they stumble upon this blog.

This has inspired me to do two things.  Firstly, there is a handy new section above that provides links to the occasional general tip article that we do.  Secondly, I thought I’d share some of the search terms and expand where possible.  Hopefully whoever originally found this blog through a search engine is still reading and now has their question answered!  Feel free to comment with questions and I can go into things further.

Adding to this, we’re currently in the process of writing some other general informational posts that we’ll throw into the new section.  A lot of this is to provide some information, a lot of this is because we’re taking a brief break from brewing because I’ll be going on holidays for about a month!

How do I make cider?  Also various cider related searches.

One of the reasons for the new tips and tricks section.  I’ve done a general run down on cider making here.

Buy super yeast for wine

All yeast is pretty super.  This is a bit of a strange search to do.  I have done a post on yeast, but there is so much to consider, it’s probably best to consult your local home brew store: they should be able to advise you on the best yeast to use for your brew.  All yeasts are different and it’s best to make sure you’re using the most appropriate yeast.

In relation to wine yeast, I’ve only used the SN9 wine yeast for my ciders.  This is advertised as generally good for whites and sparkling wine.  I’ve found it’s a pretty clean yeast that doesn’t leave any yeasty tastes.  What I’ve also found is that it’s a fairly slow fermenting yeast when compared to ale yeasts I’ve used.

Fermentation blanket

I’m not sure where this pointed the searcher, but I think we’ve made references to such things… I keep my fermenter in the kitchen, so I generally just throw a towel or an old blanket over it to keep things warm.  I’ve found that the fermentation process creates a little bit of heat, so in a modern house, a decent blanket can work wonders.  My kitchen also gets a fair amount of morning sun, and it’s best to keep UV off of your brew, so the blanket also helps to block the sun

Mikey, on the other hand, keeps his fermenter in the garage (AKA the Brew Dungeon).  Mikey has insulated a cupboard with old sheets which does a pretty good job.  To compliment this, Mikey also has a heat pad to use in case of emergencies.  Heat pads can be purchased at most home brew supply stores; I’ve even seen heat belts for sale as well.  For general heating, Mikey has thrown some Christmas tree lights into the cupboard.  Keeping these on for a few hours a day does wonders.

I’ve seen and read about various other home made temperature regulation systems.  A popular thing to do is to use an old bar-fridge (not plugged in).  Refrigerators are designed to be very well insulated, so the temperature should stay fairly constant.  Heating/cooling sources can be added to the fridge if the temperature is wrong.

Will yeast die if it gets too hot?

it depends on what is meant by “too hot”.  But yes, yeast is a living thing and will die if things get too hot, it’s always best to keep things in recommended temperature ranges (the yeast packet should tell you).  Even if the yeast doesn’t die, you can create fusel alcohol by mistake.  Fusel alcohol may form at temperatures above about 27 degrees C.  Unfortunately, if the temperature is too low for your yeast, the fermentation process may be too slow (same if you under-pitch your yeast), once again causing the yeast to sit in your fermenter for too long, causing other off tastes or also fusel alcohol formation.

Similar problems can happen if the wort isn’t aerated enough prior to pitching.  This can cause a build up of nitrogen in the fermenting wort, and once again, causing impurities or the wrong types of alcohol to form.

That’s it for now.  Maybe I’ll really nerd out and make some graphs in the future, we’ll see!

-Chas

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