First one's in!

[Talheedin]

Hi all,

I put my first brew on last night. A Brewpak Beers of the world Belgum Tripple. Possibly not the easiest one to start with as it's not the standard five gallon batch (it's a two gallon one) but we'll see how it goes in a few days and see how it tastes in a few weeks. I must admit to checking on it every time I've passed my new brewing cupboard (only about five hundred times now) and it hadn't started bubbling through the airlock when I left for work this morning. Fingers crossed though.

What would people recomend for my next kit? Something easy that I'll find difficult to mess up (just in case this first one doesn't go well, I'll need to keep morale up).

Thanks

Talheedin

[Vossy1]

I found my Belgium x-mas ale slow to start and slow to ferment, so don't woory too much yet

As for kits, got to agree with DaaB, Brupaks are excellent on the whole with Fixby Gold being my fav. Woodfordes Nelson's Revenge is a cracker also

[Talheedin]

When I got home yesterday I checked the beer again and it still wasn’t bubbling so I checked the temperature of the cupboard it’s stored in and that was showing 14C. So I wrapped a heating element that a mate had given to me around the fermenting tank (apparently it’s meant to go inside the tank but it was disgustingly sticky and even after cleaning I wouldn’t want it in my beer). This has brought the temperature of the cupboard up to a balmy 22C now and I presume that any fermentation that occurs will increase the temperature still further.

Through the semi transparent plastic of the fermenting tub I can just see that there is a fair amount of foam on top of the beer and a small layer of pale stuff at the bottom so I presume that everything is working. Also, as the kit is only ten litres in a six gallon tub (sorry about mixing units but I’m far too lazy to work out what ten litres is in gallons) I would imagine that the empty space will take longer to pressurise and start allowing bubbles out of the airlock. Next time I’ll do a five gallon kit and I’ll get a smaller tub for the ten litre ones.

If there’s no movement in a day or so what can I try to get it started or should I do anything at all?

Thanks

Talheedin

[Talheedin]

Thanks DaaB.

I'm a little vauge as to taking these gravity readings. I've got a hydrometre and a flask so (after steralising them) do I have to fill the flask or just fill enough to cover the bottom of the hydrometre (by the bottom I mean the whole bulgy bit)?

The instructions with the kit were pretty vague. Basically they were writen for people using a brewpak bag fermentor and have only a small section for those using a fermenting bin. I'm pretty sure that it doesn't mention a specific gravity reading that I should be aiming for. I followed your instructions as far as I could, then I was just going to leave it closed for ten days and test every day after that until I got two readings the same.

I read on another thread that any remaining foam should be removed at some point. Should I do this or can I just leave it until I bottle and then just not pour it out?

Thanks

Talheedin

[Talheedin]

Yeah, I was looking forward to drinking the samples and I do have a tap on the fermentor.

Guess what, I didn't take a starting sg. I presume you're meant to take that as soon as everything's well mixed in the fermentor and before the lid goes on. Woops!


Thanks

Talheedin

[Talheedin]

Over the last couple of days the cupboard where I'm keeping the beer has had a bit of an odour to it. A bit difficult to describe and I wasn't sure whether it was nice or not. This morning however the whole kitchen smelt wonderful, similar to when you walk into a house where they're baking fresh bread, not the same smell, certainly sweeter, but nice all the same.

Well, I liked it but I left before my wife got up this morning so I'm sure I'll find out what she thinks later.

Talheedin

[Hoppkins]

Thats the smell of gold being made

[Talheedin]

Well, I bottled my first brew on Wednesday and I can see why a lot of you don’t like bottling. However it seemed to go pretty well and the beer out of the primary didn’t taste too bad. Not quite at a drinkable standard but not far off. It should be ready to try again on the 27th; can’t wait!

We siphoned the beer out of the tap on the primary and into a keg using some tubing, mixed in the priming sugar (I used 40g spay malt for 10 litres so I’m hoping the bottles won’t explode) and then siphoned from the keg tap into the bottles again using tubing. The only problem was that the tubing wouldn’t fit into or over either of the taps and our somewhat hastily constructed tap adaptors leaked a little. Can you buy adaptors to fit over the taps and onto the tubing?

Then yesterday we put our second kit on to ferment. Another brupaks but this time a full five gallon Scammonden Dark. It took us half as long to do as the first lot despite being over twice the volume; it’s surprising how much difference just a little experience can make. This lot smells even better than the Belgium Tripel did. I even took an SG of this one as well.

I’ll let you know how they turn out.

Thanks for all your help.

Talheedin

[Talheedin]

Hi Everyone,

This is the first time I've had chance to post since Christmas so Happy New Year to you all and I hope you had a very very merry Christmas.

Over the holidays my first kit came of age and a few friends and I tried it. Not too good. It tasted like beer but not a good beer. However, I tried it again a week later and it had settled down a lot and although it still wasn't really ready to drink I think it may only require a few more weeks in the bottle.

My second batch celebrated it's second week in the bottle yesterday and so I cracked open a bottle (on my own this time) and I was very impressed. It was a Scamonden Dark Brupaks kit and was as good as many beers I've bought in a pub. Head retention is almost nil but flavour, body and strength are pretty much spot on.

My third kit, West Riding Wheat, is due for bottling tonight although it might be tomorrow before I get round to it. I've got great hopes for this one too. This will mark the end of my kit brewing days as I've got the final peices of equipment comming this week to start extract brewing.

Thanks for everyone's help so far and I'm sure I'll have plenty of questions to come.

Talheedin

[Hoppkins]

What a guy! I'm too chicken to make the move yet.

plus i dont think my fiancee would be happy with all that equipment yet <_<

[itmustbemagic]

Watching your steps with interest.

[Talheedin]

Woah there, rein that praise back in for a while, I'm not quite into AG yet, just mixing and matching extract, yeast and hops and adding some specialty malts. I've got one of Papazian's books (if that's how you spell his name) and I'm having a go at the first extract recipie which is Righteous American Ale: Amber malt, cascade and goldings hops and a bit of gypsum. I want to start all graining as soon as I can but I need a few more bits of equipment first (mash tun, sparger and a couple more fermenting bins) and I can't really justify getting these to the wife until I've used all the other bits I've bought over Christmas. Also I'm not confident that I'll produce anything other than vinagary turps if I dive right in so I'm going to try a few extract brews then some mini mashes before finally progressing to AG.

I also need to finish clearing out my garage and build my brewing cupboards in there so that we can reclaim our kitchen back from the rapidly spreading beer monster.

Talheedin