Homebrewing status check - August 2012

As I said in the recipe for Brew Seven, at this rate I will be drowning in beer because when I bottle the Amber Ale in a couple of weeks time I will have approximately 90 bottles of beer in storage.  I best get drinking!

The good news is that there isn't much, if any, of the original Munich 'Lager' or the kit 'IPA' and by my reckoning I only have about half a dozen bottles of the first proper IPA and the original Amber Ale.  

It's interest how the flavour profiles of the beer change over time as I shared a couple of bottles of the kit 'IPA' on the weekend and it tasted sweet and almost like a wheat beer which I can imagine would be quite enjoyable to drink on a hot summers afternoon when you've just finished mowing the lawns.  The original Amber Ale has also softened over time and doesn't have such a harsh bitter hop taste to it either. I also tasted a bottle of the American Brown Ale which has been in the bottle for three weeks.  It tasted awesome so I'm excited to see how it matures over the next month or so but I could be onto a winner there.

I'll be interested to see how Brew Seven comes out as it was pretty dark for an Amber Ale and I mucked around a bit more than I would have liked to with the recipe.

I'm at the stage now where I seem to be able to produce some reasonably tasty beer so the trick will be to try to reproduce it consistently over a number of brews.  On the other hand I don't want to restrict myself by only doing a couple of different styles and I would also like to figure out how to introduce some local NZ hops into the brews as opposed to having to use the US style hops.

Lastly, I picked up a huge pot for only $45 the other day.  I say huge because I'm unclear how big it is exactly as the writing on the sticker is in Chinese.  This weekend I'll use a bucket to fill it up to see how much it is exactly and then do a test boil to see how quickly it comes up to the boil.  If I am going to move to full size boils I probably need a way to cool the wort down and a hose to transfer it to the fermenter.  The other option is to look to moving to a Brew in a Bag process as an intermediate step on the journey to All Grain.

Brew Seven - Amber Ale

I'm going to be drowning in beer at this rate because I now have approximately 70 bottles in storage (750ml bottles at that).  Brew Six had been in the fermenter for nearly three weeks now and the gravity is reading around 1015 so it was time to bottle it and since it's more efficient to be bottles and making more beer at the same time I decided to make an Amber Ale based upon the Brewing Classic Styles "West Coast Blaster" but again there were compromises in the ingredients:

Extract: 
3.0 kg Blackrock Light LME (2 x 1.5kg cans)
0.5 kg Briess Munich LME

The recipe asks for 3.97 kg of English Pale Ale LME and only 318 g of the Munich LME.

Steeping Grains:
0.5 kg Pale Crystal
250g Dark Crystal
250g Abbey Malt
85g Pale Chocolate

The Abbey replaced the Victory that the recipe asks for. The 'Dark' Crystal matches up 120°L Crystal whereas the 40°L Crystal is the Pale Crystal.

Hops:
Quite a few recipes in the Brewing Classic Styles book asks for Horizon hops which Brewers Coop and Hauraki don't stock.  This recipe asks for it so I substituted for Northern Brewer.

30g Northern Brewer (@ 60 minutes)
30g Northern Brewer (@ 10 minutes)
30g Centennial (@ 10 minutes)
30g Cascade (@ 0 minutes)
30g Centennial (@ 0 minutes)

The recipe asked for Cascade at 10 minutes but I had to get a minimum of 50g of Northern Brewer and I didn't have any Cascade so I figured I might as well swap out the Cascade for the Northern Brewer assuming it was better to use the Cascade at flame out.

Boil Volume: 10 Litres

Yeast:
US05

Notes:
1. Original gravity approximately 1050.

2. The whole process including bottling Brew Six, cleaning and sterilising and making Brew Seven took 2 3/4 hours.

Brew Six - American IPA

Having considered my options I opted to proceed with an American IPA for the sixth brew since the feedback about Brew 4 has been overwhelmingly positive.  I used the Brewing Classic Styles 'Hoppiness is an IPA' recipe as a guide again but made some minor changes to the malt and hops.

3.8 kg Blackrock Light LME (2x 1.5 kg cans plus half a can left over from last time)

0.5kg Briess Munich LME

0.6kg New Zealand Pale Malt

30g Nugget (@ 60 minutes)

15g Centennial (@ 20 minutes)

15g Centennial (@ 15 minutes)
30g Simcoe (@ 7 minutes)

15g Cascade (@ 5 minutes)
15g Cascade (@ 0 minutes/flame out)

Boil volume: 9 Litres.

Yeast: US05.

Notes:

1.  I didn't have time to get down to Brewers Coop so I dropped by Hauraki for my ingredients.  When I got home I suddenly realised that I didn't know whether the NZ Pale Malt was the same as the Pale Crystal I had used previously from Brewer Coop.  Lesson learned: just ask if you don't know.

2.  I split the Centennial and Cascade hop additions in half in the hop it will improve the hop profile in both taste and aroma.

3.  The overall process was quicker this time - it took approximately 2.5 hours from start to finish as opposed to the 3 hours previously.

Brew Five - Bottling the American Brown Ale

I bottled the American Brown Ale on Friday 20th July after it had spent 19 days in the fermenter.  I tried using liquid finings for this beer which I added two days prior.

I'm going to leave the beer to mature for about 4 weeks before tasting it.

I now have to decide which beer to brew next - I'm leaning towards an IPA to follow up with the one I made prior to this Brown Ale. 

 

Summary of the first five beers

Here is a quick summary of the first five beers I've brewed:

1. Mangrove Jacks Munich Lager:  The can came with the Copper Tun home brew kit.  While it was fermented with an Ale yeast the good news was that the finished product was a drinkable, if not somewhat unremarkable beer.

2.  Blackrock IPA: This was a virtual repeat of the first beer while I refined and built up my understanding of the brewing process in particular the importance of cleaning and sterilising.  While the end result was lacking in any discernible flavour it has over time matured into quite an easy drinking beer.  

3.  Amber Ale:  This is where things get interesting.  I've got my hands on the How to Brew book by John Palmer and joined the Aussie Home Brew forum for general advice and guidance.  The resulting recipe included a hop boil and a move to LME from the kits.

4.  American IPA: Adding another step into the process I steeped some grains in this recipe.  The recipe itself was based up the 'Brewing Classic Styles' Hoppiness is an IPA recipe.

5.  American Brown Ale:  Once again I've used a BCS recipe to guide me through the process of making this beer.

I've come along way in my understanding of brewing in the last four months and I'm looking forward to continuing on the journey to making great beer.

Brew Five - American Brown Ale

Once again, I used the Brewing Classic Styles book as a guide for this beer choosing the Janet's Brown Ale recipe to work from.

 Recipe:

3.8kg Blackrock  Light LME

0.5kg Wheat DME

0.56kg Carapils Dextrin Malt

0.56kg Pale Crystal

0.225kg Chocolate Malt

50g Northern Brewer (@ 60 minutes)

35g Northern Brewer (@ 15 minutes)

30g Cascade (@ 10 minutes)

55g Cascade (@ 0 minutes/flame out)

30g Centennial (Dry Hop at Day 7)

US05 Yeast.

Boil volume - 10 litres.

Photo above - OG - 1056 (adjusted)

Photo below - lovely dark brown beer with yeast added.

Comments:

1. I opted for the DME as opposed to having to buy 1.5kg of the Wheat and storing it.  It seemed to work fine and I used it to get the BG to 1040 so we didn't have any problems with it clumping up.

2.  The Northern Brewer had a higher AA rating (9.8) to that in the recipe (6.5) so according to the Kit and Extract sheet it would have come out a lot higher IBU.  We decided to trim back the bittering addition at 60 minutes from 57g to 50g but in hindsight could have reduced it further - only time will tell as to if this has an impact on the final product.

3.  I still haven't got a large sieve and I think I need two further plastic stirring spoons for the brewing process.  Different coloured spoons for different activities would be a good idea.

4.  We decided to stir the first two cans of LME into the pot with around 5 minutes to go - this was a mistake for two reasons: 1.  the temperature of the wort dropped and the boil stopped and 2. the pot was now full to the brim making it very difficult to pour into the fermenter.

5.  It took approximately 25 minutes for the wort to reduce below 40 degrees.  When I added the wort to the cold water in the fermenter the digital thermometer was showing 24 degrees so once again there was no further delay on pitching the yeast. 

6.  The main cost in this brewing is the LME - it costs $14.95 per can.  I can either take a tub along to get filled which may save me a few dollars per litre or look to moving onto BIAB (Boil in a Bag) options.  I think I'll wait and see how the IPA and this beer turn out before deciding whether to progress to BIAB.  I haven't tallied the cost up but excluding bottles I would guess we are looking at $60-$70 for the brew which is still pretty cheap.

7.  Bottling during the brewing process went off without a hitch - obviously having two sets of hands helped out greatly.

Brew Four - Bottling the IPA

Progress on the fermentation of Brew Four has been smooth sailing.  On day seven I added 30g of Imported Cascade hops into the fermenter for dry hopping.  I've read that some people bag it up but I decided it was just as easy to drop the pellets in and hope they don't block the tap when it comes to bottling.

I took a gravity reading on day nine and it was already down to 1014-ish so the plan was to bottle on either Saturday or Sunday (Day 14 or 15).

I've decided to bottle the IPA on the same day as I make the next brew which has the potential to complicate matters somewhat but I've managed to enlist the assistance of my brother Jeremy for the brew so two extra sets of hands should make light work of it.

I'm planning to carbonate with less sugar - because there is only 21L I don't want to overcarbonate the beer and since I've had such success with carbonation so far I figure I don't need it to be so bubbly.  I'll aim to prime the beer with 180g sugar before bottling.

Brew Four - American IPA

Having considered my options I opted to proceed with an American IPA for the fourth brew.  I used the Brewing Classic Styles 'Hoppiness is an IPA' recipe as a guide.

I decided to dial back on the LME as the recipe asked for more than 4kg of it and the outcome would have been a 7% ABV beer which I thought was a bit of overkill.  In doing so, I also saved myself another $15 which may not seem much but by my calculations I had already spent about $60 on this brew (excluding the grain bag, 2/3s of the Briess LME and half the hops since I purchased 60g of each).

I ended up using:

3 kg Blackrock Light LME (2x 1.5 kg cans)

0.5kg Briess Munich LME

0.6kg Pale Crystal

30g Nugget (@ 60 minutes)

30g Centennial (@ 20 minutes)

30g Simcoe (@ 5 minutes)

30g Cascade (@ 0 minutes/flame out)

Boil volume: 9 Litres.

1. Steep Pale Crystal for 30 minutes in hot water (65 deg).

2. Added 0.8kg of LME 

3. Top up with water to 9L.

4. Bring to boil - wait for hot break.

5. Start 60 minute timer 

a)  Add 30g Nugget.

b)  Add Centennial after 40 minutes.

c)  Add Simcoe after 55 minutes

d)  Add Cascade after 60 minutes when you turn off heat.

6. Stir in remaining LME immediately after Simcoe addition.

7. Cool in ice bath to <30 degrees.

8.  Mix into fermenter to make 21L of beer.

9.  Take OG reading: 1050.  Stir and wait.  Repeat.  OG reading again 1050.

10.  Pitch yeast.

Notes:

1. Briess LME only came in a 1.5kg container so the remaining 1kg is stored in the fridge.

2. Pale Crystal used in lieu of  Crystal 15L and 40L as defined in recipe.

Comments:

1.  I can see why people go for a full boil - I don't fully understand the calculations used to ensure your partial boil gravity is the same as the boil gravity but the recipe spreadsheet from the Aussie Home Brewer forum instructed me to add 818g of LME to achieve the same so that's what I did.  If you do a full boil you don't have to worry about the calculations which is appealing.

2. The steeping process was a lot easier than I imagined so it'll give me confidence for the next brew.

3. The whole process (excluding initial prep the night before including sterlising equipment) took 3 hours which is about as efficient as I can make it.

4.  I need a larger sieve which can sit over the top of the fermenter to collect the hops etc when pouring boil into fermenter.

5.  The ice bath dropped the temperature of the boil quite quickly (approx 20 min) and once I poured it into the fermenter which already had approximately 10L of cold water the digital thermometer on the side was reading 24 degrees so I pitched the yeast in straight away.

6.  Contemplating dry hopping the rest of the Cascade hops (another 30g) into the fermenter once the primary has been completed in about a week.  If I'm going to have a hoppy IPA then I might as well go the whole hog.

7.  If I've spent $60 to make this beer, the per litre cost is $2.85.  The per 750ml bottle cost is $2.15.

Brew Four - what to brew next?

I now need to decide what to brew next.  Since I've been reading 'Brewing Classic Styles by John Palmer and Jamil Zainasheff I'm leaning toward taking one of their recipes and running with it.

If I map out the new few beers I see them in no particular order to be:

1.  American IPA.
2.  Brown Ale
3.  Pale Ale with NZ malts/hops.
4.  Porter or Black IPA.

The other tantalizing prospect is that a friend of mine has his own brew kit which he is brewing 100L batches with and he's invited me to help with a brew at some point.  I've sampled three of the beers he regularly makes and they are up there with some of the craft beers I've had to drink in the last six months.  The opportunity to potentially produce a beer in an all grain set up is exciting.  With this in mind I need to take a couple of recipes and refine them to the point where I would be happy to make them on a larger scale - I don't want to make something undrinkable.

I'm also looking to rope in a co-brewer.  Someone who is happy to pay for half the cost of the ingredients and take half of the beer at the end.  At the moment my brother has said he is keen so we might be kicking things off with the fourth brew this weekend.  I don't think I can sustain brewing 30 bottle batches as I'll end up swimming in beer.... at least until I make something that everyone wants to drink!

Brew Three - Amber Ale Fermentation and Bottling

No, I haven't forgotten about the blog - more that there hasn't been much going on in the last month or so.

As per my previously entry relating to Brew Three - the Amber Ale, the beer went into the fermenter on Saturday 12th May.  I took a gravity reading on Friday 25th May which was 1015ish.  When I took another reading the following week it had dropped slightly to 1014 but I figured it was ready for bottling.  Unfortunately we went away down to the Hawkes Bay for Queens Birthday Weekend so the beer wasn't bottled until Sunday 10th June which means it was in the fermenter for more than four weeks.  I don't know if there is any possible negative impact on the beer itself so only time will tell.

The bottling went smoothly and the bulk priming seems to make the whole process a lot more straight forward.  The only thing I was a little bit concerned about what that at the bottom of the fermenter there was a lot more trub than previous brews so I wasn't sure whether I would get the full 30 bottles worth - as it turned out I needn't have worried as I easily managed to fill the 30.

Now we wait to see what the beer tastes like.

Brew Two - Tasting the IPA.... pfft

Well, I've tasted the IPA after it has been in the bottles for two weeks.  What a disappointment.  This beer makes the rather plain flavoured Munich Lager taste like a Imperial IPA in comparison to the dishwater IPA.  I'm struggling to make out any discernible taste or nose on it.

Here is a comparison of the two beers:

The IPA on the left and the Munich Lager on the right.  The only positives I can take out of this brewing process are:


1.  The bulk priming appears to have worked well as the carbonation, even after only two weeks is excellent.


2.  The clarity of the beer is excellent so the finings worked as they should have.


3.  I'm going to make a 'proper' IPA as my next beer.

Brew Three - Amber Ale

Since the second brew I've been doing a lot of reading about home brewing.  Firstly John Palmer's How to Brew finally arrived from Fishpond so I took a read through it - it's easy to follow and clearly explains the process so I understand why people recommend it so highly.  I've also joined the Aussie Home Brewer forum which has a wealth of information and helpful Aussie (and Kiwi) home brewers who are happy to impart their knowledge about all things to do with brewing.  One very useful tool they have on the forum is a spreadsheet which allows you to input your ingredients which then spits out various readings which align with the style of beer you are trying to recreate (e.g. O.G, FG, IBU and EBC).

Armed with all this new knowledge I've been somewhat paralysed by indecision... what beer to I make next? Do I drop the kits altogether or do I keep going until I manage to produce a decent beer? In the end I drove down to Penrose to the Brewers Coup shop with a couple of ideas in mind but no firm plan.  I ended up asking for advice about an Amber Ale recipe which I had taken from the Coopers website and after a really good conversation about the pros and cons of the various kits available I purchased the following:


Ingredients:

1.  Black Rock NZ Draught Kit 1.5kg
2.  Muntons LME 1.8kg
3.  US-05 Yeast
4.  60g US Centennial Hops
5.  60g US Cascade Hops.

I also picked up a fluid thermometer and some more cleaner/steriliser.

The Brewing process:
1.  Sterilise fermenter, stirring spoon and airlock using the remaining sodium met solution.
2.  Add approximately 400ml of the LME to 10L of water.  Dissolve and then bring to boil.
3.  The maximum amount of time you need to boil the hops for is 60 minutes.  Therefore using this as a guide the minute the water is at a rolling boil you make your first hop addition and then start the countdown for 60 minutes.  I used the following plan:
At 60 minutes: Add 20g Centennial.
At 25 minutes: Add 20g Centennial and 30g Cascade
At 10 minutes: Add 20g Centennial and 30g Cascade

Centennial is a high alpha acid hop therefore it will impart quite a lot of bitterness to the beer.  Adding hops in the middle stage of the boil will impart flavours and at the end, aroma.  The Cascade is a lower alpha acid hop which will impart more flavour and aroma to the brew hence only two additions.
5.  Warm the Black Rock kit in some hot water.
6.  Cool the boil as quickly as you can.  I waited for a few minutes then put the stock pot in the sink and fill it with cold tap water which seemed to be quite effective.
7.  Add the kit to the fermenter with some hot water.  Mix.  Add the remaining LME to the fermenter at the same time.
8.  Add the boiled water to the fermenter.  Mix again and top up with cold water to 23 litres.  Check temp and hope it's not too hot to pitch the yeast.
9.  Pitch yeast.  Seal fermenter.



Notes:
1. There are a lot of references to boiling 10-12 litres of water then cooling it overnight so that you have clean cool water to add to the warm mix in the fermenter.  I didn't have anywhere to store the post boiled water so I purchased a 10L container of water at the Warehouse ($6.50) and fridged it overnight.
2. I'm not sure what I expected but when you add the hop pellets to the boil they disintegrate and form a slurry on the top of the water.  When the timer hit zero and I took the pot off the heat I used a sieve to scoop the hop slurry out into a second pot:

Pouring the kit into the fermenter - nice and oxygenated.

Cooling the hop boil in the sink with cold water.

The Original Gravity reading:

The reading is approximate 1042.

Final note:  Having gone through the brewing process I then decided to plug all the details into the spreadsheet from the forum (as referenced earlier) and it says that the beer would be quite highly bitter and that the OG is too low.  I guess I should have done this before hand but then again sometimes ignorance is bliss.  The fermenter is now in the garage and the temperature is reading 18-20 degrees which is perfect for fermenting.

More information about the brewing process

There is so much information on the internet about home brewing that you almost end up wasting a lot more time than you need to trying to digest as much of it as you can while you weigh up how relevant it is to you.

A few key points I've learned over the last week or so:

1.  Whether the fermenter is sealed correctly and airlock working is basically irrelevant.  Having a 100% sealed unit is close to impossible and while obviously the better the seal the less likely bacteria is to compromise your brew, it's not the end of the world if the airlock doesn't bubble.  Ultimately you can use visual indicators to check whether the beer is fermenting and you can use the hydrometer to check whether it is ready for bottling.

2.  To calculate alcohol by volume you take your original gravity reading which is the hydrometer reading taken prior to pitching your yeast into the fermenter, minus the final gravity (which is when you bottle the beer) and divide it by 7.4 to get ABV.  EDIT - there seems to be a few website which will calculate ABV for you but none of them seem to use the 7.4 method.

3. Dextrose added to the fermenter will simply help produce the alcohol but will no impart any additional flavours to the beer.  So, if you only use a kit and dextrose you'll end up with a pretty bland beer and the accuracy of the process itself will have a bigger impact on its quality - i.e. sterilisation, fermentation and carbonation.

4. Dextrose can be substituted with Brew Enhancers which typically contain Dextrose and Malt Extract (amongst other things).  These bring out more flavours in the beer.

5. The sugar you add to the bottles is used by the remaining yeast to create the carbonation - it is therefore a good idea to try to keep your filled bottles in the same place as where you brewed the beer.... preferably in a room with a consistent temperature and ideally around 20 degrees.  Too cold, and the yeast won't work as efficiently.  Too hot and it'll work too efficiency producing a poor carbonation.  Find the right balance and your beer should pour with a good head and remain fizzy.  After about a week you can move it into a cooler place for longer term storage.


So there are a few points about brewing in general and kit brewing.  I'll add some more thoughts and links later....

Brew One - Tasting.... part 2

Here is a pic of the Munich Lager in all it's glory being consumed 21 days after bottling:

I needed the camera close at hand to manage to get a photo of the poured beer with some head on it as it dissipated very quickly.

Co-taster Barney was on hand to sample the beer again on day 22 and he agreed that the taste had improved immeasurably from the first taste and we even managed to drink our way through three bottles quite comfortably.

In between the tasting at 15 days and this tasting six days later I bought a dozen bottles in from the shed and stored in the understairs cupboard in the hope that slightly warmer temperatures and a quick inversion to mix some of the sediment up would improve the carbonation.  The good news is that it seems to me that I was right and the beer is much improved.

Further to co-taster Barney, I shared another bottle with taster number two Russell on Sunday (day 23).  This was the best of the lot so far with a really good head on pouring, a clean crisp taste and enough flavour to make you go back for more.  Lucky I am enjoying drinking it because I think I have about 18 bottles of it to drink!  We've decided to try to do some blind tasting with a few of the also-ran local beers like Tui to see how it compares. I will report the results when we get around to it.
 

Brew Two - Bottling the kit "IPA"

Following on from the gravity reading on Sunday 22nd April I took a further reading on Tuesday and Thursday, both of which gave the same result of 1011-12.  

On Friday I popped down to Hauraki Home Brew again to pick up some more bottles and sodium met for sterilising but let me rewind for a second here: 

I was doing some reading about hop teas and how you can steep some hops in a french press for 10 minutes then add to the fermenter, apparently the longer the better but I figured I wasn't going to bottle until Sunday so two days in the fermenter would be better than nothing.  I picked up a Fuggles hop bag along with the rest of my purchases... I should have really done more research on which type of hop to get (especially since the dude at Hauraki was no help whatsoever) and then added the hop tea to the brew at the same time as I added the finings on Friday.  Only time will tell whether it improves any of the character of the beer.


Bottling on Sunday went off without a hitch.  This time I've stored the bottles in the garage where the temperature is a little warmer during the day (circa 20 degrees today) which will hopefully stimulate the carbonation process.


Now to decide what to make for the third beer... another kit? Something more complicated?  I'll leave that discussion for another post.

Brew Two - Hydrometer reading

The second brew (Black Rock IPA) has been in the fermenter since Wednesday 11th April.  I thought I would take a hydrometer reading yesterday (11th day) to see how it is progressing:

As you can see from the photo above the hydrometer is reading at approximately 1012 which is at the point where I bottled the first beer.  I'll take another reading on Wednesday to see if there has been any change, if not I will add the clarifying agent with the view of bottling on the weekend.

Brew One - Tasting

The first batch of 'Munich Lager' was initially sampled by co-taster Barney and I after it had been in the bottles for only nine days on Sunday 15th April.  The consensus was that it had a very 'green' nose and tasted vaguely like 'cider' with an almost apple like flavour.

As it happens I was away for work last week so wasn't tempted to drink it again so on my return on Saturday (21st April) I was keen to open another couple of bottles to see if it had improved.  The beer had been in the bottle for a total of 15 days before tasting and it had vastly improved on the previous tasting at 9 days.  The 'cidery' taste had all but disappeared and it actually tasted like beer! Pretty dull and boring beer but it definitely tasted like beer!  Here are some more observations:


1.  Colour and Clarity - this would have been helped had I taken the time to add the clarifying agent to the brew before bottling it but in my impatience to get it into the bottles I wasn't prepared to wait the recommended two days.  I would describe it as slightly murky with some residual brew matter in it.

The colour is best described as on the golden side of yellow whereas the Hofbrau Original poured a more yellow colour.  

2.  Tasting the beer - while the beer is definitely carbonated, on pouring it into the glass there was not a great deal of fizz activity and very little head.  I wonder if this will improve over time?  Lagers are generally described as 'crisp and clean' and on tasting the beer I can't say that there were any stand out flavours other than it tasted like a refreshing beer - utterly unremarkable in most respects but still it tasted like a beer.

I thought it would be a good idea to have a Munich style Lager available to taste at the same time to give some perspective on what flavours the style lends to the beer so I picked up a bottle of Hofbrau Original from the bottleshop.  Unfortunately it was two months beyond its best before date which didn't help things at all.  In fact, the home brew was a good deal more pleasant to drink.


So that concludes the first attempt at home brewing.  I managed to follow the process to a sufficient level which resulted in drinkable beer.  I'm looking forward to keep on tasting it over the next couple of months to see how it changes in the bottle but now my attention will turn to more home brew research and the 2nd brew.

Some thoughts in between brewing...

A few pieces of information I've gathered over the last couple of days:

1.  I've purchased John Palmers 'How to Brew' from Fishpond for $22 which should arrive in time for the next brew.  While I can just read it on the website I figure it'll be easier to digest in paper form.

2.  The Brewshop.co.nz website has some interesting comments about starting up your home brewing and how to improve the brew which I'll summarise here:

a) You can improve the brew by using a specialised yeast as opposed to that supplied in the brew kit - the rationale being you don't know the quality of the yeast supplied.  

b) Rather than pouring the yeast on the top of the brew in the fermenter you can rehydrate the yeast in some warm water (important that the water is between 24-30 degrees which suggests you need a proper thermometer to measure the water temp) and then pour it into the brew.

c) The beer kits often don't have enough malt or hops in them... which begs the question if you aren't satisfied with the yeast, hops or malt in a kit why bother in the first place?


Conclusions:

One option I could continue to use the base kit but add a different yeast and add some hops... if I used this approach with the same IPA kit then I would have a 'base' beer to test different mixes of hops from.

Maybe I should abandon the beer kits altogether and source the malt extract by itself, add hops (and yeast) and brew yourself.... how hard can it be ;)  But seriously, this could be a good intermediate step before I consider moving to making a wort.

Brew Two - Black Rock IPA

Brew number two away!

The whole process was a lot smoother this time as I expected it would.


I've opted for a IPA using a Black Rock kit.  I was reliably informed that Black Rock and Mangrove Jacks are produced in the same factory in Christchurch but that Mangrove Jacks has slightly better ingredients.  Given that this is only my second attempt at home brewing I figure the quality of the ingredients aren't likely to have too much impact on the final result.  The other thing is that Mangrove Jacks didn't have as many interesting types of beer to make - after making a Munich Lager I was hardly going to go for a Dutch or Czech Lager.

I checked on the first batch which is quietly biding it time in the shed and all appears to be in order.  The sediment is collecting nicely on the bottom of the bottles.  It's less than two weeks until I can try a bottle... something to look forward to!

Brew One - Bottling

Easter Friday I took another reading using the hydrometer... three same readings in a row all but decided it for me to bottle the beer.  I figure it's not going to be perfect the first time round anyway!

Bottling was a pretty straight forward process - gave the bottles a quick dunk in the steriliser/water mix in the sink and let them sit for 20 minutes, cap on.  Once drained it was just a matter of chucking two carbonating drops into each bottle and filling away.  Of the thirty 750ml bottles I think I managed to fill 27 before the beer turned to sludge at the bottom of the fermenter.

The beer has taken up residence in the shed under lock and key.  I'll be trying my first beer on my return from Singapore on the 21st - something to look forward to.

Time for a new brew....

One more thing: strictly speaking I should have added a clarifying agent to the beer two days before bottling it but I didn't this time.  It will be interesting to see what it looks like when I pour the first bottle.

Ok, another thing:  It's interesting to talk to other home brewers about the process - both Grant and Harry have offered sage words of wisdom about their experiences thus far which is encouraging.  I'm looking forward to sharing a beer with them soon.

I've tried the home brew and it tastes like beer!

Last night I rescued the fermenter out from the closet to take the first hydrometer test to see if it is ready to be bottled.

I poured some beer from the tap - as you can see from the photo it looks quite yellowy brown and smells like warm beer (funny that).  Incidentally the digital thermometer on the side of the fermenter was reading in the 18-20 degree range which is a couple of degrees cooler than last week.

The next step was to dunk the hydrometer into the beer and check the reading:

 According to the instructions from Hauraki the reading should be somewhere between 1000 (the bottom line of the blue section) and 1005 (the bottom of the orange section).


More importantly, you have to wait for 48 hours to re-test the beer.  If the reading changes then you wait another 48 hours.... and repeat until you get two readings the same.


I expect that there will probably be a change in the reading when I retest on Wednesday but I'm not far off.



The most encouraging news is that after testing it I took a swig of the homebrew and it tastes like beer... proper beer!  I couldn't convince Kelly to taste it but she did agree that it definitely smelled like beer.  This means that so far so good!

NZ beers I've tasted recently....

A few NZ beers I had on Saturday, purchased from Liquorland in Forest Hill which has a superb range of local craft beers.

I'm also using the Untappd app to track various beers I'm drinking which is a bit of fun.

The waiting drove me mad....

So after the visit to Hauraki on Saturday I thought I had fixed the airlock as the water was sitting happily uneven between the two reservoirs.  I check the brew again on Saturday night to discover they had reverted to even again.  I decided to leave it as is overnight and then on Sunday morning I gave the fermenter a shake and the airlock is once again uneven.... so who knows what's going on.

Anyway, I'm pretty much resigned to leaving it now for the next 10 days before taking a reading with the hydrometer.  When I checked just now I think I detect a change in the colour to a darker brown but I may be imagining that.

You can see in the photo above that the airlock has reverted to even again... doh.

Testing testing... is this brew working?

Ok so this morning (day 3) I decided to pop back down to Hauraki Brewing to ask some questions because I was concerned that the brew wasn't going as well as I had expected.

What has happened so far:

1.  After 24 hours there was some activity on the top of the brew.
2.  Condensation has formed on the inside of the lid and a few small bubbles have formed in the airlock.

But no further activity and I was concerned that there wasn't an effective seal around the airlock or that the yeast was ineffective to begin with.


What I learned:


1. The brew is working and will work regardless of whether the seal has worked.
2. The water in the plastic airlock must be uneven in the two reservoirs to show that the pressure in the Fermenter is different from the outside and therefore the Fermenter is sealed.  Until now the water has been even between the two which shows it hasn't been sealed.
3. The rubber bung you use to attached the plastic airlock to the lid of the Fermenter which comes with the kit is hopeless.  The lady at Hauraki gave me a replacement but told me not to replace it until the next brew.
4. Don't over-tighten the lid - there is a sweet spot somewhere between not tight enough and too tight which is where the seal is complete.




I was also told not to open the lid but when I got home and fiddled with the lid and the airlock it became apparent to me that the rubber bung was the problem so I whipped off the lid to attached the new one.  Once I carefully put the lid back on I refilled the plastic airlock and it appears the water is uneven! Hopefully now the brewing will kick off again.




It's hard not to want to check the brew every five minutes expecting a sudden change so I'll do my best to leave it for now and hopefully in a few hours the pressure will have built up sufficiently that we'll see some more activity.

The first brew finds a place to stay

From what I've read, an ideal brewing temperature is somewhere between 18-22 degrees.... too cold and the yeast won't work, too hot and you'll end up with a bad brew.

We have an under-stair closet which I think should be a good place to store the Fermenter while it does its thing as it seems to be relatively cool in there and there isn't any direct sunlight or heat.

The 'digital' thermometer on the side of the Fermenter says that it's approx 22 degrees so I'm hoping it's not too hot.  The only other feasible option would be the garden shed but I am concerned that the temperature would fluctuate too much in the shed so the 'gimp' closet is where it'll stay:

Now we wait for 12-24 hours to see if the brewing has started....

Brew One - Mangrove Jack's Munich Lager

Here we go....

After doing a bit of reading I decided to take action... as the title of the blog says how hard can it be?  I guess the proof will be in the taste of the beer but for now I'll summarise the start of the process:

Cleaning and Sterilisation:

It appears to me that the cleaning step is actually more sterilising than the sterilising step since it helps remove any bacteria from previous brews.  It's comforting to know that since this is a brand new kit there isn't a lot that can go wrong with this part of the process.

I filled the Fermenter with 6 litres of water and six teaspoons of the cleaner, put the lid on and swirled it around to ensure all surfaces were covered.  I then rinsed the other utensils and refilled the fermenter again with the same amount of water, this time with 6 teaspoons of the steriliser powder.  With the lid on, you leave the Fermenter for 15 minutes to allow the gas to build up inside to aid the sterilisation process.  Once complete, again rinse the utensils and drain but do not rinse the fermenter.

While I was waiting for the steriliser to work it magic I removed the lid of the Malt to get the yeast and placed can in some hot water.  The malt has a similar viscosity to golden syrup so warming it up helps with pouring it into the fermenter.

Brew Making:

Here is a slightly blurry photo of the Mangrove Jack's Munich Lager kit being poured into the Fermenter:

Once I poured the majority of the content out I used some warm water to wash around the tin to get the remainder into the fermenter.   I added more cold water (approx 6 L) to it before pouring in the Brew Enhancer and gave it a good stir.  

Once well mixed I topped the fermenter up to the 23 litre mark and this is what is looked like:

Before adding the yeast I took a couple of measurements with the Hydrometer - not sure what it was supposed to read other than both readings should be the same to show that the brew is well mixed.  I need to do some more reading to understand some of the science behind the hydrometer readings. 

The final step in the process was to add the yeast and put the airlock on the lid before closing her up.  

Job done.

The kit

So, as I said in my first post I went down and picked up a Copper Tun Starter Brewing Kit from Hauraki Home Brew Services in Rosedale.

I unpacked the box which had the following content:

1. Fermenter with tap.

2. Mangrove Jack's Munich Lager can (with yeast)

3. Copper Tun 1kg bag of Brewing Enhancer

4. Stick on digital thermometer

5. Mixing spoon.

6. Hydrometer

7. Bottle wash brush

8. Bottle wash compound

9. Sodium Metabisulphite steriliser

10. Plastic airlock.
11. Carbonation drops.

Interestingly, Jason from Hauraki replaced the Copper Tun cleaning and sterilising stuff saying that it was rubbish and that their compound and steriliser were much more effective. 


The pack cost approximately $100.  I also purchased thirty 750ml PET bottles for bottling at a cost of $25.50.

The beginning

So I went and purchased a Copper Tun Starter Brewing Kit from Hauraki Home Brew in Rosedale.

I've been enjoying discovering the world of craft beers over the last 6 months or so and I figured that I should really have a go at making some beer so I can satisfy my curiosity about the brewing process.  Actually my interest piqued when watching a few of the NZ Craft Beer TV episodes and seeing some of the interesting folk around NZ doing their brewing thing. 

So what is my goal?  At a basic level I'd like to be able to produce drinkable beer and to be able to experiment with different styles to enhance my understanding of beer in general.  By starting with a simple home brew kit I'll be able to control various factors while I figure it all out.

One resource I've been recommended is John Palmer's How to brew website.  So I'm off to do a bit of reading in preparation for my first attempt.

Some links:

http://www.haurakihomebrew.co.nz/

http://nzcraftbeer.tv/

http://www.howtobrew.com/sitemap.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyCGW8nemlY