Any [beer] home brewers here?

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I'm sure a few, if not several of you here take a DIY approach to your beer.

I'm an advanced novice (when things work out well)/ beginning intermediate (during "learning experience" batches). Anyone else?
 
I have been making home made beer for 8 years now, just finished bottling 70 gallons. (I dont drink all of this, I make it for my own consumption and give it to my customers as a token of appreciation)

I am no expert, are you running into any problems I MIGHT possibly be able to help you with?

NO beer is better than homemade if done right.

Cyprs
 
As my username suggests, I am a homebrewer. Have been for about 5 years. Ive taken home a number of ribbons in local contests.

As Cyprs said, NO beer is better than homemade if done right.
 
Wow, you have homebrewing contests there, cool. Congratulations on your awards HB.

Cyprs
 
I use the "krausen brewing" method. Take apple juice in a 3 quarts WalMart plastic bottle. The plastic is good, so the bottle does not explode. buy some corn sugar (do not use regular sugar) and dissolve 2 cups of sugar with juice, remove another cup of liquid from the bottle to make room, and pour the sugar syrup into bottle. Spike it with proper beer or wine yeast. Leave a few inches in the top of the bottle to allow for expansion. Cap it, but every day release the pressure a couple of times, so the bottle doesn't explode. After a week, the violent primary phase of the fermentation is done, and it is fairly alcoholic. eventually buy a device for specific gravity from your brewing store, to see how much alcohol u have. Get another few jugs of juice from WalMart, and continue this process, but the next batch, instead of store bought yeast, just innoculate with some of the previous batch. When your apple cider has fermented enough, put the bottle on its side in ur fridge, and after 24 hours start to drink. this method will get u slightly tipsy from 3 mugs of cider. for a very strong apple flavour, add undiluted frozen apple juice concentrate to the brew, and for very high alcohol content, use more sugar, and buy special yeasts (champagne yeast, for example). buy a brewing book, and refine your technique, but what i described will give you a nice alcoholic drink with no fuss. You can also buy a "bubbler" for the plastic WalMart bottle, which automatically relieves pressure, and gives you an idea about the speed of fermentation. When the bubbling start to get slow, the violent first phase is done, and you can transfer to another clean bottle of the same type, for "secondary fermentation". This will yield a cleaner brew, with much more kick, but I am already getting impatient to drink after a week. Beer making is just a variation of this theme, except WalMart does not have Malt Syrup in bottles. I have also brewed a very nice home brew beer, this takes longer, but it is worth it. Here you need to get bottles or a keg, and either you will be bottling, of drinking from a keg. U need to have a fridge big enough to hold the keg though, or else get used to the flavour of warm beer.
 
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I'm a beginner home brewer. I just started my first batch of hard cider and will be adding the yeast and bottling soon. I will do a batch of beer in the future but i've had the biggest craving for hard cider as of late..
 
Originally Posted By: Cyprs
Wow, you have homebrewing contests there, cool. Congratulations on your awards HB.

Cyprs


Thanks Cyprs!

With so many quality brews available, I have always strived to brew beer that is not available elsewhere. Herbs, potions and "layering" of the ingredients is key for producing high quality, outside-the-box brews IMO. I have always taken chances for 90% of my brewing endeavors. Hence my "brewery" name, heathen. I spit on on Reinheitsgebot and pervert and twist the definition of "beer".

The first beer I entered that gave me a blue ribbon (1st place) was a chocolate/coffee/vanilla dry stout. Sounds rather (somewhat?) unassuming, but I tend to push the boundries. I made it with whole caco beans, choccolate extract (similar to vanilla extract), whole vanilla beans (soaked in vodka to extrat the essence of the beans), dark chocolate powder (Note: fats will destroy head retention, so reading the ingredients is VERY important...dont use hot chocolate powder!), a tasteful amount of freshly ground coffee and a blend of carmalized sugar and carmalized malt extract (this lends a toasted marshmallow taste to the finished product). I was impressed, but what would the judges think?

One of the reasons I like the Del Mar Fair homebrew competition is that you get the "score sheet" back at the end of the of the judging process, and I was elated to find out one of the judges was (at the time) Stone Brewing Co. head brewmaster, Lee Chase. Scored at 9 out of 10 (I still have all my judging sheets to this day as it helps me refine my process) on his sheet! A few judges scored me a bit lower, and 1 gave me 10 out of 10, but the fact a brewmaster gave me such high marks made the hair on the back of my neck stand up!

Other oddball ribbon-takers include: a Jalapeno/Serrano/Black Pepper Pale, a Sage infused IRA (Irish Red Ale), a Chai tea Dry Mead, a Honey/Cinnamon/Anise Porter, a straight Imperial IPA (11%!!), a Peppermint pale ale (awesome summer brew) and a Caraway Seed Imperial Stout, to name just a few off the top of my head.

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On a side-note, since Summer is fast approaching, I recommend this tasty hot weather treat - take a bottle of your favorite Stout ( if one of my homebrewed Stouts are not available, I recommend a Youngs Chocolate Stout) and pour it over some premium plain vanilla ice cream (Haggen-Dazs is a fav of mine) that you put into a blender. Mix it up and you have a phenomenal, refreshing adult beverage. Sounds odd, but it is a MUST TRY! Perfect way to indroduce the style for those who think a Stout is "too heavy"!

And in my experience, the ladies LOVE it!!
 
Sounds good HB, it can get up to 100F here where I live in July, a beer shake would hit the spot.

Home beer brewing is just starting to take off up here in Canada. I read a few years ago that home brewing of beer was over 2 billion dollar industry in North America, maybe more now.

With down turn in economy now Canada is taking more interest in home brewing as shown this Christmas past, I saw on our national news cast on CTV that there was considerable movement to it. I would like to see contests up here too eventually as the hobby grows. I hear in B.C. near coast that micro brewing is big, people visit the pub, make their beer, come back weeks later to drink it, guess it is a good growing business there.

I use mostly Black Rock India Pale Ale malt, supplied yeast, pure corn sugar. I ferment beer as slow as possible for 9-11 days at lowest temp without killing yeast to reduce the methanol content, methanol = headaches. I hydrate yeast in 40C water prior to adding. I use OXY-SAN sterilent, best stuff I can find so far without having to rince, it's residue also enhances the brewing and flavor, smoothes the taste of beer. I like to age my beer no less than 3 months after carbonation. I also put bit more water in my beer, I find all beer malt kits are rich, I like the thirst quenching beers like Corona or Miller High Life. I also do not make "HA HA" juice anymore, last year I made 9% beer, this year I cut back sugar and made 5%. I use the sugar carbonation technique on bottling which also increases alcohol content too. I used 3) 25 American gallon fermentors this spring for mass production, worked great, I was using 23 litre (5 Canadian Gallon) carboys with air locks before and that was too time consuming for volume I make.

I have a lot of people try my beer, they are impressed with clarity and smoothness, carbonation, my greatest secret/success is my pure spring fed well water in my opinion. Most people have a real bad attitude when they hear the word "homemade beer", there response is usually to effect of "NO thanks, I have tried that before, I'll pass." I have to convince them to try mine and it is not easy, once they do they are suprised. Water, sterilization, patience and NOT cheaping out on sugar etc is the secret to beer in my findings.

I never get headaches or feel groggy as I do when I drink store bought beer, just a great buzz, my wife and I do all the acreage chores on Saturdays, drink a few bottles each at noon with lunch and get up and finish yard work without any less energy except the buzz. Great stuff, I make homemade beer first for the better taste, secondly for no adverse health effects while drinking it as explained above except for an accasional hangover after a hard weeks work. Thirdly I make about $1,300.00 Canadian funds worth of store bought beer for about $300.00, it takes me one day to make it, 1.5 days to bottle it, I also recycle bottles in process too. Over the years I found the no rince sterilents, different techniques and carboys to get a lot of beer done right and fast.

It is a hobby one never stops learning, I always tell people to get into this hobby and enjoy it, I tell them that if they get into it just to make cheap beer (compared to buying store bought) then it becomes a chore and not a challenging and enjoyable hobby.

I like the Jalapeno/Serrano/Black Pepper Pale beer idea, we like Southwestern here, sounds good with homemade HOT salsa and taco chips.

Your pushing the envelope on beer making far further than I am HB, I think you do your beer more like a science.

Cyprs
 
Sounds like you know what you are doing Cyprs...keep it up.

One reason why hangovers are reduced with homebrew is they are unfiltered. That yeast at the bottom is good stuff...full of B-complex and alcohol pulls those vitamins out of your body. I notice hangovers are nonexistant when drinking unfiltered beers. 98% of the OTC beers are filtered and this does contribute to the hangovers.
 
Good point HB, I do get a very hard residue of finings at bottom of bottles due to the carbonation process, I do serve guests the nice perfectly clear stuff above these hard finings, at times I will swish the bottom ounce or two and drink it therapudically rather than dumping down the sink, the taste is not bad once one gets over the milky appearance and it is laced with vitamins as you say.

Good luck with further contests HB.

"no beer truely is better than homemade if done right."

Cyprs
 
I've been homebrewing for the last 18 yrs. I don't much go for expanding the beer universe, but instead make good beers that go down well. I do different styles, but I mostly just make what I like to drink.

I enjoy being a part of what mankind has been excited about for thousands of years...good drinkable beer.
 
Originally Posted By: Mr_Incredible

I enjoy being a part of what mankind has been excited about for thousands of years...good drinkable beer.


I am a proud Barbarian Beer Brewer and Beer Drinker too
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I am not cultured enough for wine, I can live with that.
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Is beer brewing the second or third known profession?
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Cyprs
 
Been brewing for about two years now. I entered the national homebrewing competition last year and didn't win anything, but got some good reviews from two judges. One of them even said "the more I sit with this beer, the more I like it." Good enough for me. I usually rotate amongst three styles: Pilsner, Amber and a Wheat brew. I've tried lots of different recipies over the years, but have narrowed it down to those three. To me, they are the holy grail. No need to continue experimenting, if you find something you really like, why switch??? If you want to learn all-things-brewing, go to http://www.homebrewtalk.com, TONS of stuff there.
 
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