Working around the basement this morning I realized that I had just one bottle of my first batch of homebrewed beer left. It was barely 2 months old. We made a large dent in the supply last weekend during a cookout at Mike and Debbie’s house. While there, I received some pretty good feed back, as well as some very good advice on how to make better home brew from several of Mike’s friends. We found that the Cooper’s Lager went well with the elk that was cooked on the barbeque.
last bottle of first batch of homebrew
Today, I bottled the second batch of Cooper’s Lager, I will age this one a little more before tearing into it. The basement will be nice and cool starting next month, perfect for aging a lager. This batch was a little unusual as the whole thing seemed to ferment in about 24 hours. I left it in the fermenter for a week anyway because I didn’t have time to bottle it until today. I checked the Final Gravity (FG), and it was right where it should be, about 1.010. I noted it smelled a little yeasty (like bread dough), but it tasted normal. I suppose I will have to check this batch by sampling one in a couple of weeks. The AVB should be around 6% or so.
After bottling the Lager, I made a batch of Stout. All of the home brewers I spoke to say that stout is the easiest of beers to brew at home and get good results. I will bottle the stout next weekend in glass bottles and let it age out a few months. I believe this will be the last kit brew that I do. Several people have recommended doing a partial grain brew next. It’s a little scary to add some more steps to the homebrew process, but I want to start making my own beer, vs somebody else’s kit recipee.
Boilermaker brewpots
To that end, I am buy a brew pot. Looking for a good stainless steel 10 gallon unit. The are a little pricy, but I only want to buy one brew pot, so I might as well get the best one first. I will continue use the coopers fermenter while it holds up, Eventually, I am sure, it will get a scratch in the plastic, at which point I will buy a glass carboy for fermenting.
I used to brew beer back in my college days. I made a knock-off of Guinness Stout that turned out great. I never tried brewing from a kit, and always used grains and ingredients purchased separately. Since I really like IPA style beers, I could go overboard on the hops and really customize the flavor. It’s more work brewing from scratch, but you get to make what YOU want. My suggestion is to make a recipe or two following the recipe, just to get comfortable with the process, then go nuts with changing it to the way you like it.
Agreed. As with cooking food, recipes are starting points, not things etched in stone. I worked in a brew on premises / brew pub for a while, and while the brewmaster who came up with the basic recipes had a degree in zymurgy, some of the best stuff was from people experimenting with those basic recipes.
I am still waiting for a bottle of the beer to come my way….. I’ll even trade some empties for it!
Joe, when are you going to be in, I’ll bring in some of the bitter, although I will say, bitter is an acquired taste…
Regard beer recipes, I agree, they are a general guide line. When I am cooking, I often improvise and try different things. When I hit upon something that is really good, I write it down. Often times it takes several tries to get something just the way I like it. I imagine homebrewing to be the same process…