Beer Brewing Thread

So any of you into brewing beer? I used to be heavily into it in the late 90s, I probably brewed well over 30+ batches back then. This was still with the internet in its infancy, and although some stuff was out there, info wise, recipes, most of the knowledge came from books and magazines. Started off with thee extracts, but then quickly got into the all grain stuff because of prices.

Anyway, I slowly amassed a whole bunch of equipment, 8 galling boiling pot, another one to heat up strike water, high pressure propane burner, wart chiller..the Home Cheapo coolers for mashing, and although I started with bottling my beer, probably like every one did, I eventually stepped up into 5 gal corny kegs with a Co2 system to run it. But then the wife came, then the kids quickly after that and it pretty much sat in the basement for the better part of 20 yrs.

So one day last week my 18 yr old stated asking about it, and showing some interest so I figure now would be a god time to dust all the shit off and start brewing some beers again now that my sons are old enough to maybe enjoy a beer here and there. Looking over the shit though, I would have to repurchase some of the plastic shit like siphon, racking tubes, vinyl tubing, probably new seals for the kegs new regulator for co2, new regulator for the burner... Shit like that. Plus probably replace those old mash coolers I was using back then because they are pretty gross.

Anyway would like to get back into it, maybe share this shit with my kids, and hopefully someday they set off on making their own stuff.





Now of course all this shit would need to be scrubbed hard, its been sitting in the basement for the better part of 20 yrs. But dont look at the dirt, but the potential.

Yeah maybe one day, but probably gonna stick to what I got for now. I was checking out that robobrew though, seems like a solid deal for $300.

Yeah bottling was a pain. First was collecting the bottles, which was not bad in of itself, because all the good bottling bottles were pretty much craft brews. So I bough a lot and drank a lot. But then the cleaning, the sanitizing, meh. If it wasnt for the kegging thing, I probably would of stopped after the first few brews I did. The kegs themselves were not that expensive back in the day. I think I got my 3 off of ebay for like $60? or some shit? I see now they are way more.

Also watching some vods on this shit these days, they seemed to simplify the whole mash process pretty drastically. Back then it was all about the step mashing, mashing in at at like 148f or so, then stepping this up to 154f for a while then sparging with a sparging arm which used to drip hot water for like 30 min. Some even did protein rests at 120F. But I never did those. Anyway most seem to do batch sparging now which seems so easy compared to the method I was using. Plus they only use one temp for a hour to mash. Usually the low 150s. Or high 140s for the dry stuff.

Donblargo said:

Was actually going to look to see if we had one a while back and never got to it. Used to help my dad brew but I never really asked him about the microbiology behind it. Want to start making small batches on the stove till I can move up to 10-15 gallon batches hopefully. I had built a stainless conical fermenter as a welding fabrication project a few years back In welding school, and I want to put that to use.

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Damn I wish I had the skills to do that. SS fermenters like that are expensive. Plus these days the fad is to pressure ferment lagers at room temps (1-2 bars) I guess it shortens to lagering process and the pressure diminishes the off flavors of the yeast while fermenting at those high temps. They are getting lagers from brew ketle to keg in like 2 weeks instead of 3-4 months with awesome results. And of course I would not risk pressure fermenting in a glass carboy.

How much for you to build me one?

So my wife was at some store and she spotted a 15 gal pot for $60. She picked it up as a good wife would! Its aluminum, so not the preferred SS, but it will do the job. Its thick as fuck too, probably 5-6 mils thick. Going to become my new brew kettle.

yeah

I started in late 90s and more and more syrups were available and all grain became more common among home brewers. We had such things as light syrups, dark syrups and even wheat syrups too made by probably 3-4 different companies. I was also lucky to have 2 great places that sold all this shit including some great wyeast, freezers and fridges full of whole hops, and specialty grains of all sorts to flavor those syrups a bit more.

You should try it. Way more control over the final product. And if you buy the grain in bulk it's way cheaper as well. $40-$60 per 50lb bag. And typical beer is around 10-12lbs per 5 gal. But this takes some additional equipment/investment.