I needed a new hobby. For some time I considered mini-ITX case-modding, but ended up on homebrewing. It was perfect for me since it includes elements of all things I like: cooking, experimental biophysics/chemistry, tinkering with stuff and BEER! Now craft beer is still (2005) a relativly new thing in Denmark, and 9 out of 10 will tell you that Carlsberg pilsner is their favorite beer. However I gradually learned about the wonderful multitude of beersstyles in the world: wheat beers (German and belgium), British pale and brown ale, porters, stouts, Belgium abbey ales, american ales ...
First batch - Extract
Through one of the few danish homebrew supply stores Brygladen I ordered my starter kit and supplies for my first beer. This is a picture of me after opening the box...
Don't I look happy? If I had only known what I was getting myself into: The sleepless nights of worring, the backaches from washing bottles in the bathtub, the unbearable waiting for the next supply delivery... Anyhow, my starter kit consisted of:
- two 30 L plastic fermentors w. lids and airlocks
- lab thermometer
- hydrometer w. glass
- bottle capper
- 100 bottle caps
- racking cane and siphon hose
- bottle washer
I also have a 10 L and a 14 L pot for boiling the wort. I don't recommend using larger pots than these on a regular electric stove since it takes forever to bring a big pot to the boil. You should also remember that 10 L of wort weighs 10 kg! I know I'm stating the obvious, but mucking about with large volumes of extremely hot sticky liquid is no joke! Two smaller pots are much safer to handle than one big and heavy!
I started out with an extract kit for an India Pale Ale (IPA) containing:
- 4 kg Weyermann Bavarian pilsner malt extract
- 300 g cara crystal crushed grain
- 100 g Cascade hops
- 10 g irish moss
- Safale S-04 dried yeast
The process was quite simple: steep the chrushed grain, add malt extract, bring to boil, add hops (40 g @ 60 min, 30 g @ 30 min and 30 g @ 5 min), add irish moss @ 15 min, cool wort, add yeast and wait...
I had in fact never tasted an IPA before brewing one so the result was somewhat disappointing. However, I soon discovered that an IPA was supposed to be
that bitter, and also discovered that I really liked it! And so did other people, or so they told me... As you can imagine this boosted my ego and full of myself I decided that my next beer would be an all-grain lager! And I also decided to design the recipe myself!!! This almost proved to be a classical case of hybris!
The "Microbrewer" helping me out with the bottles...
All grain I - the early years
My first two all grain batches were made using the two pots for mashing, it actually worked quite well. But you really get tired from stirring and constant temperature monitoring for 60 to 90 minuttes. My lauter tun was simply a large plastic bucket with lots of 3 mm holes in the bottom suspended above a fermenter bucket. I made two beers on this setup: A wheat beer HifHaf HefeWeizen
and a Bavarian märzen Julien Märzen
and both turned out quite nicely, although I had my doubts about the märzen... But it improved immensely with time, and I guess that's why it's called a lager!
All grain II - now we're cookin'!
My new-and-improved all grain setup: a 32 L cooler with a mesh screen tube inside and ball valve on the outside. This makes mashing, lautering and sparging so much easier. I simply add the grain, add hot water, stir and leave the lid on for an hour to an hour-and-a-half. Then I open the valve, recirculate the first runnings and drain wort. I batch sparge by adding the sparge water, stirring and letting it sit for 5 minuttes. Then I recirculate and drain the last wort.
The mesh screen inside the cooler is a "Bazooka" screen from Northern Brewer. The mesh screen has quite large holes and this prevents a stuck mash. Using this setup I have made a couple of beers, an american pale ale Personal APA and an IPA Leftover IPA.
Mini-kegs
I started out using bottles which I still think works fine. They're easy to fit in the fridge, and you can easily bring a couple (or 10) when going out. However, for partys where you want to serve 20 L of beer it's really annoying to use bottles. So I bought some 5 L mini-kegs (corny kegs are too big for my taste), and a Beer King 2000 tap with 16 g CO2 cartrigdes. DON'T BUY THIS TAP! It dosn't let you control the CO2-pressure and you end up getting more foam than beer. I fitted mine with 1,5 m of 3 mm (ID) hose to gradually reduce pressure in the beer - it works, but it's not the ideal solution... If you can recommend another that works better, please let me know :-)
Links
Brygladen - Danish homebrewing store
Maltbazaren - Another danish homebrewing store, smaller selection, but close to where I live
Basic Brewing Radio - Excellent pod-casts on homebrewing
Barley's Homebrewery Index - Index of 150+ homebrewery websites
BeerCalc - Excellent tool for all your homebrewing needs, including 2000+ recipes
Brewing Techniques - A good resource for articles etc.
How to Brew - John Palmer's book on home brewing, free of charge
