Do you brew your own beer?
 

I brewed 3 batches so far with success and think I'm ready to try steeping. I've made 2 batches of Amber Bock and one of Irish Stout. All used the can of syrup method and fermented in a single bucket. I use EZ-cap bottles so I don't have to use metal caps. (they are like the lids on a Grolsch)

Anyone else into homebrew? What kind of setup do you have and what kinds of beer have you brewed?

I certainly want to give it a try. Ideally, I would like to find someone locally and learn by helping them.

I preference is imperial stouts.

I got started with a trip to a local homebrew supply store and talked with the owner. He recommended a book, "The Complete Joy of Home Brewing" by Charlie Papazian. It is an excellent book and goes over the stages of brewing from beginner to advanced. It has some brew recipes also.

The hardest part was thoroughly sanitizing anything that touches the beer. Actually, waiting for it to ferment so I could try it was the hardest part.:D

Stouts and porters are pretty easy to brew since the flavors are so strong it covers mistakes.

The beer that I brewed that everybody said was the best was a German alt beer.

I'm pretty much a kit brewer -- use malt extract rather than whole grain. However, I have used a few pounds of malted barley to impart the nutty flavor that I just don't think you can get from extracts. I also buy pelleted hops (http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?products_id=2097) and yeast from wyeast (http://www.wyeastlab.com/). But the absolutely best beers I've ever tasted were whole grain brews. I have no patience for it.

Your best bet is to have a fanatical friend that malts his own barley and such. Then have another friend with a nice swimming pool and another friend with a big sailboat. You have the car!

B

I'd love to homebrew, especially since my sister works for a brew supply store in Chicago and I can get all kinds of good stuff. She actually gave me a real nice kit with a for several different types of beer for Christmas a couple years ago but I haven't gotten the chance to brew any yet. It'll probably be a year or so until I have the time and patience to do it right. Not unlike biodiesel brewing.

Making sure everything is thoroughly sanitized is my biggest concern. I can hardly do anything right now without getting interrupted and forgetting what I was doing before the interruption.

I'd like to learn how to make vodka, too. I'd just like to see what kind of vodka I could make out of Maine Potatoes.

We brewed many batches, mostly varieties of ales and wheat beers. We grew 4 types of hops out in the garden to make our brews as 'home made' as possible. It's a great hobby, as long as you don't plan on making beer more cheaply than you can buy it. The fun really starts when you try adding exotic ingredients that you don't usually find in beer. It's true the bottle washing and sanitizing becomes pretty tedious. Our brewing activities trailed off before we got to using soda kegs though. :(

I'd love to try brewing some with coffee/coffee beans a la Buzz Beer, maybe a stout or porter. My two favorite things together...:wacky:

I would like to make a very complex, darker than dark, 'thick' stout and call it 617.951 ELIXIR.:P

Maybe with just a hint of diesel essence? :)

Exactly!:D

I have several soda cans and fermenters. For a while I had them all busy. Now I'm down to two fermenters and a single soda can.

My beer costs a little more than industrial beer -- Bud or Miller or Coors -- but is about on parity with good German or UK imported beer.

I just got the stuff to make a 5 gal. of Red Ale with the pelleted hops for steeping and pitchable yeast. I hope to get it started tomorrow. While I was at the homebrew supply store, I saw citric acid since it is used in wine making. I got 2.2 lbs for $6 and will do my cooling system flush next week along with new hoses :D

My costs include the good beer we had to drink WHILE brewing the current batch - you know, to achieve and maintain quality standards.

One of my friends is a very serious brewer. He laughs at me for being too impatient to brew really high-quality beer, and he's right! But I have found my comfort level. My beer is better than most commercial beer that I like.

Also, I kind of like tasting it while it is still young. I'll take a sample every week until I can't stand the wait and then I'll just start drinking it. I guess that's one reason I never tried a barley wine. No patience for it! I did brew an imperial stout that was not too repulsive, both early in it's life and a year later it was worthy. By then I was down to like a cup. Shouldda waited.

B

What is the brewing time for homebrew?