Batch 1 - Day 4 update - Active Fermentation

I checked on the batch today, this will be my last check this week unless something else happens that requires me to check it. I have opened the fermenter way too many times in the first four days and don't want to risk infection.

Active fermentation has begun. I am seeing constant activity in the airlock and krousen is forming nicely over the top of the beer.



I expect this batch to go about 3 weeks in the primary fermenter, so I should be bottling around the 11th - 18th of March and drinking around the beginning of April.

Another thing! I know voting isn't over yet (by the way if you haven't voted please do on the left hand of the screen, I am very indecisive), I will be doing another batch along with the current one and it is going to be a Raspberry Wheat Ale. As soon as I order my next ingredients after these two batches they will be for the poll that isn't finished, probably in a couple weeks.

Don't drink and brew

Ok you can drink, but don't drink as much as I did.

Well I got my stuff and jumped right in. Me Mike and Luie were drinking and brewing. It all was fun but I think I was doomed from the beginning. First of all I used an old tamale pot that was stained on the inside, I really don't know if that will effect anything so hopefully that part is fine. Secondly my thermometers weren't working properly so I had to guess at some points. I also dropped it into the hot wort and it took about ten minutes to get it out, ontop of that we put a couple non-sanitized spatulas to get the thermometer out. The last big thing is I forgot to put the fuggle hops in at the correct time ended up putting it in while the wort was being chilled..For the most part it was a disaster, but hopefully a miracle happens and it all works out fine.

All in all it was fun, and I am going to do it again soon, but don't get drunk and start taking your attention away from the brew..

Annette says she's supervising me next time we brew.

High Country Canadian Draft

Sitting here waiting is just too hard so I decided to use the Mr. Beer again, even though it wont produce as much as I will when my good equipment and ingredients arrive. I have two more flavors left, Whispering Wheat and Canadian Draft.

Yep, you guessed it, I decided to try the Canadian Draft. I'm not quite sure exactly what it is, but until I am able to mix my own ingredients I'm going to have to deal with these extracts. I added some honey to the wort, not much but it might add a little ABV and maybe effect the taste a little in a good way. We'll see.

Also today I set up my closet for fermenting, I'll show you all pictures as soon as I get a light in there.

Almost disaster

Last night I was looking at my order information on Midwest Supplies and saw that I put the wrong address! I was one number off and according to the website the order had already been completed. I had to wait till this morning to call them and apparently my package was just about to go out the door, so I had just made it in time. Luckily Midwest Supplies customer service is superb so far and because of that, there shouldn't be a delay and I wont be buying supplies for the guy down the street!

Now to wait..I was thinking about firing up that Mr. Beer fermenter one more time for the hell of it, but I think I'm just getting anxious for the higher quality supplies.

Introduction

First of all I would like to thank anyone who decided to follow me in my first blog. As the title suggests, I took up a hobby of home brewing. I will be posting everything in detail from day one because the number one best thing about homebrew, is sharing and enjoying that homebrew and the experience of making it.


For Christmas I was given a Mr. Beer home brew kit. A little 2 gallon at a time, store bought kit. While it was a cool idea, that was very small scale and I wasn't able to deliver what I truly want in this new found hobby. For a long time I have been looking for a new activity. I thought about model car building, one of my childhood activities. I also considered woodworking which isn't completely out of the picture. But then I got my first homebrew kit. I tried it the night I got home, and loved it.

First I made a pale ale from extract. It was OK, but it had a little off taste to it. My second batch was a Vienna lager which was better, but still had that darn off taste. After reading a few articles and ebooks I found that the Mr. Beer kit takes shortcuts and I wasn't satisfied with the results. I found a great site called Midwest Supplies which has every possible product you can think of when it comes to homebrew. I finally ordered more proficient equipment and here we are now, waiting for the tools to start my first REAL brew.

Again this blog will be updated multiple times a week, I appreciate all my followers and encourage you to continue following, you never know, maybe you'll decide to try home brewing for yourself.

Thanks, see you next time!