Homebrew Thread

[Anonymous No.514576]

This is a continuation of the previous homebrewing thread. Please post anything homebrew related here. This can include current projects, setups, equipment, recipes, questions, stories, anything that pertains to the subject.

[Anonymous No.514593]

>>514576
im getting into homebrewing is this - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Home-Brew-Balliihoo%C2%AE-Complete-Equipment/dp/B001RZYJI6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374696096&sr=8-1&keywords=home+brew

a good deal? or should i buy everything seperatley

[Anonymous No.514596]

>>514593
Not really sure, because i dont know what those numbers mean.

But the best way to get shit is fine people who got into it and quit, and buy all their stuff. There's tons of people who do this.

[Anonymous No.514601]

>>514596
its a link to amazon homebrewking kit
and ill look but the reason i wanted to buy a kit is that then its all together and i dont have to start looking for individual things before i know what im doing

[Anonymous No.514605]

>>514601
>http://www.amazon.co.uk/Home-Brew-Balliihoo%C2%AE-Complete-Equipment/dp/B001RZYJI6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374696096&sr=8-1&keywords=home+brew
It looks like it has all of the right pieces of equipment, but it also looks a bit over priced for what they are offering, maybe find one that offers the same pieces for a lower price. Chances are it will be cheaper to buy them in a kit then separately, but
>But the best way to get shit is fine people who got into it and quit, and buy all their stuff. There's tons of people who do this.
is a good point.

[Anonymous No.514606]

>>514605
yeah ive been looking around for cheaper kits but after P&P its pretty much coming up to the same prcie, plus alot of them dont offer the 2nd fermentation vessel

ill keep looking but if nothing pops up in the next couple of days ill buy the kit, wanna start brewing!

[Anonymous No.514608]

>>514605
might be in luck, kit on ebay going cheap!

[Anonymous No.514628]

>>514608
Sweet, hopefully that works for you.

[Anonymous No.514650]

>>514593

that all seems to be a bit much, for what you're getting. Especially considering how much more pounds are than dollars.

you could probably get all of that for a lot less separately. not to mention, you can brew usually with pretty much just shit around your house.

[Anonymous No.514656]

>>514606

my advice would be to just take that as a list of things to have (funnel, hydrometer, bucket, etc.) and buy them separately. Keep in mind, too, that nothing's actually SPECIAL about that barrel. As long as the buckets you're buying are specified "food grade" (make sure that they are) they're pretty much interchangeable. I feel like you could get 2 buckets off amazon or some specialty brewing site for cheaper. Maybe I'm wrong, I'm probably not the most experienced guy.

[Anonymous No.514661]

to help kick this thread off I'm gonna go ahead and say...

So right now I'm in a doing-it-for-cheap-alcohol kind of stage, obviously trying to make nice stuff, but not the proper hobbyist's attitude towards homebrew. So I'm mainly using 2 liter bottles and a newly-bought 6.5 gallon bucket. I've got ~3 liters of lemon hard iced tea, that I've got in the freezer to freeze-concentrate, because it worked out pretty well for some kilju I froze. Made it kinda sting the back of my throat (it was harsh) but taste-wise was better off. And drunk-wise it worked out too. So I'm hoping that this will work similarly, and bring out the lemon and tea flavor a bit stronger than in the original product.

I also have 6 2-liter bottles, 12 liters or ~3 gallons that have been going for about 10 days or so now, I think. 3 of them are flavorless kilju, one is cherry kool-aid, one is lemonade, and one is lemon-less tea. Shamelessly bottoming-out on price, if you couldn't tell. I've also got kilju going in the fermentation bucket, and all I'm worried about is that I won't have enough bottles for all this stuff. I'm hoping that freeze-concentration will thin the amount of bottles I'll need and make the storage concern moot.

[Anonymous No.514668]

>>514661
I'm doing almost exactly the same thing. I've made dirt cheap 10 day wine and cider, I make brown sugar batches, hard lemonade, I stopped making kilju just because it's been too weak for me, and right now I've got some agave nectar running as well as a ginger root and black tea batch. Freeze concentration works wonders on flavor and strength, so I use it often as well.

[Anonymous No.514882]

update on my freeze distillation

I let them freeze a bit, but kept very liquid, poured each 2-liter bottle into a pitcher I have, through a sieve that held a coffee filter. after a while I would squeeze the coffee filter and get any liquid out, be left with a solid chunk of ice, and chuck it. seems to have worked pretty well. I then took everything and put it back in the freezer a few hours ago, and I'm about to go through the process for a second and final time, just to be sure.

[Anonymous No.514905]

>>514882 here

another update, I finished putting it all through the filter, and everything turned out pretty much as I expected. There were some I-guess-you-could-say "off flavors" initially, but freezing has really accentuated the lemony tea flavor. my only complaint is that while it's fairly sweet, relative to its strength, I feel like a little more sweetness would bring out the flavor better. So I've mixed up some simple syrup, and I'm hoping to mix a little with the tea and see if it isn't notably better.

Looking at the volume that I'm left with, where I only cut maybe a liter's worth of volume from the product, I feel like it's not all that much stronger. But I was left with a significantly better drink, probably the most drinkable thing I've ever made, so I think I'm happy either way.

[Anonymous No.514923]

>>514882
>>514905
I'm disappointed I didn't have the patience to freeze distill my brown sugar batch and make a weak rum, but the agave I have running? thats gonna end up being weak tequila. I'm not sure, should I freeze concentrate 1L of cider thats done tomorrow or drink it as is?

[Anonymous No.514934]

>>514923

I'd say it depends what it tastes like. Although I've never personally done anything cider-related, I have heard that freezing ciders to make applejack can be really beneficial as far as the flavors are concerned. I think you should freeze it. But also, 1L is a kind of small batch... is that what you do all your batches as? I would recommend going for a gallon at least.

[Anonymous No.514936]

>>514923

I'd say it depends what it tastes like. Although I've never personally done anything cider-related, I have heard that freezing ciders to make applejack can be really beneficial as far as the flavors are concerned. I think you should freeze it. But also, 1L is a kind of small batch... is that what you do all your batches as? I would recommend going for a gallon at least. Especially if you're going to be freezing the stuff.

[Anonymous No.514940]

>>514936
1L test batch, it's some german imported apple juice I wanted to try out. Yeah, a gallon batch is next. I think winter will be fun, at that point you can freeze bucket batches pretty easily.

[Anonymous No.514995]

Hey guys, I've seen my fair share of horrible home brew threads on /diy/. I think its time for a real question, I'm making a 15 gallon (60Litre) batch of Raspberry Mead in 5 days, I have only ONE smackpack of yeast and am keen to do a staggered nutrient addition alongside adding fresh yeast in each day for the first 3-4 days.

QUESTION: how many yeast starters should I make with my single smackpack? what size should they be for the larger batch? how long should they be started for before pitching? Is it possible to pour some liquid from my initial starter into a second starter after one day and then the next until I have all my starters so that they stagger also? or is it best to just start them all at the same time and add them in a day after each other?

[Some Goddamn Loser No.515532]

I'll repost some links I put in the previous thread. This is an instruction on making a very simple SMASH--that is, Single MAlt, Single Hop--beer.

http://www.basicbrewing.com/index.php?page=january-28-2013-new-albion-ale

This is a link to a basic beer-brewing kit sold on Northern Brewer. It's only a gallon at a time, but it's very simple and you can reuse the materials afterward.

http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/brewing/beer-equipment-starter-kits/one-gallon-small-batch-starter-kit/1-gallon-small-batch-starter-kit.html

They also sell a slightly more expensive kit (it's like eighty bucks) for making five-gallon batches at a time.

I'm gonna buy the gallon kit and make a wide variety of beers with it. Mainly, I need a productive hobby.

[TheMaciej No.515539]

Yast is a living animal (vegatable ? dunno what it is in english)

If you have any amount of that lovely guys inside and you will provide them enough food they will keep spreading out untill they will eat all food (extra dry) or they will die due to high alcohol % (strong sweet wine)

You can take small sample of allready "boobling" starter and use it to create another starter. Mind that you can move any contaminates as well (thats why we prefer fresh yast each time)

If you will use not enough yast to start brewing you will just have a longer delay before it will reach 100% efficiency (limited by "so little" yast that they will die early, usually 1 starter pack is many times too much to ensure proper start )


When im making starters from liquid yast im pouring them into bottle with apple juice (home made juice, mind that bought juice can contain yast-killers), then im leaving bootle open with inserted "cork" from a cotton to prevent insects / dust from comming inside. They are ready when foam is close to cork, it takes from 2 days to 1 week (temperature, type of juice, type of yast etc etc)
If you wanna use starters every day / couple days (im not doing so, never seen a reason) you will like to start starters day by day cause they easily die.

[Anonymous No.515729]

I need to harvest honey from my hives soon. Last year yielded 50 lbs of honey which 30 of it was turned into mead. It takes 1-3 lbs of honey per gallon depending on how sweet you want it. This year, I want to start a batch of chocolate mead since it takes 2 years to age properly.

[Anonymous No.515870]

>>515729
Sounds like loads of fun, lucky you to have hives of your own, and a chocolate mead sounds awesome, I hadn't heard of it until now.

[Anonymous No.515883]

How much do empty glass bottles (Wine and Beer) cost exactly?

[Anonymous No.515894]

>>515883
You can get like 5 cents for them generally, depending on what the recycling facility accepts. If a bar is nice, they'll give you their empty bottle s for free.

[Anonymous No.515917]

I'm interested in trying to brew mead. Any sources/advice on this in particular?

[Anonymous No.517533]

My hobo wine will be done tommorow. I have a few concerns.

There are almost no bubbles left, but the balloon is still full. If I made the hole too small, would it cause problem? I assumed it would just grow bigger until the hole widened and the pressure normalized (or until it popped).

Also, while after a week the smell was distinctly that of wine, it quickly turned into a vinegar-ish, carton wine smell and now does not smell like wine at all. I fear the rubber may be behind that, and it doesn't look like the thing has been infected at all. There's definitely alcohol in there, though.

[Anonymous No.517941]

>>515917
Mead is fairly straight forward and very easy. The difficulty is finding bulk amounts of honey that are cost effective. For example, a 5 gallon batch for a sweat mead you need between 15 to 18lbs of honey. If you want to make a dry mead you can use 10lbs. In a large pot bring water to a boil. Reduce the heat and slowly add your honey and stir well, this is your must. Add the remaining purified water to help cool the must. Let it cool to room temperature, add yeast nutrient, pitch your yeast, and seal it up. With mead as opposed to wine play with the acidity/tanning/flavor AFTER fermentation is through. Adding fruits or acid blends etc can be done at the beginning but in all my years I have found it easiest to cater the taste after fermentation has run it's course, simple to minimize possible explore to any creepy crawlies you don't want in your mead. Another good tip, aerate the must when you add your yeast. Once fermentation is complete AVOID aerating your mead as best as you can. Depending on your starting SG most meads take anywhere from 1 to2 months to reach a SG of 1.000. Rack to strain off sediment. You can bottle and let it age or drink it right away. The nice thing about large batches, it gives you plenty of mead to sample over time!
One of the BEST books on home mead making is called the Compleat MeadMaker by Ken Schramm.

Cheers!

[Anonymous No.518140]

>>517941
Five star post, anon! I'm probably gonna try starting a 5g mead batch in the coming days.

[Anonymous No.518265]

>>517533
Here's a sitrep for anyone who wants to try the same thing.

2 weeks is not enough. What I drank yesterday was basically slightly alcoholic, extremely sweet grape juice. For some reason though, if I let it sit in the air, it tastes like actual wine.

Now while it did taste surprisingly great, the alcohol content couldn't have been higher than 5% or so. Odd, since the wine reeked of alcohol.

[Anonymous No.518633]

I was rather disappointed when I came into the thread but then I read some comments from some legit homebrewers about proper equipment and technique. I just got done harvesting 30 pounds of my ozark strawberries and decided I was going to do a summer mead for next year. Going to use a blend of basswood honey and orange blossom. First time Im going with a blend so wish me some luck..just got done cleaning out the conical fermenter and awaiting brew day. ( also brewing a nut brown ale then going to add strawberry puree to the secondary) I bought some cheap food grade 10 gallon conicals online for my mead and I'm honestly happy with them.
> to all the new brewers..remember that sanitary conditions are top priority for good product.

[Anonymous No.518637]

>>514995
tbh, i dont really know where youre going with this.
But the yeast doesnt go bad or even slightly worse, if you keep it in the fridge and start it in a sanitized container.
Assuming youre not dealing with dry-yeast, its best just to start all up at once in a single container.

[Anonymous No.518756]

Trying to homebrew beer for the first time. Don't want sediment in my beer, don't want to buy a kegging system. Would the attached picture work? Just a 20 dollar kegging idea. The yeast produces the CO2 but is contained so it won't go into the glass.

Also I might have to make a cooler pressure tight, might just use a pressure sprayer instead.

[Anonymous No.518765]

>>518756

The yeast proliferates through the bag. It multiplies and you wind up with like 3 million yeast cells per mL.

Not sure if troll, or just retarded.

3/10 made me reply

[Anonymous No.518769]

I'm making wine from grapes. Squashed them yesterday, pitched the yeast today.

/ck/ had shitfest when they saw I used my washed feet to juice them.

[Anonymous No.518770]

>>518756
is storing/making brews in plastic containers even safe?

[Anonymous No.518771]

>>518769
I still recommend a food mill or Squeezo.

[Anonymous No.518773]

>>518770
It is "safe", but not 100% healthy. Glass or stainless steel is best. I wouldn't store it/age anything in plastic, but I'd make it in plastic if I needed to; but only for cold brews like wines, not hot liquid brews like what might be happening with beer.

[Anonymous No.518777]

>>518765
Is there anything fine enough to let water through but not yeast?
>>518770
I could just as easily use a glass carboy. And i would only be storing it in the plastic for a day or so.

[Anonymous No.518779]

>>518777
>Is there anything fine enough to let water through but not yeast?

Micro filters. It isn't worth doing that.

Read this,

http://beersmith.com/blog/2008/03/26/6-tips-for-crystal-clear-home-brewed-beer/

[Anonymous No.518784]

>>518770
I use 5 gallon water cooler jugs. They're BPA free, and I'm comfortable using them

[Anonymous No.518798]

>>518784
BPA is only the popular one to vilify. All plastics leach chemicals.

http://www.npr.org/2011/03/02/134196209/study-most-plastics-leach-hormone-like-chemicals

[Anonymous No.518884]

Novice homebrewer here, I am trying to brew in my apartment in toronto but I dont have control over the temperature of the apt.
Sometimes it gets pretty warm how much of a problem is this going to be for fermentation? Does anyone have any exp with setting up and maintaining an ice bath for the 2 weeks or so before bottling?

Secondly, I want to start kegging my beer. Are there any good ways of keeping a keg cool without a cold room or one of those keg-fridges?

Thanks dudes

[Anonymous No.518891]

>>518884
Some English Ale yeasts seem to do just fine fermenting in higher temps (70F-75F). I don't have any experience with an ice bath or anything. It seems doable, but a pain.

People use a cooler called a "jockey box" to serve cold beer from a warm keg. Basically just a cooler with a coil in it. While it won't keep the keg cold, it will give you cold beer. They do sell small 3 gallon kegs that should fit in your refridgerator fairly easily, they can be a little pricy though.

Lately I've been using 2 or 3 liter PET bottles for my batches. Makes bottling real quick, and you can tell when they carb up.

[Anonymous No.518902]

>>518784
i swear every store that i see stores those in direct sunlight like fucking idiots. i can also taste the plastic of most jugs in water coolers

[Anonymous No.518913]

>>518891
Thanks Anon, I will look into these.

[Anonymous No.518919]

>>518770
http://www.torontobrewing.ca/servlet/the-785/Better-Bottle--dsh--5/Detail

Try these. This place sells really high quality shit so I trust these will be good

[Anonymous No.518927]

>>518919

I've heard a lot of good things about those, and I was considering buying one myself. the one thing I heard to be knowledgeable about (though not really a downside) is that they are relatively elastic. they bow out a little when full, and if you lift it while full the bottom indent does bow out a little, too. not enough to cause it to break, but just something to be mindful of. for instance one guy I read about had his stopper and airlock in it when that happened, so it ended up sucking all the water out of the airlock when he lifted it.

other than that one minor detail, which I didn't hear any real COMPLAINTS about (IE it didn't cause breakage or anything) I've only heard great things. strongly considered getting one but ended up going with a 6.5 gallon bucket instead, because it was marginally cheaper and I'm not a connessuer of fine wines, I'm just a dude making kilju to get drunk.

[Anonymous No.518976]

Mah brew

[Anonymous No.518977]

Mah still.

[Anonymous No.519047]

>>518977

do tell more about this. Is that a still that uses food-safe plastic tubing, not copper?

Are you able to make a still like that? because I might actually go about making that if I could. So far all I do is brew and freeze-distill to make it slightly more palatable and take slightly (significantly) less effort to "receive the desired effects", so to speak. But if I knew you could make a still with tubing, which I have... that might change everything.

I mean I like how my stuff turns out, I'm happy with it, but the way I see it, the higher-proof I get it, the less I spend on mixers...

[Anonymous No.519063]

how do I brew the beer with the low alcohol percentage without sacrificing flavor?

[Anonymous No.519079]

>>519047
Its not the copper in the still you ar worried about, its the lead used to braze it together. The copper actually helps but absorbing sulfur. It would be rather difficult to make a still like that one as it compact reflux design but its easy enough to make a simple pot still just make sure you use lead free solder to braze it.

>>519063
If you are doing all grain beer you can first use less grain and second when you are mashing use a higher temperature. Using a higher temperature results in more starch converting to unfermentable sugars resulting in a sweeter beer (which is not always desirable). Just look for light beer recipes.

[Anonymous No.519190]

>>518771

no.

[Anonymous No.519239]

>>519063
You should look up some English Mild recipes, especially a Northern one. They are packed full of flavor and are usually <4% abv.

[Anonymous No.519274]

First time poster, made a laptop stand and converted some 120mm fans to USB, howed I do?

[Anonymous No.519326]

>>519274

I do not believe this is where you intended to put your first post

what a shame

[Anonymous No.519329]

>>519326
isn't this a shit you made thread?

[Anonymous No.519352]

>>519329

this is a homebrew thread
as in, home-brewing of ethanol from a combination of sugar, yeast and water.

so yes, provided that the "shit you made" was some form of alcohol.

[Anonymous No.519354]

>>519352
I'll go search for another thread

[Anonymous No.519371]

It isn't beer, but I started brewing kefir at home about a month ago for the health benefits. It probably only has about 0.5% alcohol.

I enjoy brewing beer but haven't in about a year. I drink it too damn fast plus a lot of the equipment was my former roommate's.

inb4 pic sucks, sorry had cloud mode on and I'm lazy.

[Anonymous No.520354]

My father used to brew beer for a few years. I remember one time he bottled a batch, and after a week or so the bottles began randomly exploding.

What exactly could cause this? Active yeast in the beer?

[Anonymous No.520367]

>>520354
Either added to much bottling sugar or you didn't wait long enough during primary fermentation for the yeast to eat all the sugar. In either case too much sugar in the bottle > too much pressure from released CO2 > explode

[Anonymous No.520378]

>>518769
Four days later, added to the secondaries. Smells like wine. Tastes like wine.

[Anonymous No.520404]

Where do you guys get your yeast and how can I reproduce mine so I don't have to keep buying packets?

[Anonymous No.520435]

OP posting for the first time in awhile, I've been checking in but haven't had time to make my own contributions or write responses lately. Anyways, I brewed 60oz or so of black tea (Some teavana and rishi mixed), leaving the loose leaf tea in, I added .14 grams of fresh minced ginger root, 1 cup of sugar, and when it had cooled, my yeast. just under two weeks later, what came out was a delicious, slightly fizzy, stronger than beer ginger brew. I'm happy with the results and would recommend others try it. My other project, some agave "mead". I added 12oz of agave nectar to a 64oz brewing container, and added water and yeast. It's taken about a month, but what has finally stabilized and finished fermenting tastes somewhat similar to a strong beer with another flavor behind it. I'm also quite happy with these results. Just wanted to share, Thanks for listening !

[Anonymous No.520608]

>>520435
why sage your own thread?

[Anonymous No.520799]

>>520608
I didn't sage it.

[Anonymous No.520807]

>>514661
>>514668
>>514882
>>514905
>>514923
>>514936
>>514940
To all you guys talking about freeeze concentration:

I posted about this in another thread that was talking about cider, since my post was directly related to cider, but they don't seem to be responding there, so I'll ask you guys:

Basically, I was looking up making hard cider when I came across applejack. I'm really interested in it, since it seems easy, but I was reading that apparently the method for making it (freeze distillation, fractional freezing, etc) is actually outlawed in a lot of countries, one reason being that it apparently can cause very unsafe levels of fusel alcohol to build up in the concentrate.

I'm wondering how one would go about dealing with that issue? The two basic ideas that I'm considering right now, but don't have enough info on are:

1: I've seen "fusel alcohol/oil filters" available online, but I don't know if they're universal in terms of being able to be used with any brewing project without messing up the final product.

2: the "ice wine" method, which is to use freeze distillation on the juice BEFORE fermentation, which apparently prevents an extreme buildup of fusel alcohol. However, my question there is if this will effect the strength of the final product. I've read that applejack can get up to 30%, but I'm really only looking for 20% (apparently anything hitting over 24% requires a permit to make?) I read that some ice wines can get up to ~15%, but I'd like to get as close to 20% as I can.

tl;dr - how do I get drunk on apples without going blind?

[Anonymous No.520808]

>>520807
Youre SOL.

[Anonymous No.520813]

I've done fractional freezing before. It turned a nice brew into some really harsh nasty paint stripper shit and that wasn't even concentrated all that much since I was using a normal freezer. I don't really recommend it.

[Anonymous No.520819]

>>520813
Yeah, that's what I read - the fusel alcohol buildup apparently causes that.

>>520808
So even concentrating it before fermentation is out? Is that just because it'll produce a lower ABV% than what I'm shooting for, or because it then won't ferment properly at all?

Thanks for the responses, btw - at least I'm getting some feedbac know.

[Anonymous No.520821]

>>520819
Even if you DID manage to get yeast to grow in this super sugary stuff, they'd still reach about 12% and commit yeast seppuku by alcohol. They can't grow in that alcoholic of a liquid.

If you use distillers yeast, it'll taste like shit

[Anonymous No.520840]

>>520807
>>520819

I think you're overthinking it, buddy. As the poster of like half of the posts you quoted, I have to say that everything worked out pretty damn well. Other people have been making applejack and freeze distilling homebrews for a long time now, it's not really something you should be too worried about. It's not dangerous. I've done it, other people have done it. Personally, as long as it's cold, I think it tastes pretty great. I "jack" all my stuff now. The only thing I can think of that would be dangerous is if you were fermenting apples and left in all the stems and seeds and shit that ferments into methanol, but if you're using store-bought juice or just removed the shit that ferments into methanol, there shouldn't be an issue. Furthermore, the process of jacking would concentrate both the methanol and the ethanol together, and ethanol consumption actually counteracts methanol poisoning. The only reason that true distillation can unsafely concentrate methanol is that methanol vaporizes before ethanol, so you can actually get pure methanol from distilling.

tl;dr if the shit you BREWED was safe to drink, the shit you CONCENTRATE will be safe to drink. Personally I like the way jacking alters the taste, brings out a lot of flavors (supposedly cider REALLY benefits) and I also like the strength to it. But that's just me.

Also, the strength it gets up to is based on how cold you can freeze it, if you're worried about it being too strong it's likely not going to be a problem, unless you have a deep-freezer maybe. And if you're worried about it being too strong to make LEGALLY, I don't think it'd be an issue either. likely wouldn't get that strong, and furthermore, who's gonna know?

I don't own a hydrometer, is a cop gonna bring one with him?

[Anonymous No.520867]

>>520840
Now I'm just going by what I read online, but I did read the same info repeated in different ways in many different locations, and that is that jacking apparently removes some of the ethanol.

But yeah, I've also seen people state the logic that "this shit is 300 years old and still going," along with a number of forums with people saying they've been doing it without issue.

I may look into it further on my own, but thanks for the info.

>>520821
On the plus side, it may only be ~12%, but I'll bet the batch would come out pretty sweet, which is a bonus for me.

I'll have to try two batches, jacking before and after fermentation to see how it comes out.

[Anonymous No.520876]

>>520867

you probably won't get absolutely 100% of the alcohol out, some of it will be left with the ice. You can get more out by squeezing the ice out, which will bring a bit more water with it, and you can also save the ice in a separate container if you want some lighter-but-not-alcoholless watery piss. I've drank it, it wasn't good, but I've said before I'm homebrewing to supply myself with drunkenness. not a fine-wine taster.

it won't concentrate more methanol than ethanol, CERTAINLY not to an extent that you would concentrate the methanol. that's ludacrisp. if it was a system that primarily concentrated methanol, it wouldn't be passed down through the generations as a way of concentrating ethanol.

now if you don't like the taste and don't want it for that reason, that's on you. but it's not unsafe.

[Anonymous No.521762]

This local shop salesman told me I needed a huge ass kettle to extract my own malt from the barley. I'm not sure if he was lying or not because as far as I know you can extract the malt in a regular kettle and then simply add the rest of the water in the brewing tank. In addition this is exactly the procedure he told me to use for this liquid malt extract+hop premade batch he kept pushing.

Have I been fed bullshit /diy/? And do I need to buy a 100$ freaking kettle that I probably can't fit on my range to make beer from cereals?

[Anonymous No.522122]

Hey guys, I've been lurking these threads and the one on /ck/ and I've come to the conclusion that the easiest drink to make would be Mead, from the recipe below. Just checking to see if anyone could suggest anything easier/cheaper to make that is still decent in alcohol content. I'm a student, so gotta keep it cheap + small scale.

TL;DR - Suggestions for shit to make that's cheap and strong.

http://www.gotmead.com/index.php?option=com_rapidrecipe&page=viewrecipe&Itemid=6&recipe_id=118

[Anonymous No.522132]

>>520821
If you use wine yeast, it should be able to get up close to 15%.
A lot of the more premium rich reds (shiraz/syrac etc.) are often 14.5% ABV

[Anonymous No.522297]

>>522122
Kilju is faster than mead, okay strength. Or, make cheap wine, which can be strong. Generic grocery store grape juice, some bread yeast, 3 cups of sugar for every gallon of grape juice. 10 to 14 days later, alcohol.

[Anonymous No.522348]

>>522122
UK wannabe home brewer, looking to do something similar. I was initially looking at vodka, but mead does sound easy xD

[Anonymous No.522386]

I got the northern brewers deluxe kit and a kettle/lid off of amazon prime for a total of around $250 including shipping. Should I be good just reading through the instructions and hoping all goes well?

going to try and make their irish red ale

[Anonymous No.522390]

>>522386
Read the instructions and if you have any questions it doesn't answer, ask us, this will still probably be up. Sounds fun, best of luck.

[Anonymous No.522397]

>>522122

there is NOTHING cheaper or easier than kilju. sugar, water, yeast, and maybe a few raisins or some yeast that has been boiled, if you want to be sure (they act as nutrients for the yeast, not 100% necessary but helpful). Let sit for between 10 and 14 days to be sure.

the yeast is what determines maximum alcohol content, the quality of the job you've done (IE doing a good job cleaning everything, letting it sit in a stable-temperature room, not using too little sugar, etc.) determine the actual content. Mead, wine, kilju, none of it has any special alcohol content restriction. Your upper limit will always be determined by your type of yeast, and how much alcohol starts to kill them (imagine the yeast as people in an airtight room, breathing in sugar and breathing out alcohol. after a certain point, they start to "suffocate", but some specific strains of yeast are more resilient). The strongest yeasts you can get are generally champagne yeasts, which can get you up to around 18-20% abv, under PERFECT conditions. More realistically, you'll get around 12-15.

It sounds like you're in my position, poor student looking to get drunk on the cheap, taste is secondary. Kilju is your best bet. Done right, it will taste like nothing but neutral alcohol of varying strengths. with maybe a little yeast flavor. Mixes well with lemon juice and simple syrup (google it if you don't know). Comes out a cloudy-ish white liquid, but if you let it sit for a long while, it'll eventually fully clear and become either perfectly clear like water, or clear with a tint of yellow, depending on the quality and purity of your sugar.

[Anonymous No.522398]

>>522397 here
For increased strength at the cost of some volume, you can "jack" it, freeze-distilling it by freezing it partially at the coldest temperature your freezer can get (the colder the stronger) and sifting out the ice. I get it to a slush, pour through a coffee filter, let the liquid go through, and squeeze out the ice a little once it's filled the filter. You'll lose some volume, but you can actually save the ice which will have a real little bit of alcohol still in it, if you want to drink incredibly weak disgusting yeasty pisswater. I generally run through the process twice, freezing the frozen product a second time to get the strength up a little bit.

Bam, consider this a crash course in cheap homemade alcohol. It won't taste the greatest, and it will never taste the greatest unless you start using high-quality ingredients, doing sugar-content calculations, getting high-quality large-capacity instruments, and letting your wines age between 6 months to a year+, which is all stuff that I don't do, and you probably won't do either. It's not great, but like Samuel L. Jackson Beer, "IT'LL GET YA DRUNK!"

[Anonymous No.522403]

For the people interested in mead making, I highly recommend the BJCP mead exam study guide. It's got most if not all of the info from Ken Schramm's book "The Compleat Meadmaker" and has a lot of new practices in it that are not in his book: namely staggered nutrient additions.

Anyway, here's the link, check it out:

http://www.bjcp.org/mead.php

[Anonymous No.522442]

If any of you ever had any questions about many of the subjects discussed in this thread, homebrewtalk.com is an excellent resource and community of like minded individuals.

[Anonymous No.522648]

>>522297
>>522397
>>522398

Thanks for the info guys, I'll try and make some kilju with champagne yeast and distill it, I'll do it next week and post my findings.

[Anonymous No.522836]

>>522648

unless you're building a pot-still and distilling by boiling off the alcohol, please don't say "distill". say either "freeze distill", "freeze concentrate" or "jack". because freeze distillation isn't actually distillation. there's different laws about it, it's a totally different process, and it's only a colloquialism that concentration is called freeze distillation.

also distillation proper is way more effective. distilled enough, you can get up to 94% alcohol or so, but freeze-concentration's limit is dependent on how cold you can get the freezer, peaking at ~30% abv at -30 degrees.

[Anonymous No.523101]

>>518884
Follow up to this. I filled a large bucket with cold water and put my carboy in. The temp has only gone up about a degree a day. I will replace the water later today or tomorrow I am pretty happy with the system and Ill keep using it till it gets colder out

[Anonymous No.523177]

I have a lot of muscadines growing around here and love muscadine wine, but I have never made it. Does anybody know a good recipe for muscadine wine? And the process for making wine starting with fruit (should I ferment with the pressed fruit or just the juice?). This won't be the first time I've made alcohol but it's the first time I've used fruit to make it.

[Anonymous No.523646]

>>523177
I'd assume you juice it, and then pour the pulp over a strainer so you get all of the juice out, into the bottle/whatever. Just like apple cider.

[Anonymous No.524052]

>>522122
fuck if you want cheap and strong just look into "turbo" yeasts that rage into 17% or more, you just have to keep the brew at about 70 degrees F for a few days while it brews

[Anonymous No.524133]

>>524052

turbo yeast is not cheap, relative to other yeasts.

[Anonymous No.524135]

>>524133 here

also it doesn't taste good, from what I hear. It's meant to quickly get wash for distillation, not to make straight drinkable things

[Anonymous No.524378]

I'm currently cold crashing my mead to get all the shit and yeast to drop out of solution for a rerack without any sediment. At first I was under the impression that this would kill the yeast, but apparently it won't. I've read that potassium sorbate is recommended to chemically kill them off (I'd pasteurize on a stove, but my stove pretty much has two states - On, and FUCKING HOT, so it'd be tough to do right). Where can I BUY Potassium Sorbate IRL? I'd prefer to get it from a local brick and mortar store. Do grocery stores sell it? I didn't see any.

[Anonymous No.524685]

Right now I'm experimenting with a hobo brew thing with apple juice that was in another thread.

I decided to say 'fuck it' and used a bottle of unopened 100% apple juice and baking yeast. I made a jury rigged airlock out of a bottle, some tube and hot glue which seems to hold alright.

So my question is: how can I tell how healthy the yeast is?
My biggest concern is that I didn't put enough yeast in, or too much yeast, and that the process is going to stop and die prematurely, or it will run out of sugar and will also die. How can I tell what the yeast wants, if anything? Any telltale signs or tips to share with an anon?

I'd like to get into brewing properly, but this was just something I tried on a whim.

[Anonymous No.524698]

>>524378
Try running a few bottles through your dishwasher on high. This is supposed to be good pasteurization, although I'm skeptical of bottles blowing up. Worth a shot though, yeah?

[Anonymous No.524704]

>>524685
If it doesn't ferment, you didnt add enough yeast, or the juice has a stabilizer in it. Look for anything with "metabisulfite" in the ingredients. It wont brew if it has that.

You can't over pitch yeast.

If they all peter out and die while the juice still tastes sweet, then you're kinda SOL. I've never revived a stuck fermentation.

If it runs out of sugar and dies, GOOD. This means they've done their job and have made you a gallon of 4-5%abv cider. Be proud of their hard work. Put it in the fridge to let the haze settle out. Once clear, enjoy.

Usually it's pretty obvious when something is wrong with your batch. Floating white islands on top? Mold. No bubbles from the airlock? Done or stuck. Taste it. If it's sweet, its stuck, youre fucked. If it's dry, is done.

I find brewing small batches like that is more worthwhile than big batches. I can give a gallon of dandelion wine a go without investing the time, money, or space in a 5gal batch. You can branch out and try more things.

Take some pics, share your experience.

[Anonymous No.524709]

This is how it looks right now. It's just sitting in my room. On top of the foam I can see tiny little lumps of an orangey-brown substance that looks like yeast. There are bubbles forming in the juice and the whole room smells like fucking cider.

The cling wrap is there because I'm just paranoid and isn't really doing anything.

Cleaned the tubes, caps, and the other bottle with 1:10 bleach and washed with water.

I had a read of the back of the bottle and it says Food Acid (330) and citric acid, nothing else other than 'fruit juice' so I suppose that's okay.

If it does stop suddenly in maybe a day or so because of a lack of yeast is it fine to add more yeast? Or should I just go buy real equipment and do it properly.

Thanks for the knowledge.

[Anonymous No.524775]

>>524378

That's something you'll have to get online.

And it doesn't kill the yeast off or anything. It only prevents them from reproducing.

Meaning if you bottle it,and there is still yeast in there,they will keep going and you will likely have bottle bombs.

Pasteurizing works because the heat kills them off.

[Anonymous No.524787]

>>524709
330 is ascorbic acid. thats fine.

It wont stop because of the lack of yeast. It stops because of lack of sugar.

[Anonymous No.524791]

>>524787
Wow I can't believe I forgot the fact that the yeast multiplies as it ferments.
Thanks for the help.
I'll post occasionally with updates and if it comes out drinkable.

[Anonymous No.524822]

>>524698
>tfw apartment doesn't have a dish washer
>>524775
Wait, it really doesn't kill them? Well, shit. How important is it to get an exact temperature with pasteurizing? Do I need to keep it right at 140 or whatever it is? Wouldn't going over fuck with the alcohol? (I thought that was the point alcohol evaporates out of solution).

[Anonymous No.524830]

>>524822
If it's bottled, it wont have anywhere to go.

Is it still bulk or have you bottled it?

If it's bulk just go the metaK route

[Anonymous No.524841]

>>524830
I made it up in two half-gallon glass milk jugs, where it is still at. I'm reading that this ought to be done along with sorbate in order to kill most of the yeast and stunt any that survive?

[Anonymous No.524861]

Hello /diy/ers, newfag for /diy, and i am a experimenting with my Mr. Beer kit in a series of failed attempts to make a sweetbeer. I've made some ancient recipes in the past (favorite being the Egyptian beer-bread) but now my sweet tooth is aching. Anybody got a recipe for a sweetbeer?

[Anonymous No.524866]

>>524841
Either or. They do the same thing. If youre making beer and bottle carbing, you dont want to stabilize. Then you wouldnt have any carbonation in your end product.

[Anonymous No.525398]

Gentlemen, I have a question: I recently produced a 1 gallon batch of mead using this recipe recommended by you as a starting point: http://stormthecastle.com/mead/fast-cheap-mead-making.htm..

Now, the final product wasn't as sweet as I anticipated (It tasted slightly sour-ish, like very strong, non-sparkling champaigne, and I'd say it had 8-10 % Vol. - definitely drinkable and enjoyable.)

The website says sweetness is essentially proportional to honey. I used around 1300 g of honey. Any recommendations on how to get this stuff sweeter the next batch?

[Anonymous No.525407]

>>525398
I'd say try it with 3-3.5lbs/gal next time, so 1360-1590g

The last time I made it with those proportions I ended up with something that could be described as a warming dessert wine following a recipe based off this one.

[Anonymous No.525406]

>>525398
use the same amount of honey with less water. Your yeast dies when there's either no more honey to eat (probably what happened here) or when it drowns in it's own piss (your alcohol). This drowning effect is controlled by %abv, or your alcohol to water ratio.

[Anonymous No.525565]

>>524866
One batch is the fast Storm the Castle mead (with the balloon airlock), and the other is an attempt at a coffee wine (It's late, can't be buggered to find recipe, basically cold brewed 1/2 gallon of coffee, added pound of sugar, yeast, and raisins since I don't have yeast nutrients, shit fermented and bubbled like a mufugga). Would it work out alright if after this cold-crash, I reracked once more to get rid of all sediment, then just kept it cold at all times so the yeast doesn't reactivate? I want to backsweeten it, but I think my shipping is wonky (not sure if Uni will be OK with a shipment of chemicals to my mailing address there). In short, could I backsweeten if I kept it cold without the yeast eating it up and just staying dry?

Also, another interesting project: I put Dr Pepper in a half gallon jug, put in a quarter cup of sugar (Wasn't sure if yeast would metabolize the shit in Dr Pepper readily so I wanted to jumpstart them with something I knew they'd take), raisins (again yeast nutrient), and obviously yeast 2 days ago. It's fermenting (al beit, not as fast as mead or coffee wine), with yeast foam on the top, so it's at least working. I'll update you guys once I decide to go with a rerack.

[Anonymous No.525577]

>>520378
Dude that's pretty rough, maybe you should've used a blowoff tube or left more space at the top of the jugs.

[Anonymous No.525578]

>>521762
Straining water thru cooked barley a few times is pretty tough even in small amounts unless you have really big pots and strainers, so if you go for 5+ gallons you're gonna have a bad time with standard kitchen equipment. Many people use mostly malt for their beer even though it drives up the cost a little bit per batch because it saves a lot of time and hassle. You can then cook up a small amount of barley and strain it in for aroma.

[Anonymous No.526147]

howtomakehardcider.com is the best site I've used as a resource.
>I made a batch of hard cider last year, the best cider to start with is organic, unless you can get your hands on fresh orchard cider.

[Anonymous No.526173]

>>518977
this is a nice still, but its wrong
add a 750 mm long copper pipe use the same diameter as your current setup
fill it with raschig rings

i say your still in its current configuration is about 15% Good
http://homedistiller.org/calcs/reflux_calc

[Anonymous No.526187]

Given that Methanol has a BP of 148 °F and Ethanol has a BP of 173 °F, would it be reasonable to distill at 160 °F first instead of distilling at the normal temperature and discarding the heads?

[Anonymous No.526359]

OP here. Have had some kilju and another brown sugar batch brewing since wednesday, gonna drink em up friday maybe ( these are the quick cheap booze brews). Just started a simple wine batch, juice, sugar, yeast, and I plan on maybe letting that one age a bit. Gonna start some cider soon, and maybe make more agave mead and hard ginger black tea. I want to try a hard coffee or an actual mead. Thanks for listening.

[Anonymous No.526377]

>>526359
I currently have hard coffee cold crashing that I'll be backsweetening in a week or so, and I'll HOPEFULLY have some potassium sorbate or something to deactivate it. I'll be reporting in when I have it finished and test it. (By hard coffee you mean coffee (I used cold brewed) with sugar, nutrients (used raisins), and yeast?)

Meanwhile, I have a 'Dr. Pepper Wine' brewing. Basically, half gallon of Dr Pepper, sugar (wanted to kickstart the yeast just in case they didn't take well with the ingredients of the good Dr.), and raisins. Shit's fermenting pretty well now.

[Anonymous No.526553]

>>526377

wow, that's two really strange concoctions. I'd like to hear more about them. I would have thought that pop doesn't ferment well... Does it not have preservatives?

[Anonymous No.526592]

Quick question. Is it possible lead fumes produced during fermentation down past the water lock in the toilet by a hose. (to avoid smell)
Will it continue down into the sewers or just bubble right back up?
pic related

[Anonymous No.526613]

>>526592
if what is going through the hose is heavier than air then it won't bubble up because that is what the trap is there for.
if it is lighter than air then i't won't go down the tube in the first place
anything near the other end of the hose will smell like shit though

[Anonymous No.526639]

>>526377
Yeah, I mean cold coffee, sugar, yeast, yeast nutrient.

[Anonymous No.526673]

>>526553
I imagine it does, but it's definitely fermenting. I read that the preservatives simply can't keep up with a whole colony of yeast coming in and setting up shop.
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f79/coffee-wine-421497/
That's roughly the baseline I used for the coffee.

[Anonymous No.526680]

>>526592

what type of yeast are you guys using that smell is such a huge issue? I've seen other types of people complain about it too. I use Red Star Premier Cuvee/Lalvin 1118 and at first, stuff like apple or cranberry juice will smell like sweet soda a bit, but never enough to get the smell outside of my closet, and never to a crazy extent. And neither the tea, lemonade, or kilju that I've ever made have ever given off much of a smell at all.

[Anonymous No.526684]

>>526680
Some people tend to use bakers yeast out of laziness, inexperience, preference, or numerous other reasons,and I'm guessing it's the bakers yeast that creates such a stink, that or people are using too much yeast, or it could even be that the live yeast are starting to munch on the dead ones for nutrients (smells sulfurous) .

[Anonymous No.526689]

>>526684
note that the whole dead yeast consumption thing really only stinks if it happens too much though.

[Anonymous No.526760]

You can't use plain barley for malt, you have to use malted barley. Malted barley has been germinated to convert the starches to sugars to provide food for the yeast during fermentation. After it's been germinated and the sprouts are about an eighth of an inch long, you knock off the sprout and roast the barley, a short roast for lighter beer longer for darker. There are some good malting videos on YouTube. After you have your roasted malt you put it in a pot with your water and boil it for an hour or so. Hops are added during the boiling, when you add them is per your recipe. After it's boiled for a while you will have extracted malt from the grain, at which point you remove the whole grains and keep the liquid, which is your wort. You put the wort in your primary fermenter and pitch the yeast once it's cooled to around 100F. This is just the basics, get yourself a good recipe and follow it to the letter for your first whole grain beer, once you get the hang of it you could start making your own recipes. You can also eat the grain you removed if you want, or just throw it out.

[Anonymous No.526793]

I just brewed my first all-grain batch of beer yesterday. I used the brew-in-a-bag method (I don't have the space for regular all-grain brewing) and it turned out really well. It's a SMaSH beer using Vienna malt and Palisade hops.

I took the picture after about 24 hours of fermentation.

[Anonymous No.527206]

>>520840
>The only reason that true distillation can unsafely concentrate methanol is that methanol vaporizes before ethanol, so you can actually get pure methanol from distilling.

First and foremost, you can not concentrate the naturally occurring methanol found in fermented beverages to unsafe levels without really trying.

Everyone thinks distilling is dangerous because during prohibition gangsters mixed poisonous chemicals with flavors and sold it as booze. Remember, Al Capone had people murdered, do you think he really cared about the welfare of his customers?

The reality is that some amount of methanol is present in all fermentations. The levels are higher in substrates containing higher amounts of pectin.

Imagine that you are performing an experiment, you have two identical bottles of wine. You pour one bottle into a still and collect as much of the alcohol as practical, without discarding any of the methanol that comes out first.

Now pour one shot your 'brandy' and one glass of wine with the same equivalent alcohol content.

Which glass contains the most methanol and why? Think it through.

[Anonymous No.527210]

>>520840
>>527206

Also, note that pre-WWII German Schnapps distillers often did not discard the methanol that came out of their stills first, as part of the 'heads' or 'foreshots'.

It certainly affected the flavor and contributed to hangover severity, but it did not and could not have resulted in a dangerous concentration of methanol in the spirit.

Lastly, please always remember that ethanol is a poisonous solvent in itself, and you're far more likely to die from alcohol poisoning (C2H5OH), than from methanol in fermented or distilled beverages, jacked or otherwise.

[Anonymous No.527246]

>>520378
i wouldnt drink your foot wine

[Anonymous No.527247]

>>519047
>do tell more about this. Is that a still that uses food-safe plastic tubing, not copper?
I'm not the guy who owns that still, but I can tell you that the reflux column/condenser is metal, either stainless or copper I can't remember.

>Are you able to make a still like that?

You could make a still like that, BUT hot ethanol is a very powerful solvent, and you'd be extracting all sorts of plasticizers and such which would probably be bad for your health while at the same time making the liquor taste terrible.

If you're really interested in distilling, and it's legal where you live, then go take a look at the homedistiller.org website.

A pot still can be as simple as a cheap 20qt stainless steel stock pot, a brass compression fitting and some 1/2" copper tubing in a bucket of water. The main thing to keep in mind with a pot still is having enough coil/cooling water to condense the vapor coming out of the boiler.

As always, be careful, ethanol vapors are extremely flammable, and don't do anything that's illegal where you live.

[Anonymous No.527510]

I need a quick rundown on this, humor me, please.

1] Can I make hard liquor of dubious quality for a considerably cheaper cost than what I might spend at the store?

2] What's my initial investment going to be, approximately?

I want to dip my toes in this a bit, with as little risk as possible.

[Anonymous No.527572]

>>522122 here, about to start. I've got a 30g sachet of champagne yeast and an airlock. My question is, can I split up the yeast into five and still make the same strength alcohol? I ask as I can only really source a 1 gallon water bottle at the moment, and I'm thinking of making around 4-5 gallons, but not all at once.

TL;DR if I divide the yeast up into smaller amounts will it make the same strength alcohol for each batch?

[Anonymous No.527578]

>>527572
Yeast is an organism, it's alive and reproduces, so yes, as long as you kept your process clean and the yeast has no competition, you will make the same amount/ strength alcohol, it will just take slightly longer to start up.

[Anonymous No.527602]

>>527578
This.

To clarify, yeast in reasonable conditions has a doubling time of 90 to 120mins, This varies on strain used and environment, but it will normally be in that range.
Say instead of using 1tsp(7 grams) of yeast, you decided to use 1 gram. After acclimatizing the yeast will start growing and within 2 hours you would have 2 grams, after 4 you would have 4 grams, after 6, you'd have 8 grams, meaning your fermentation will take about 1/3rd of a day longer than if you had used the full 7g.

[Anonymous No.527703]

>>527510
>1] Can I make hard liquor of dubious quality for a considerably cheaper cost than what I might spend at the store?

Once you get the hang of it, I'm told you can make liquor as good as most bottles on the shelf.

>2] What's my initial investment going to be, approximately?

Depends on what you want to make, what's cheap where you live, and whether you build or buy a still. Building generally is cheaper than buying, obviously.

>I want to dip my toes in this a bit, with as little risk as possible.

Unless you're living in New Zealand, don't even think about it. And don't imagine for a second that you're going to go into the moonshine business, as that is illegal /everywhere/. The tax man wants his cut.

[Anonymous No.527899]

>>527703

don't listen to this guy

yes, homebrewing is significantly cheaper than buying wine. with the right yeast, you can get up to around 20% abv and by freezing it and discarding the ice that forms you can increase it to about 28-30%. without building a still, that's as good as it gets.

if you're just fermenting, your initial investment is practically nothing. you can ferment sugar-water in 2-liter pop bottles if you so choose. distilling is only a bit more costly, as
>>527247
points out. pretty damn simple pretty damn cheap.

Obviously selling moonshine is a horrible idea and incredibly illegal, very dangerous, and while I don't know the legal status of selling your own fermented alcohol, it would be a worthless endeavor unless you happen to be the coolest 15 year old in a town where not a single highschooler has a cool 21-year-old older cousin.
But so long as you're safe about what you're doing, and you're not selling what you make, there's no reason to expect cops knocking at your door asking what's up. Plenty of people home-distill. There's a goddamned show about moonshiners, fer God's sake!

[Anonymous No.527924]

I got a kit for my birthday earlier this month and while homebrewing was never something I'd even briefly considered as an interest, it fascinated me almost immediately. I set out to make a pumpkin ale with the help of my local homebrew store and today I'm ready to bottle.

I've popped the lid a few times to check gravity and everything seems to be going exactly as it's supposed to so hopefully this first foray is a success. Now, being that I'm not a patient person and that I have to swing by the store to get some bottles today anyways, I was planning on picking up what I need to start a second batch right away. I'm hoping to eliminate gaps between batches so I always have something to enjoy. That said, any suggests from more experienced homebrewers on what to make?

As I said, first batch is a pumpkin ale that I figured would be good for October. Seeing as this next one will be more towards the end of October/early November I was considering a cider but it almost seems too easy. I don't want something complicated necessarily, just something that feels like I'm actually learning something.

[Anonymous No.527958]

>>527246
It's actually doing very well. I racked them about a two weeks ago. One half I added a cup of simple syrup to, and the other I left as is.

This should give me a gallon of dry and a gallon of sweet. The sweet took of fermenting again and is fizzing like a soda.

[Anonymous No.527961]

>>527246
It's actually doing very well. I racked them about a two weeks ago. One half I added a cup of simple syrup to, and the other I left as is.

This should give me a gallon of dry and a gallon of sweet. The sweet took of fermenting again and is fizzing like a soda.

[Anonymous No.527964]

>>527246
It's actually doing very well. I racked it about two weeks ago..

One half I added a cup of simple syrup, the other half I left as is. This should give me a gallon of dry and a gallon of sweet.

The sweet took off fermenting again and is fizzing like a soda

[Anonymous No.528001]

After several years of half arsed brewing to mixed results I've given up on fermenting my own drinks, My new joy is making my own LIQUEUR.

THe one I'd like to try next is a 'Magenbitter' herbal schnapps/digestifs (Think Jaegermeister but without the sickly-sweetness)

WHAT HERBS SHOULD I USE?

Online searches have suggested Anise, fennel and cumin as a base.

Other recd. herbs are:
Dandelion
Sage
Mint(pepper)
cardamon
Orange peel

Any suggestions?

[Anonymous No.528005]

My best homebrew trick is mixing applejuice concentrate to double strength and fermenting that for cider.

The higher alcohol content makes it easier to store, and you can dilute it with club soda, so you don't have to worry about pressurization issues.

Tastes just like regular cider.

[Anonymous No.528008]

>>526377
So the Dr. Pepper has a strange black-ish gunk attaching to the *top* of the bottle. I'm planning to rerack with the tube running past this in hopes of getting whatever it is out. I imagine it's some of the nasty ass preservatives in D.P. Also, fermentation has significantly slowed.

[Anonymous No.528012]

Just the thread I was looking for. My gramps brews his own beer pretty often, but my great uncle sent him some grapes and he turned them into...something? From what I know all he did was crush the grapes, measure out sugar and water to make 2 gallons, and add a couple of cakes of yeast, then let it sit for a couple of weeks where it wouldn't get contaminated but could still get air.

The end result is extremely powerful and carbonated from the lack of degassing. Is it safe? And if so, what would you call it? I'm a pretty big knownothing when it comes to wine.

[Anonymous No.528019]

>>528012
It's just carbonated wine of a sort. Depends on the yeast he used to make it with, as well as the grapes. That generally determines what it's called. What you described sounds perfectly safe, though I'd recommend racking it before consuming.

[Anonymous No.528021]

>>528019
Alright. Thanks a lot. The smell could only be described as "grape flavored rubbing alcohol" but I realized that if you give it a bit in the glass or give the container a bit of a shake it tastes pretty good.

[Anonymous No.528082]

>>528008
Also, my coffee wine is still cold crashing with my mead. I just had a thought today. What if I freeze distilled some coffee wine, freeze distilled Kilju, and mixed with cream. Would I get an approximation of a white russian?

[Anonymous No.528097]

>>528082
Erm, not quite. Your coffee liquor might taste pretty good, but in my experience, kilju does not taste even remotely like vodka. So in theory, it could turn out to be a tasty drink (the hard coffee could salvage the flavor of the kilju) but I don't think it will taste like a white russian. That and it'll still be relatively watered down. Still, it's a cool idea, I think you should do it, see if you can make your own drink.

[Anonymous No.528113]

>>528097
I was under the impression that kilju essentially tastes like straight alcohol (considering that's pretty much what you get flavor wise), and in my experience, that's the flavor of vodka.

[Anonymous No.528114]

>>528113
>component wise

[Anonymous No.528166]

>>528113
There's a strong tinge of grape as well as the alcohol bite. I made a faux-kalimotxo by adding 1 parts into 2 parts of dr. pepper and it was honestly really good.

[Anonymous No.528258]

>>528166
A tinge of grape? That's odd. What causes that?

[Anonymous No.528279]

>>528258
>>528166
did you use rasins for yeast nutrient?

[Anonymous No.528395]

>>528279
Oh wow, yes. I'm a tad retarded!

[Anonymous No.528609]

>>528395
>>528279
>>528258
Guy whose gramps made the carbonated wine here. I've further improved upon the idea by mixing it half and half with sweetened iced tea on the rocks and it's absolutely great. The tea and grapes make it very refreshing, but the alcohol gives it a really crisp bite.

[Anonymous No.528674]

>>528395
Simple mistake, don;t worry about it.

[Anonymous No.528675]

>>528609
Oooh that sounds really good, I'll have to try that.

[Anonymous No.529155]

This thread must stay active. Bought some more honey to start another gallon batch of mead. I'm looking at Storm the Castle fast mead again. Any ideas for some modifications?

[Anonymous No.529170]

>>529155
Try adding ginger, cinnamon, mint, or cloves to it.

[Anonymous No.529184]

>>529170
I allowed a stick or two of cinnamon to sit in my first batch for the primary fermentation. I'm not sure how I feel about ginger and cloves, not a fan of mint. Thanks for suggestions, anybody have more? I've read that allowing a pepper to sit in it is also interesting. I have a habanero plant outside, but it hasn't yielded this summer (Thanks, shitty St Louis weather and shit that came up preventing me watering it for a few weeks)

[Anonymous No.529188]

>>529184
If you do cloves, go easy on them. I made a batch of black tea with ginger root and sugar added and fermented it, it turns out well, if you mix it with your mead, I'd also go really easy on it, and I don't know how the flavors would mix. Definitely try out peppers, that sounds good. You could add small amounts of lemon and lime with the orange, or try juniper berries.

[Anonymous No.529198]

>>529184
What part of stl?

[Anonymous No.529200]

>>529198
Midtown

>>529188
Yea, I've read that one or two cloves is a MAXIMUM. My buddy's planning to make a tea batch here soon. Hopefully it turns out well. Also hoping my coffee batch is a success. It seems that my mead and coffee went fully dry, so I'm going to have to backsweeten. I figure I ought to backsweeten mead with honey, not sugar, right? Any suggestions on how to go about that, considering I've decided to cold crash it to stop all yeast activity, and just drink it cold so I don't have to worry about pasteurizing, adding chemicals, etc?

[Anonymous No.529210]

>>529200
Mine certainly did. I'll be trying a coffee batch of my own soon. Right now I'm running low budget wine, and a brown sugar batch. And back sweeten with honey for sure, the problem is if theres any live/awake yeast, they'll start munching. It won;t make much of a difference if you sweeten to taste right before drinking, but adding more honey and letting it sit could start up another round of fermentation. So I suggest just adding honey just before you drink it. In the future, I wouldn't pasteurize, it's hard to do without loosing alcohol content, though some chemicals are okay sometimes.

[Anonymous No.529230]

>>529210
Yea, the stove in my apartment basically has an off and hell-fire-and-brimstone hot, so pasteurization would have been virtually impossible to control. Now by immediately before, how soon before? Assuming I'm keeping it refrigerated, could I do this a week before, a day before, hours before? I ask because I'm intending to make a 2 hour drive to hang out with my buddy at another university. The weather should be fairly cool, so I'm not TOO worried about the transit, I suppose.

[Anonymous No.529231]

>>529230
Or might it be best for us to just sweeten it once we commence drinking? I feel as though sweetening before would allow the flavor to improve a bit, rather than basically having mead plus globs of honey.

[Anonymous No.529432]

>>525407
all the ingredients would have cost 12 euro ,for 12 euro i would buy 14kg of sugar thats givin me about 16L of good vodka:D sory for my english but im molvanian:D

[Anonymous No.529442]

>>529432
That is true, but the mead is still very nice.

I have got some kilju fermenting at the moment, one with white, one with demerara. Last time I sampled them the white was alright, but the demerara was great, I was tempted to pull out a full glass right there, but it's still only around 4-5%

[Anonymous No.529468]

>>522442
>homebrewtalk.com
This is a great resource, although they don't really like the whole cheap college student thing.

If you want easy, cheap mead, make JAOM. You CAN'T mess up JAOM.

[Anonymous No.529495]

>>529468

>although they don't really like the whole cheap college student thing.

this is why I try to be as forthcoming with information from my perspective as possible. there aren't enough "poor college student homebrew" resources around. maybe for good reason. but it's a perspective that should be shared!

[Anonymous No.529518]

Looking to build a simple 2-tier wooden set up. Doesn't need to be anything fancy, but obviously must be sturdy.

Any ideas where to find pics of set ups or how much I might be looking at in cost? I don't do a lot of projects so I really have to clue how to start.

[Anonymous No.529524]

>>529230
2 hours before might be okay. Transport should be done cold, and with as little shaking as possible. Ideally, you want to have a way to let pressure out but keep liquid in just in case

[Anonymous No.530419]

>>529495
Exactly! I like how you think.

[Anonymous No.531186]

I'm brewing 1 gallon batches of beer (I didn't like brewing 5 gallons batches) so now I'm using a refractometer.

Anybody uses one?

I enjoy not having to take a lot of beer to check the gravity.

Anyway, I'm looking for a good online refractometer calcultator for checking the gravity and ABV. I tried a lot of them but they all kind of yield different results.

There's Sean Terrill's one that seem pretty accurate since he put so much effort in the alcohol correction (you can see his formulas, it's pretty deep). It's just annoying that his calcultator yields results that are so much different than other ones (sometimes around .7% difference).