Nuff Said :friday:
Home Distillation of Alcohol

I made a bit of home distilled alcohol a few times in highschool. Sugar + bread yeast + water + airlock = fermented mash in a few days. Boiled in a closed container with a coper tube coiled through some ice water to cool the steam. Lot of work for a little bit of stuff though.

Been doing some reading and here is some good info:

How to brew beer book/writeup:
How to Brew - By John Palmer - Introduction

Home brew forum:
HomeBrewTalk.com - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Community.

Thought you might want to know about some stuff to read. I am always learning about something. Last week has been about brewing. :beer:

Interesting review of the specialty beers.

Incidently, my very first homebrew was a barleywine. Unintentional.
My brother told me to use two cans of malt extract OR 1 can and a small bag of dry malt. I misundestood, and used 2 cans plus a large bag of malt. After only about 3 weeks in the bottle, a friend and I tasted it. Turned out like beer flavored rubbing alcohol. Disappointed, I almost never brewed again.

Fast forward a year or so. I'm ready to bottle another batch (my 5th or 6th at this point), and I'm out of bottles. I notice the case of that first brew in the back corner, and decide to pour them out to use the bottles. I crack one, and it's very carbonated. I decide to be brave and taste it again before dumping it out. Holy shit, it's fantastic! The year or so of aging has mellowed all the harsh flavors. It's thick and strong, with a distinct roasted flavor. Could have used a bit more hops, but it is still very drinkable. I immediately guzzled down that bottle and another. Holy shit again. I was drunk on two bottles. Not just a little buzz, but really feeling it.

I saved that batch for special occasions, but it ended up that the last couple of bottles turned sour. I always intended to make another, but I haven't brewed for quite a while.

ya barleywine needs to age ... which is the main reason why i wouldn't do it for a first batch. I bet you are glad you kept it around eh?

Omg, that must be what happened to me once. I didn't wait a year and try it again though, when I needed the bottles I promptly dumped the shit down the drain without a second thought.

Fuck.

A good lesson for beginning brewers: Dont quit due to disappointment because of a bad batch. It happens.

Incidentally, the best beer I brewed had an accident during the process that I was sure was going to ruin it. I was making garlic mashed potatoes to the left of my stock pot full of wort. It needed a stir so instead of putting down the potato masher and grabbing the wort stirrer(word?) I dunked the potato masher into the wort...potatoes, garlic and all. Was the tastiest beer i've ever had.

Well i brewed my first batch on St. Patricks day. I think i am going to call it "Ryan's green APA". I used 7lbs extract and 1lb of crystal 60L. For hops, I used 1oz of summit (18%) for 60 min and .75oz summit and .75oz Amarillo (8.6%) for 15 min. I should have used less in retrospect because it adds up to about 100 IBU and my final gravity was 1.052 ... so it should be quite hoppy, which i like but this may be overkill. After 12 hours in the fermenting bucket, the krausen hit the lid so it is doing quite well.

Anyway, thanks for getting me interested guys!

That sounds like an interesting first brew. And yeah, with an oz of 18% for an hour and your gravity, it's going to be fairly bitter. I did something similar once with Chinook (~12% IIRC) in a pale ale of similar gravity as yours and the beer had a strong piny resiny flavor. I also managed to over-carbonate it to hell, like I'd get an ounce of liquid at the bottom of the glass and the rest would be foam. It was still drinkable though, if one had enough patience.

I'm not sure what the flavor profile of Summit is, but Amarillo is kinda citrusy not unlike Cascades. Who knows, it might turn out great. One great thing about overhopped beers is that you will have fewer people trying to drink your stash. And remember, nobody's first batch is phenomenal. If you produce something that is merely "drinkable," that's not a bad start at all.

just an update, after about 40 hours the gravity dropped from 1.052 to 1.015 (4.85 abv) and i am hoping it keeps going down to around 1.010. Pretty exciting stuff. Oh and as far as the hoppiness, its very similar to sierra nevada pale ale with a strong grapefruit overtone.

not exactly "home" brewing, but I just found out this was near by:

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