Home Brewing, an American Pastime.
It’s the Fourth of July, time for Barbecues, Friends, Family, Fireworks and of course beer. But in this case I am referring to the making of it, not the consuming of it.
A few weeks back my amazing wife (@trillian1117) gave me a Otto Hoxxiem Deluxe Home Brewing Kit. Although I have said in the past that I’d like to try brewing my own beer in the past, wasn’t sure now was the right time to add another hobby to my life. But after a few weeks of hemming and hawing and a trip to exchange it for the kit with a different beer in it, I decided to give it a go.
So this afternoon I started the process. What follows here is a documentation of the process that I started. It’s not meant as a review, that will come later when we have a finished product.
The first step was to sanitize all the equipment. The kit comes with a packet of Sodium Metabisulphite that I dissolved in my sink to wash the barrel and all the accessories I was using today. There were no instructions as to how long anything had to be in contact with the hot water and sanitize so I just winged it and set everything out on a towel to air dry.
The second step was to make the wort. One can of malt extract from the kit, one gallon of water, and 1 teaspoon of salt is all you need to get this going. Mix together and bring to a boil, then let simmer for 25 minutes. Interestingly enough the malt extract resembles molasses in both consistency and smell. I did my best to empty the can of this sticky goo into the water, but I didn’t get it all, hopefully this is ok.
My first major issue was with boiling the mixture, I could not see anything but foam in the pot so I failed to see when it started boiling, while my back was turned for a second the pot boiled over, I lost maybe 1/4 cup to the stove top, ooops. But after that the pot simmered along nicely for 25 minutes as the instruction said.
The next step was to take the mix off the heat let it cool for a bit, and then add 8 cups of cold water. No issues here.
Then I mixed up some luke warm water and sugar and added the yeast. I let this bloom for 10 minutes or so while I assembled the barrel.
The Barrel that comes in this kit is very nice. It’s plastic and is made to resemble a wood cask, nothing special there, but it’s a good size and shape and very solidly made. It’s fairly small, only big enough to make about a 12 pack of beer, but for me that’s perfect, for now.
Now we hit the next problem… How to pour a large pot of wort into the keg. The Otto Hoxxiem kit provides a funnel but it;s not nearly big enough. I quickly found out that if I poured fast the funnel overflowed and I lost wort down the sink drain (note to self next time do this over another large pan to catch any spills) But if I poured slowly the wort dribbled down the side of the pot and I lost some there too. I then grabbed a larger funnel that we had in out kitchen and it went a bit smoother but was still not easy. I have no way of knowing how much of my wort I lost, but I think it was significant. This will probably affect how my first beer comes out. :(
Now with the wort in the cask, I added 3 more cups of water, and the yeast mix. Capped it off with the air lock, and set the whole thing on a shelf in our pantry where it shant be disturbed for at least 7 days.
The instructions say that after I add the yeast mix there should be much room for air left in the cask, but in mine there was plenty of room for air, the wort mix was at least an inch from the top of the cask. I suspect that was due to the amount of wort I lost in the funnel filling disaster.
So thats where I am, It’s fermenting for the next seven to ten days, then I clarify for a few days then we draw it off, clean out the cask, put it back in and let it carbonate.
Questions I have for any of you who might have done this:
- Should I have topped off the cask with water when it wasn’t full?
- How long should it take before bubbles start forming in the air lock?
- Are they any signs of a bad brew so you can abort before you get to the end?
- Anyone know where I can get a large steel or enameled pot with a pouring lip on it?
I’ll post an update when I get to the next step, and I’m sure we’ll talk about this in the next show.
