Brewing Master

Question:

I bought my stainless steel "stock pot" for $7. Holds 5 gallons. What a deal. /s/ bobH

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – ….Snippage detected in particle beam! By the way at G&G you save more by purchasing the same stuff as a kit. Now you will need 50 bottles, bottle brush, caps, a pot to boil in, and a kit. You make the call on how good your deal is. He’s absolutely correct, sir!  You may already have a brew pot… check with your wife/SO and see if you don’t already have a large capacity canning kettle.  If not, run down to your local "We’ve-got-it-all-or-you-don’t-want-it!" store and grab the largest ceramic-lined canning kettle they carry– voila, BREW POT!!!!  The one I managed to snag holds/boils 6 gallons.  If you have an electric stove, you will also need a trivet (a multi-S shaped piece of heavy-duty large-gauge wire that goes on top of the burner and under the pot– this will save $$ for you by allowing you to keep the burner on high without burning the wort or blowing the burner– which I did a couple times before I began using the trivet). Also, per Papazzion, you will need a "…long-handled wooden spoon with charisma…" for stirring your sacred brew in the pot whilst it boils. Mine has definite charisma, as it got laid down on the stove-top too close to the burner one time and now has some wonderful charcoal on the handle…. hee hee hee!   {:-)  Cheers, — DAsh "As long as the world is spinning, we’ll all be dizzy and nauseous."  Mel Brooks, the 2000 Year Old Man —–= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =—– http://www.newsfeeds.com – The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! —–==  Over 80,000 Newsgroups – 16 Different Servers! =—–

Response:

The Mr. Beer at 6 qts is a lot of time for a little bit of beer.  Assuming it takes a minumum of 2 hours to do everything you have to do with the Mr. setup, you end up with 16  12 oz bottles of beer.  At about two beers consumed a day you are out of beer in a week, and it took two to ferment and clear. How is the True Brew Equipment Kit?  It is the kit recommended for beginners at Brew & Wine Masters.

Seems reasonable. One problem with most beginner kits is that they come with hand cappers, which are a PITA. You’re much better off spending an extra $10 for a bench capper. And since you’ve already brewed, maybe you already have a capper? The plastic buckets can be obtained for free at many restaurants; just ask them. John Palmer has a good section on beginner equipment at: http://www.howtobrew.com/equipment.html

Response:

….Snippage detected in particle beam! By the way at G&G you save more by purchasing the same stuff as a kit. Now you will need 50 bottles, bottle brush, caps, a pot to boil in, and a kit. You make the call on how good your deal is.

He’s absolutely correct, sir!  You may already have a brew pot… check with your wife/SO and see if you don’t already have a large capacity canning kettle.  If not, run down to your local "We’ve-got-it-all-or-you-don’t-want-it!" store and grab the largest ceramic-lined canning kettle they carry– voila, BREW POT!!!!  The one I managed to snag holds/boils 6 gallons.  If you have an electric stove, you will also need a trivet (a multi-S shaped piece of heavy-duty large-gauge wire that goes on top of the burner and under the pot– this will save $$ for you by allowing you to keep the burner on high without burning the wort or blowing the burner– which I did a couple times before I began using the trivet). Also, per Papazzion, you will need a "…long-handled wooden spoon with charisma…" for stirring your sacred brew in the pot whilst it boils.  Mine has definite charisma, as it got laid down on the stove-top too close to the burner one time and now has some wonderful charcoal on the handle…. hee hee hee!   {:-)  Cheers, — DAsh "As long as the world is spinning, we’ll all be dizzy and nauseous."  Mel Brooks, the 2000 Year Old Man —–= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =—– http://www.newsfeeds.com – The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! —–==  Over 80,000 Newsgroups – 16 Different Servers! =—–

Response:

I personally recommend the www.williamsbrewing.com to start.  It even comes with a video to help you through it. Or you can start just by purchasing a bucket with a lid and airlock for fermentation, and a bucket for priming.  If both have spigots then all you need is a hydrometer, a spoon, a short piece of hose (for filling bottles), and a long piece of hose for transferring from the fermentation bucket to the priming bucket. Airlock $0.90 Spoon $2.60 Primary Fermenter $5.70 Lid $1.60 Priming bucket $5.70 Spigot $2.50 (get two) Hose $0.30/ft (get six feet or so) Hydrometer $4.95 Racking cane $1.60 Emily Capper $9.95 Total – $39.80 *www.grapeandgranary.com* By the way at G&G you save more by purchasing the same stuff as a kit. Now you will need 50 bottles, bottle brush, caps, a pot to boil in, and a kit. You make the call on how good your deal is. Cheers, Mike The Mr. Beer at 6 qts is a lot of time for a little bit of beer. Assuming it takes a minumum of 2 hours to do everything you have to do with the Mr. setup, you end up with 16  12 oz bottles of beer.  At about two beers consumed a day you are out of beer in a week, and it took two to ferment and clear. How is the True Brew Equipment Kit?  It is the kit recommended for

beginners at Brew & Wine Masters. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Thanks, Mike Submitted via WebNewsReader of http://www.interbulletin.com

Response:

The Mr. Beer at 6 qts is a lot of time for a little bit of beer.  Assuming it takes a minumum of 2 hours to do everything you have to do with the Mr. setup, you end up with 16  12 oz bottles of beer.  At about two beers consumed a day you are out of beer in a week, and it took two to ferment and clear.

How is the True Brew Equipment Kit?  It is the kit recommended for beginners at Brew & Wine Masters. Thanks, Mike Submitted via WebNewsReader of http://www.interbulletin.com

Response:

I also got started down this road with a Mr. Beer at Xmas. However while I found the beer I made drinkable, that is about as far as I would go. Having caught the bug I started to research the subject, and am now brewing beer that is IMHO not only "drinkable", but damn good. This of course required a new kit. While I did skip this step this web page offers some alternate directions for Mr. Beer beer that will at the very least introduce you to some of the procedures you are likely to use when decide to chuck the Mr. Beer and buy a regular kit. (Again IMHO if you really enjoy brewing and drinking your own beer, your Mr. Beer kit will become just a fond memory of what got you into homebrewing in the first place.) http://www.homebrewshop.com/

Response:

I think you did an admirable thing to go by a brew shop, but I would not suggest prehopped kits even for a beginner.

The shop’s web site is www.haveahomebrew.com if you’re interested.  I’m a little confused, though.  Why "chuck the Mr. Beer?"  Isn’t it fine as a fermenting device?  I figured I would brew my next batch strictly with ingredients from the brew store, ignoring the Mr. Beer directions completely.  I thought I might as well take advantage of the materials I already have. Keep the faith, if you stay with it you will make good beer, and become something of a beer snob.

I’ve actually considered myself a beer snow for a while…:)  I detest beers such as Bud and Miller. Mike

Response:

I’m a little confused, though.  Why "chuck the Mr. Beer?"  Isn’t it fine as a fermenting device?  I figured I would brew my next batch strictly with ingredients from the brew store, ignoring the Mr. Beer directions completely.  I thought I might as well take advantage of the materials I already have.

The Mr. Beer at 6 qts is a lot of time for a little bit of beer.  Assuming it takes a minumum of 2 hours to do everything you have to do with the Mr. setup, you end up with 16  12 oz bottles of beer.  At about two beers consumed a day you are out of beer in a week, and it took two to ferment and clear. Let’s use a 5 gallon fermenter (ie chuck Mr. B).  You should have at least two cases of beer.  48 beers, two per day, 24 days of wonderful beer.  It takes 10 – 12 days to ferment out, and about 7 days to carbonate,  Sounds like as you just finish one batch it will be time to bottle another. Now let’s be even better with our time and make 10 gallons of beer per brew session. With all that said, the best reason to get rid of the Mr. Beer is you will never make truly great beer with it.  I suggest you buy a Mr. B kit or two and put it on e-bay.  I sold one with a friend a few years ago, and I think we made about $70. If you really want to become a certified beer geek you could use the Mr. Beer for krausening the beer at priming time.  I’m not even willing to go there. Cheers, Mike

Response:

My wife got a Mr Beer kit for Christmas a couple of years ago so we tried it out.  It was the first time either of us had ever brewed beer and it turned out horribly.  I am new to this whole brewing thing ( I just brewed my second batch not counting Mr Beer ) but I think our yeast was bad.  I never foamed up or did much of anything.  It was very, very disgusting.  My suggestion is to chunk the Mr Beer kit and buy a beginners kit from your local brew store or one of hundreds of sites online.

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I brewed a batch of beer but the specific gravity will not go below 1.02. My beer kit instructions (I was given a Mr. Beer kit as a gift) say to use 2.5 teaspoons of sugar in the one quart bottles, plus 1.25 cup of water to adjust the flavor and alcohol content.  Can somebody please let me know whether or not I should change these measurements and by how much so it continues to ferment and then carbonate?    The best advice from more experienced brewers is to learn more about brewing, dump the Mr. Beer, and get some better, more flexible, and often cheaper equipment.    Adding sugar at bottling time is strictly for carbonating the beer– it should at that point already have fermented out, so you wouldn’t expect any significant drop in gravity, and nothing you do will change that.  The bit about adding water to adjust flavor and alcohol content is pretty much nonsense (unless you’re doing high-gravity brewing like big commercial breweries sometimes do).  Adding water will, of course, drop the gravity down, but i suspect that’s not want you really want.    (Is anyone familiar with the instructions for Mr. Beer? It sounds mighty goofy to me, but maybe it *is* a high-gravity brewing system…) — Joel Plutchak "Would you prefer… the ancient set of problems (disease, starvation, no access to Sierra Nevada)?" – Chris Colby in HBD

Response:

I think you did an admirable thing to go by a brew shop, but I would not suggest prehopped kits even for a beginner. Look through the website by John Palmer, and see if you might have missed any of the steps he describes. Adding corn sugar to most brewing processes in large quantities can result in a cidery taste.  The sugar added at bottling is a very small amount and does not contribute to a cider effect. I think the yeast didn’t make it based upon the small amount of beer you tried to make.  You will find for not much more money in ingredients than you spent, you can make 5 gallons of quality beer.  You will need some basic equipment, and it is outlined in John Palmer’s website. I got my start from www.williamsbrewing.com .  Their kits and instructions are very high quality, albeit pricey.  I think that is an excellent place to begin, and then once you learn the basics to move on to kits from other suppliers, www.grapeandgranary.com is an excellent one, and begin to design your own recipes.  Then if so inclined you can move to the point you mill and mash your own grain, make your own wort, and basically control all aspects of the brewing process.  You can do as much or as little as you desire. Keep the faith, if you stay with it you will make good beer, and become something of a beer snob. Cheers, Mike Actually, I visited Brew & Wine Masters in Rockville MD before doing

anything.  They provided me with some modified instructions for pre-hopped kits.  I purchased malt and yeast from them.  It turns out they didn’t realize the small size of my Mr. Beer kit (The Pilot Brewery, http://www.mrbeer.com/pilin.html) and gave me instructions to boil two gallons of water, adding in the malt and wort (I hadn’t looked close enought at the kit – he was unfamiliar with this particular model as it has since been discontinued).  I ended up with much more than the six quarts my kit holds so I discarded any extra. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I am happy that the Mr. Beer has peaked you interest in brewing. Unfortunately you have a question that I cannot answer without more information.  What did you do with the Mr. Beer? Boil?  Hops?  Extract? Yeast? Without more information, I would say your yeast has given up the ghost. You might find the following website helpful if and when you decide to become more involved in the brewing process. http://www.howtobrew.com/ Cheers, Mike Submitted via WebNewsReader of http://www.interbulletin.com

Response:

Actually, I visited Brew & Wine Masters in Rockville MD before doing anything.  They provided me with some modified instructions for pre-hopped kits.  I purchased malt and yeast from them.  It turns out they didn’t realize the small size of my Mr. Beer kit (The Pilot Brewery, http://www.mrbeer.com/pilin.html) and gave me instructions to boil two gallons of water, adding in the malt and wort (I hadn’t looked close enought at the kit – he was unfamiliar with this particular model as it has since been discontinued).  I ended up with much more than the six quarts my kit holds so I discarded any extra.   I am happy that the Mr. Beer has peaked you interest in brewing. Unfortunately you have a question that I cannot answer without more information.  What did you do with the Mr. Beer? Boil?  Hops?  Extract? Yeast? Without more information, I would say your yeast has given up the ghost. You might find the following website helpful if and when you decide to become more involved in the brewing process. http://www.howtobrew.com/ Cheers, Mike

Submitted via WebNewsReader of http://www.interbulletin.com

Response:

I brewed a batch of beer but the specific gravity will not go below 1.02. My beer kit instructions (I was given a Mr. Beer kit as a gift) say to use 2.5 teaspoons of sugar in the one quart bottles, plus 1.25 cup of water to adjust the flavor and alcohol content.  Can somebody please let me know whether or not I should change these measurements and by how much so it continues to ferment and then carbonate?

   The best advice from more experienced brewers is to learn more about brewing, dump the Mr. Beer, and get some better, more flexible, and often cheaper equipment.    Adding sugar at bottling time is strictly for carbonating the beer– it should at that point already have fermented out, so you wouldn’t expect any significant drop in gravity, and nothing you do will change that.  The bit about adding water to adjust flavor and alcohol content is pretty much nonsense (unless you’re doing high-gravity brewing like big commercial breweries sometimes do).  Adding water will, of course, drop the gravity down, but i suspect that’s not want you really want.    (Is anyone familiar with the instructions for Mr. Beer? It sounds mighty goofy to me, but maybe it *is* a high-gravity brewing system…) — Joel Plutchak "Would you prefer… the ancient set of problems (disease, starvation, no access to Sierra Nevada)?" – Chris Colby in HBD

Response:

I am happy that the Mr. Beer has peaked you interest in brewing. Unfortunately you have a question that I cannot answer without more information.  What did you do with the Mr. Beer? Boil?  Hops?  Extract? Yeast? Without more information, I would say your yeast has given up the ghost. You might find the following website helpful if and when you decide to become more involved in the brewing process. http://www.howtobrew.com/ Cheers, Mike – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I brewed a batch of beer but the specific gravity will not go below 1.02. My beer kit instructions (I was given a Mr. Beer kit as a gift) say to use 2.5 teaspoons of sugar in the one quart bottles, plus 1.25 cup of water to adjust the flavor and alcohol content.  Can somebody please let me know whether or not I should change these measurements and by how much so it continues to ferment and then carbonate? Thanks, Mike

Response:

I brewed a batch of beer but the specific gravity will not go below 1.02. My beer kit instructions (I was given a Mr. Beer kit as a gift) say to use 2.5 teaspoons of sugar in the one quart bottles, plus 1.25 cup of water to adjust the flavor and alcohol content.  Can somebody please let me know whether or not I should change these measurements and by how much so it continues to ferment and then carbonate? Thanks, Mike

Response: