Making Beer
Don't have a beer tree? Then you might have to make it the old fashioned way...
Making your own home brew is a great way to save money and live a happy self sufficient life! You may also be a little fed up with some of the bland fizz you can get down the local shops/pubs.
A lot people think that it's quite a difficult process and yes it can be. But I think that's really up to you. There are some very complicated methods that you may progress to. Here we're going to show you the easy way. It should take about an hour for the intial process then about week of a wait!
Equipment
The one catch about brewing your own is that there's a small initial investment to made. Bar the bottle caps it's a one off investment and more than worth it.
You'll need:
- Large pot (soup/stock pot will do)
- Primary fermenter - a large plastic 7 Gallon (min.) container with air tight lid
- An air lock
- Large spoon
- Thermomitor
Ingredients
- Can of Hopped Malt Exract
- 1kg of Sugar (dextrose)
- Water
- Brewers Yeast
- Ice
The boring bit - Cleaning
The most important thing you need to do when brewing your own is clean! You need to sterilise everything you use with boiling water and sterilising solution. Some people use a cap full of bleach and rinse like crazy. I'm scared of bleach but I'm told it works - it's up to you but be careful.
The interesting bit
OK lets get started! Take your malt and pop it into a bowl of boiled water for 10 mins. This is a little trick which helps you get the malt out of the tin - it's so thick and syrupy you'll be glad you did it.
In your bew pot heat up 4 litre's of water to around 80°C. Remove from the heat. Add the dextrose and then the Malt extract. Make sure you stir the mix to prevent the extract sticking and burning on the bottom of the pot. You can add some hot water into the malt tin to get all it out. This mixture is called a wort. Keep stiring and bring up to the boil.
Take off the heat and place in iced water. The best way to do this is to fill you sink with ice and water! Cold water from the tap will do but it's best to bring the temperature down as quick as possible.
Pour you wort into the fermenting bin. Add about 11 litres of cold water. The final temperature of the wort needs to be between 21°C to 26.5. A good way to ensure you don't make it too hot or too cold is to add cold water to begin with and keep testing the temperature. If it's getting too cold add some hot instead of the cold. It's a bit of trial and error but very important to get right.
OK add your yeast. Make sure you spread it out as you sprinkle on top. Some kits will tell you stir it in, other to leave. It's best to follow your kits instructions. The yeast will eat the sugar and create the alcohol. You can add more dextrose when you are making the wort. This will increase the alcohol content. Be careful if you put too much in it will spoil.
Now you just need to fix the lid on. Fill the airlock with water and fix in place. Once you see air bubbles come up through the airlock the beer is fermenting. Once the bubbles stop or slow to 2 minutes between bubbles the beer is done.It may take 3 to 6 days for this to happen. Now you need to add it to bottles.
Again the bottles like everything that comes into contact with your beer needs to sterilised. You can get specialist brushes and cleaning kits. If this something you are regally going to then I'd buy them - they will make life much easier.
Ok get your funnel and bottles ready. You are going to add about half a teaspoon of dextrose to each and every bottle. Again I would check this amount with your kit. The amount will change for different bottle size. This will help give a fizz to you beer.
Sterise your bottle tops/lids. You'll know how by now. Remove the airlock or the water may get sucked into to your lovely brew. Fill each bottle with the beer. Get the lid on good and tight. Give the bottle a little shake to mix in the sugar.
A good tip is to clean all the equipment as soon as you've used - it will save you time next time.
The fun Part
After 2-6 weeks (depending on your kit) you can happily enjoy your own beer!
Cheers!<
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