Brewing Beer at Home.

So today I was over at my buddy Deejay's house helping him brew some delicious Belgian Whit. I got the idea to finally use my own home brewers kit. My mother gave me the kit and it includes everything I need to brew my first home brew. I figure i'm going to try this batch and if it goes well i'll move on to brew some delicious Mac & Jacks. This is just to prove to myself that I can brew my own as well as help my buddy.

I started by getting all the stuff out and read up on what to do when. Then I started sanitizing the tools like the carboy, brewing spoon, syphon, tube, and air lock. While that was sitting in the bathtub I got the 2 gallons of water heating up in my stock pot. Once the water gets to 160 deg. I put in the carmel malt to steep in for 30 min. Then I will put in the Liquid Malt Extract and water salts then bring the water to a boil. Once it hits boiling I will put in half of the packages of hops and let that boil for 55 min. With 5 min left I'll go to putting in the rest of the hops for 5 min of boil. Once the boil is done you cover the pot and let it sit for another 5 mins. Once ready you syphon the wort (as its called) into the carboy and top it off to 5 gal. This has to sit in the carboy and cool to about 70-80 deg before you put the yeast in you give that a slight stir and then put the air lock on the bottle.

This is called the primary certain types of beer that require a two stage fermentation process in wich you would use the carboy as the secondary. In my case I'll  only have this in the carboy for a week then to bottles for 2 weeks. In the two stage process you would actually use a fermentation bucket for your primary for 4-6 day and then syphon from that to your carboy for 7-10 days. Then bottle for 2 weeks. Once the two week bottling stage is over you would then be able to cool in the fridge and serve as desired.

Now this is my take from what I have read and learned so far. Some beer enthusiasts may give a different account of what to do, but this is close for those who want to try this at home for their first time. The best thing you can do for yourself if you want to start this as a hobby is to find a beer supply store. I personally use a place called the beer essentials. It is local, and they are very helpful. They have everything from stuff to make it strait from a can and nothing else all the way to making your own mash. Mash is something all together different. It requires a process that I have not even gotten into, but it uses oats and grain to make your own extract basically. Most of the places that supply beer will have all the recipes for you to be able to make just about any kind of beer you want. Even clone beers to make some of your favorites you get at the bars.

I decided to post this in my blog because it is a craft just like any other hobby you can do out there. This one just tastes great and makes me happy.