My wife is the best! On January 19th we wed, her marital gift to me was a kegerator. I love it! I now have the option of kegging my homebrew. I thought this was a great option, and it is, but I have come to find it’s not quite as easy as dumping your brew in the keg (which I’ll fully explain at another point).
Back to my wife. So then in February for my birthday she purchased me a membership to the American Homebrewers Association. This membership offers lots of cool rewards like a years subscription to Zymurgy, an awesome bimonthly homebrewing/beer enthusiast magazine, pub discounts, discounts on resources, etc. As cool as this is, it’s not a reason to join AHA. That would be like me saying I became a teacher for the discount on my cell phone bill. The two main reasons, as I see it, one joins is
- Because they are passionate about beer and/or homebrewing
- To connect with other beer enthusiasts
So to summarize, my wife is the greatest, she knows my passions and fans the flames, rather than stifling them despite her not understanding or agreeing with them all.
I have been a bad homebrewer.
I have been a bad blogger.
I have not updated this site since this past summer. However, there are good reasons. First of all, I have not been brewing so I didn’t have much to write about. I was not brewing because I got married in January on the 19th. The amount of planning and preparation needed really escaped me. However, I am back and brewing like crazy.
For this post, some cool new things have happened.
- My wife bought me a kegerator for my wedding gift
- I purchased a reusable keg
- I will be kegging all future beers
This has had a strong impact on my likeliness to brew. The bottling is a real pain in the ass. You have to collect the bottles, clean them, and then bottling the beer is about a 20 to 35 min process. Needless to say, I am not unhappy I don’t have to do that again unless I want to.
The brew is coming
It’s funny that I was so eager to drink it then when I could I was so busy that I didn’t have the time to taste it for about 2 days. In my first taste I was pleasantly surprised. If you cannot tell, I have been a bit nervous about messing up somewhere along the line. I was surprised how much I could really taste the hops that I used in the brew. I smelled them while brewing and I can really taste that same aroma in my beer. I shouldn’t sound so amazed, it kind of makes me sound stupid because that’s how it works, but it was stronger than I expected.
There was a chemicall-y after taste to the brew, kind of like a medicine taste to it. I have noticed over time as I continue to let the beer age the after taste has dissipated. I don’t know if this is typical or if this means that I made a mistake somewhere along the line. I plan to take a bottle to a local homebrew shop to see what they have to say.
All in all, I am very happy with my beer. I did a good job! I like having the large quantity available to share with friends. I am already planning the next beer. I am looking for a light, fruity, but high alcohol content beer. Anyone got any god recipes fitting the bill?
By far the hardest step in the process. I had to wait 2 weeks before I could taste my beer. I kept it cool covered with a towel just in case any of the bottles exploded. It went by quickly.
Last night I finally bottled my beer. All in all, it was an arduous task. The hard part was and is cleaning everything. I cleaned the plastic fermenter, cleaned the bottles, and prepped the area. Cleaning the bottles was a pain and wasteful. I put a small amount of bleach in each bottle (about a teaspoon) and filled the rest with water. I let the bottles sit for about 45min to sterilize.
I then rinsed the bottles and set the carboy on the bitchen counter with the plastic fermenter below it. The transfer process was a breeze. I did a 6 pack at a time then immediately capped it. This process probably took about 30 min. Including cleaning and prep it probably took about 3 hours.
What I have learned is that in the future I need to streamline the bottling process, especially cleaning and sterilization. Maybe I could invest in a bottle cleaner.