tonight_we_fly
Active Member
Thanks to those of you who offered friendly welcoming words when I joined the forum recently.
Here is the story so far... Iâm now part of the way through my first brew (Edme Superbrew German-style lager). It was a far trickier experience than Iâd imagined, largely due to a lack of instructions; I was quite surprised that the kit which I bought was marketed as being for complete beginners, yet it came with absolutely no setting up instructions whatsoever.
Similarly, the book I had purchased (by Palmer) was subtitled to suggest that it was intended for brewing âthe first timeâ and yet an awful lot of the basics seemed to just be assumed (âuse warm water when sanitizing your equipmentâ â what does âwarmâ mean? Sixty degrees? Sixteen degrees?). Also, the directions in the book seemed to entirely contradict the instructions which came with the kit at some points (e.g. the kit told me to sprinkle the yeast on top, the book said I should rehydrate it at a precise temperature for fifteen minutes before stirring it in).
It was apparent that it was going to be a lot more complicated than Iâd anticipated even from the very first step, in which I was instructed to remove the label from the outside of the tin (tear it off? You would have needed industrial-grade paintstripper, a blow torch and possible some kind of nuclear reaction to get that label off). I was close to just pouring the whole thing down the drain when I followed the instruction to âadd nineteen litres of cold water, then wait for the temperature to drop to 18-21 Celsius (after adding that all cold water the temperature was resultingly at about ten degrees).
But I kept working at it, and now have a fermenting container under the stairs with a visible layer of something on top, and the occasional bubble definitely glugging out through the airlock. In the end it was like a child waking up to discover a fresh layer of snow on the ground outside the bedroom window; I went to bed on Saturday night thinking it had all gone wrong, and decided to have a look at it in the morning before deciding whether to persevere or just pour it all away. When I woke up a fluffy white layer was visible across the surface, and suddenly the world now seemed like an exciting place all over again.
Anyway, sorry, I promised a question, didnât I... Well, itâs another apparently contradicting scenario. The book seems to instruct that I should not remove the sealed lid from my fermenting vessel at any point, as this may potentially introduce bacteria etc. However, I also seem to be instructed to take readings with my hydrometer over a period of days in order to ascertain when the liquid is ready for bottling and secondary fermentation.
This seems rather puzzling to me. Presumably I will have to remove the lid after all in order to take a sample for the hydrometer? Or should I remove the airlock, and try to siphon some out through the hole to minimize exposure? Everywhere I look for instructions on this, they seems to magically jump to the stage where a testing jar is filled with liquid and ready to have the hydrometer immersed in it, without any intermediary detail about how it actually got there.
If anybody has any comments about this Iâd be very appreciative, thanks.
Iâve got a feeling this is all going to be considerably easier the second time around...
Here is the story so far... Iâm now part of the way through my first brew (Edme Superbrew German-style lager). It was a far trickier experience than Iâd imagined, largely due to a lack of instructions; I was quite surprised that the kit which I bought was marketed as being for complete beginners, yet it came with absolutely no setting up instructions whatsoever.
Similarly, the book I had purchased (by Palmer) was subtitled to suggest that it was intended for brewing âthe first timeâ and yet an awful lot of the basics seemed to just be assumed (âuse warm water when sanitizing your equipmentâ â what does âwarmâ mean? Sixty degrees? Sixteen degrees?). Also, the directions in the book seemed to entirely contradict the instructions which came with the kit at some points (e.g. the kit told me to sprinkle the yeast on top, the book said I should rehydrate it at a precise temperature for fifteen minutes before stirring it in).
It was apparent that it was going to be a lot more complicated than Iâd anticipated even from the very first step, in which I was instructed to remove the label from the outside of the tin (tear it off? You would have needed industrial-grade paintstripper, a blow torch and possible some kind of nuclear reaction to get that label off). I was close to just pouring the whole thing down the drain when I followed the instruction to âadd nineteen litres of cold water, then wait for the temperature to drop to 18-21 Celsius (after adding that all cold water the temperature was resultingly at about ten degrees).
But I kept working at it, and now have a fermenting container under the stairs with a visible layer of something on top, and the occasional bubble definitely glugging out through the airlock. In the end it was like a child waking up to discover a fresh layer of snow on the ground outside the bedroom window; I went to bed on Saturday night thinking it had all gone wrong, and decided to have a look at it in the morning before deciding whether to persevere or just pour it all away. When I woke up a fluffy white layer was visible across the surface, and suddenly the world now seemed like an exciting place all over again.
Anyway, sorry, I promised a question, didnât I... Well, itâs another apparently contradicting scenario. The book seems to instruct that I should not remove the sealed lid from my fermenting vessel at any point, as this may potentially introduce bacteria etc. However, I also seem to be instructed to take readings with my hydrometer over a period of days in order to ascertain when the liquid is ready for bottling and secondary fermentation.
This seems rather puzzling to me. Presumably I will have to remove the lid after all in order to take a sample for the hydrometer? Or should I remove the airlock, and try to siphon some out through the hole to minimize exposure? Everywhere I look for instructions on this, they seems to magically jump to the stage where a testing jar is filled with liquid and ready to have the hydrometer immersed in it, without any intermediary detail about how it actually got there.
If anybody has any comments about this Iâd be very appreciative, thanks.
Iâve got a feeling this is all going to be considerably easier the second time around...
temperature (not in the airing cupboard 
) - By warm around 18-22C
