When and why did you start brewing?

[cheshirehomebrew]

A friend of mine started to make his own wine, so I said i would have a crack at making beer, that was a couple of years ago now and am liking my all grain BIAB beers as well as having the knowledge to put certian grains/hops together and know I would get a decent beer out of it.

Oh and am a second generation brewer I used to help my dad make beer and wine back in the 70s/80s

 

[Greenhorn]

I've got to know the landlord at our local real ale pub and he's very passionate about brewing. We've been chatting for years about getting into it (hypothetically.)

There is also a local microbrewery which used to be really good, but has changed hands a couple of of times over the past few years and is now essentially mothballed (we think).

It was sold a couple of years ago for a song, which just got me and the landlord talking more.

I've been commuting into london ever since me and Mrs Greenhorn got sick of london 8 years ago, and I'm getting the right **** with it. We've got two young kids and 3 hours commuting every day is just no fun.

So I decided to investigate homebrewing to see if I like it and have a feel for it. Making a change of career is a longer term idea and only really a pipe dream at the mo. but so far I'm really enjoying it.....

 

[clibit]

http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=60314

I see Brewbarrell do kits that are brewed in a mini keg which they say are ready to drink after a week. �£30 for 5 litres.

A lot of us seem to have come back to brewing after helping our dads brew beer in the 70s. I wish my dad was around to sample my beer. I might finally have made him proud! :lol:

 

[Tony1951]

I started in 1969 or maybe 1968 making mead first from a kit. It wasn't great. I then made a few brews using Geordie Kits which as I recall were a mixture of concentrated malt and hops in a string bag. It was a bit of a clart and because it had a large amount of white sugar in teh recipe, it always had a weird flavour, beer, but not quite the same as pub beer and certainly not as good. Then I started up again in the 1980s - proably about 1984 or 1985. Kits again and white sugar. the only beer then that had a strong enough flavour to almost disguise the dreaded 'twang' was Stout. made about a dozen brews of that and then got some off brews, three in a row, which as it happens, coincided with me starting to use a heat belt on my FV. At teh time, I thought I had got a persistent infection. Now I believe the brews were just too hot in the FV. They were probably up about 30c - which of course is ridiculously too hot. I gave up in the mid eighties and only started up again about a year ago after one of my sons bought me a brewing kit in a bag. This used no sugar and just used malt and teh difference in flavour from the old days was clear as can be. Now I am a committed AG brewer and enjoying it a lot.

 

[Tony1951]

I see Brewbarrell do kits that are brewed in a mini keg which they say are ready to drink after a week. ��£30 for 5 litres.

A lot of us seem to have come back to brewing after helping our dads brew beer in the 70s. I wish my dad was around to sample my beer. I might finally have made him proud! :lol:

He'd of been proud right enough Clibit, even if he didn't say so. A lot of blokes can't be doing with that emotional stuff and get toe curlingly embarrassed if they have to say something like that to their sons. I am as proud as can be of my three lads (36, 32 and 30) but I'd feel REALLY weird if I was to say so to their faces and so might they. I couldn't be prouder of them - I can tell you that, but not them.

 

[clibit]

He'd of been proud right enough Clibit, even if he didn't say so. A lot of blokes can't be doing with that emotional stuff and get toe curlingly embarrassed if they have to say something like that to their sons. I am as proud as can be of my three lads (36, 32 and 30) but I'd feel REALLY weird if I was to say so to their faces and so might they. I couldn't be prouder of them - I can tell you that, but not them.

My three are 17, 18 and 20 and I tell them I am proud of them regularly. Doesn't come naturally but I've made a point of doing it!

I once did a night class, not long before my dad died, to learn how to paint, and I showed him an oil painting I'd done and he said "bloody hell, I didn't know you had it in yer!" Which. for him, was a huge complement. He was a lovely bloke though.

 

[Notlaw]

My old man tells me he's proud of me and we always give each other a hug when we see each other. Since I moved down here I only see my folks once every couple of months or so, but we've probably become closer since I moved away.... strangely enough.

I'll tread a fine line with my laddie... I've got a while yet, he's not even 2 yet, but I want him to know I'm proud of him, but I don't want any of my kids to be pampered pooches. My daughter is 6 and the sun shines out of her **** for me, but I'll still tell her if I think she can do better or if she's done something wrong. At the minute I'm trying to get her into coding with a Raspberry Pi, she loves it, but I still push her that tiny little bit so she doesn't stop trying.

 

[MickDundee]

I see Brewbarrell do kits that are brewed in a mini keg which they say are ready to drink after a week. �£30 for 5 litres.

From what I understand, the kit it is a 20L scaled up version of these for about £10 less. My sample when I took FG tasted pretty good so I'm hoping for a nice beer!

 

[clibit]

From what I understand, the kit it is a 20L scaled up version of these for about �£10 less. My sample when I took FG tasted pretty good so I'm hoping for a nice beer!

First time I've seen a German made kit on sale. I'm not going to make a kit but will be interesting to hear how it works out.

Paying £30 for a mini keg and 5 litres of beer hardly makes sense. You could put the 20 litres in mini kegs if you wanted to though.

 

[monkier]

My daughter is 6 and the sun shines out of her **** for me, but I'll still tell her if I think she can do better or if she's done something wrong. At the minute I'm trying to get her into coding with a Raspberry Pi, she loves it, but I still push her that tiny little bit so she doesn't stop trying.

Good man! I can't wait for my daughter to grow up a bit more so i can get her into programming. The Raspberry Pi is a great bit of kit.

 

[MyQul]

Every word of my biography on my profile is true.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I laugh when I read your profile and the Imperial Poobah reference. :lol:

 

[MyQul]

I laugh when I read your profile and the Imperial Poobah reference. :lol:

That's your official title isn't it? We need to get Forum Admin changed to Imperial Poobah :thumb::lol:

 

[Hoppyland]

Yep, all down to my Dad as well.
Not sure why though, when you really think about it. This was the 1960s. Totally **** ingedients, very little nous about beer. Perhaps wine was better served with Bravery's Scientific Winemaking (or somesuch) book. Or maybe, not much better.
Two things I remember are Dad scalding himself badly, stupidly trying to lift a plastic bin of hot wort into a cupboard (luckily no lasting harm).
The other is his misplaced enthusiasm for a "kit" (it doesn't deserve elevating to this level) called "Sarah's Bitter". As I recall, this presented itself as an "authentic" recipe from Newcastle - giving a "history" of the eponymous Sarah and her brew. What I now see is that it was a bag (1kg??) of crushed crystal malt (undoubtedly stale), and a wee bag of wizened brown things that smelled odd. According to the instructions, these things were hops. Anyway, you were supposed to put it all together with hot water to make 5 gallons of premier ale. Oh, of course with a whole load of sugar - forgot to mention that :lol:
After that? Blue wine at Uni was a hit in 1969 (basically potato wine with food colouring).
Trying to brew beer & wine in Saudi Arabia in the 1970s was interesting. Then, gradually, better stuff became available. But now is the absolute pinnacle. Fresh & varied malts, vacuum hops, proper yeast. A Wonderland indeed!! :smile:
Wish Dad could see it!

 

[Tony1951]

Yep, all down to my Dad as well.
Not sure why though, when you really think about it. This was the 1960s. Totally **** ingedients, very little nous about beer. Perhaps wine was better served with Bravery's Scientific Winemaking (or somesuch) book. Or maybe, not much better.
Two things I remember are Dad scalding himself badly, stupidly trying to lift a plastic bin of hot wort into a cupboard (luckily no lasting harm).
The other is his misplaced enthusiasm for a "kit" (it doesn't deserve elevating to this level) called "Sarah's Bitter". As I recall, this presented itself as an "authentic" recipe from Newcastle - giving a "history" of the eponymous Sarah and her brew. What I now see is that it was a bag (1kg??) of crushed crystal malt (undoubtedly stale), and a wee bag of wizened brown things that smelled odd. According to the instructions, these things were hops. Anyway, you were supposed to put it all together with hot water to make 5 gallons of premier ale. Oh, of course with a whole load of sugar - forgot to mention that :lol:
After that? Blue wine at Uni was a hit in 1969 (basically potato wine with food colouring).
Trying to brew beer & wine in Saudi Arabia in the 1970s was interesting. Then, gradually, better stuff became available. But now is the absolute pinnacle. Fresh & varied malts, vacuum hops, proper yeast. A Wonderland indeed!! :smile:
Wish Dad could see it!

Bwaarrrghhh- sugar.... Enough said.

The difference in ingredients now is literally unbelievable.

 

[Herb]

I started because I saw a Facebook advert for an AG kit.

I did used to help my dad do some brewing years ago, particularly the infamous Carrot Wine he did that was basically rocket fuel.

Just been having a beer with him for his 65th which is today. He's looking forward to a bottle of my beer, told me not to bother with the 4% stuff from Brew #1, and to let him know when the 6.5% brew #2 is ready

 

[MyQul]

Bwaarrrghhh- sugar.... Enough said.

The difference in ingredients now is literally unbelievable.

Sugar in brewing isn't as bad as you think. English Bitter's have a long history of using sugar (invert syrups), so do Belgian beers in the form of candi sugar

 

[HebridesRob]

I think the late Seventies was probably the nadir of the British brewing industry. I got interested in CAMRA then started brewing around 78/79. Made a few kits, started reading library books, winemaker & brewer monthly magazine. Got hold of Dave Line's "The Big Book of Brewing" and started brewing what is now called all grain pretty soon afterwards. Stopped doing it in mid-nineties, I found I wasn't drinking it because I was doing most of my drinking in pubs.

Started brewing again last year after moving to Scottish Western Isles because the beer here is terrible and expensive.

 

[Notlaw]

My dad also used to make wine when I was a kid, but I don't remember him doing any beers. He made stuff like oak leaf wine, parsnip wine and stuff like that. I remember one that he did where the recipe called for 2 cloves, but he added 2 tablespoons of cloves...! I remember him saying it was like Benylin..!

 

[IainM]

I'd just moved back from Barcelona about a year ago. Spain isn't renowned for its beer, but there are some good ones coming from a blossoming local craft movement, several brew-bars, craft beer bars, and Belgian bars - Catalonia is well ahead of the gastronomic curve (a bar round the corner from me usually had a smoked wheat beer on tap!). My colleagues bought me some simple kit for my 30th (fv, capper, siphon, hydrometer, trial jar and thermometer). However, with the choice available, starting from €1 a beer in a bar for a perfectly decent local brew in Märzenbier or doppelbock style, the kit just sat on the terrace unused for a year. Only when I got back, ordered two drinks and barely got change from a tenner, that kit started niggling at me. First brew was close to a disaster, but good enough to get me hooked. Since September I've done 13 brews, mostly kits of various different styles, and started playing around with dry hopping, yeasts and other flavourings. I'm itching to get into AG, but that might have to wait until we move house. I think that there are many factors which have sunk the brewing hooks into me. Foremost, I love experiencing different flavours and tastes, and recreating them in my kitchen; my perfect Sunday would be cooking in the morning, followed by a long lunch with drinks and friends leading well into the evening. Secondly, I'm quite technically minded, being initially trained as a chemist, but now working in biology. This suits me well, as there are plenty of back-of-the-envelope calculations in brewing, and so many aspects of brewing which bring back fond memories of when I studied chemistry. I'm also fascinated by our little yeasty friends, and there is so much good science out there about them, from how they secrete different molecules to communicate with one another, how they detect information about their environment, how they combine all these signals together to adjust their behaviour, and how this relates to the chemical transformations which turn our worts into one of the quintessential pleasures in life!