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There is so much to know about brewing that we think it is important, especially for beginning and intermediate brewers, to keep it simple but still meaningful. That is the primary objective of this support area. We cannot possibly provide a thorough treatment of all issues here. Rather, we will touch on brewing basics, starting with sanitation, brewing with extracts, using specialty malts, and a primer on all-grain brewing. Another section discusses bottling and kegging.
We encourage readers to email questions which do not appear here, which we will either try to answer, or refer you to other resources for answers.
Navigate directly to the "hypertext" section you want to read by clicking on its name. At the end of each section of text you may either simply continue reading, or jump back up to this Table of Contents.
- Brewing Basics (5 sections - click here to expand)
- Bottling & Kegging (3 sections - click here to expand)
- An all-grain primer
A. Brewing Basics
Most people get started with a basic equipment kit pre-assembled by a homebrew supply shop. You should have at least the following items, and if your kit didn't come with them, go and get them. I consider these things mandatory, although the pieces I have marked with an asterisk (*) could, I suppose, be put off for another day.
- Fermenter, typically a food-grade plastic bucket of 6.5 - 7.5 gallon capacity with a tight-fitting lid;
- Stainless steel kettle, at least 20-qt. (5 gallon) size;
- Hydrometer with test jar;
- Thermometer, either a floating one made of glass, or a "quick-read" cooking thermometer with a dial face;
- Long-handled stainless steel or heat-resistant plastic spoon;
- Racking cane;
- Clear vinyl siphon hose, at least 4 feet length;
- Bottle capper;
- Bottling bucket with lid and spigot;
- Bottle filler;
- "Jet" type carboy and bottle rinser (attaches to kitchen faucet);
- 5 gallon glass carboy w/cap;
- Brushes: bottle cleaning brush; carboy cleaning brush;
- Turkey baster or "wine thief" to take samples for gravity testing, etc.
- Air locks;
- Nylon grain bags;
- Muslin hop bags (some people I know rinse them and reuse them, but I think that's gross);
- Plastic bucket/pail for cleaning/sanitizing (2-4 gallon size)
- Beer cleaning product (P.B.W., Bio-Clean, B-Brite, One-Step, etc.)
- Sanitizing product (Iodophor, Star San, chlorine bleach)
- * Wort chiller *
- * Carboy handles *
- * Strainer, large enough to rest across the fermenting bucket *
- At least one reputable book on the subject of homebrewing, not just the little 20-page pamphlet that came with your kit.
Sanitation, very simply, is the process by which we reduce the population of noxious microorganisms (molds, bacteria, wild yeasts, etc.) coming into contact with our beer, down to safe numbers in order to prevent them from contaminating and ruining the taste, aroma and appearance of the beer. It is not the same as sterilization, which is the total elimination of all organisms from a particular environment.
Sanitation procedures are something with which you must have at least a passing familiarity before trying to brew your first batch of beer. If you are unfamiliar with what it means to brewers, I'll just say that failure to follow a basic (and very easy) program of sanitization will doom you to brewing beers or beer-like beverages which taste like household cleaning products which no one, least of all you, will want to drink or serve.
There are three basic rules of thumb when it comes to sanitation:
- Sanitize everything that comes into contact with your beer after it has been boiled, up to and including bottling time.
- In order to sanitize something, it must first be clean...really clean.
- Using more of your sanitizing agent than is required to do the job is probably worse than using less, particularly the "no-rinse" types.
Unfermented wort is very susceptible to infection by the tiny gremlins that are all around us. Happily, killing most of them is easy and inexpensive. For most of us, it involves mixing up a solution of a sanitizing agent and soaking our equipment in it long enough to kill the bugs. The most common sanitizing agents used by homebrewers are chlorine bleach and iodophor (an iodine solution). There are others, as well, including a newer product called Star San which I like.
- Chlorine bleach is used at a strength of 1 tablespoon per gallon of water. Contact time of 15 minutes should do it, and the bleach solution should be rinsed off before using your equipment. It is dirt cheap and effective, but it should not be used on stainless steel equipment, as it can cause pitting and corrosion over time.
- Iodophor is used at a strength of 1 tablespoon per five gallons of water. Contact time is 15 minutes, and it is commonly believed that an iodine solution of this strength does not need to be rinsed off, just left to drip dry. The solution can cause a slight harmless discoloration to plastic equipment, but it is safe to use on stainless steel goods, such as kegs.
- Star San is an acid-based sanitizer used at a strength of 2 tablespoons per five gallons. Contact time is only 2-5 minutes, and it is specifically made, and advertised, to be a no-rinse sanitizer.
Remember that in order for something to be sanitized, it first must be clean. It is recommended that cleaning be done with one of the commonly available cleaning powders such as P.B.W. (Powdered Brewery Wash), One Step, or something similar. If you take this step after using your equipment, it will already be essentially clean for your next brew day, and all you'll have to do is a quick rinse prior to sanitizing. To clean thoroughly, soak the equipment in a cleaning solution for about 30 minutes, and use either a soft sponge, cloth or paper towel to get all the dirt off. Just soaking isn't enough, but you should not use abrasive products on the soft plastic fermenters and other equipment or it will put small scratches in the surface where bugs can hide out. Thoroughly rinse all traces of cleaning solution from your equipment before sanitizing it.
What to sanitize? Everything that will come into contact with the beer, with the exception of your brew kettle, which still should be clean before use. The temperatures reached in boiling will sterilize your wort, which is why you don't need to sanitize your kettle. But once boiling is over, your wort is at constant risk of infection. Keep your unsanitized hands out of it, and unless you've left your brewing spoon in the boiling wort, it must be sanitized before it touches your wort again. The same goes for your thermometers, the baster you use to take samples for testing &/or tasting, the strainer you strain your wort through, etc. If you use a wort chiller, it should be immersed in the boiling wort during the final 15 minutes in order to sanitize it as well. Sanitize your fermenting bucket by filling it to the top with cool water and adding the proper amount of sanitizer, whether it be chlorine, iodophor, Star San, or whatever. Sanitize the lid, too, and the air lock.
To rinse or not to rinse?
Whether or not to rinse your sanitized equipment prior to using it depends on the type of sanitizer you use. (Chlorine bleach sanitizers should always be rinsed; Iodophor and Star San don't need rinsing if used at the proper dilutions.) The primary objection to rinsing is that you risk re-introducing contaminants to the equipment you have just sanitized, especially if you rinse with plain tap water. But some folks just can't bring themselves to use equipment without first rinsing the sanitizing chemicals from it, no matter what they've used. For you folks, there are two safe solutions: either boil the water you rinse with, or use the cheapest canned beer you can find as your rinsing agent.
This is not to say that you absolutely cannot use tap water to rinse with. But if you do, you are putting your brew (and the $15-30 you've invested in any given batch) at significant risk of serious off-flavors. Ask any homebrewer how many batches they've made which just didn't taste right but that they couldn't put their finger on what went wrong. By being just a little bit anal about your rinsing solution, or correctly using a no-rinse sanitizing agent, you eliminate one more possibility of introducing something bad to your beer.
Whether you have plain malt extract syrup, or a canned hopped "kit", picked up a "kit" of ingredients from a supply shop that came with its own hops, yeast and instructions, our first piece of advice to you is to throw away any other instructions you have and follow these procedures. We don't mean to insult any suppliers here who might include a perfectly legitimate set of instructions with their "kits", but since this set of instructions is intended for the new brewer and since we cannot know what information the new brewer has been given, we think it is best to err on the side of caution and give everyone the same reliable set of basic brewing procedures.
- Put two gallons of water in your 20-qt. brewpot and bring it to a boil. If you must brew with a 16-qt. kettle, use only 1 gallon of water.
- If you are using malt extract syrup (cans or bags) rather than dry malt extract (DME), put the cans or bags of syrup in a separate container of hot water while the kettle water is heating. This will soften the syrup and make it easier to pour.
- When the kettle water begins boiling, remove it from the heat. Dissolve the malt extracts (syrup or DME) into the kettle water and stir it thoroughly before returning it to the heat. This will prevent any of the heavy extract from settling on the bottom of the kettle and being scorched by the heat source.
- You now have the beginnings of a concentrated wort. Bring your concentrated wort back to a boil, and pay attention to it. Do not cover the kettle. Before it starts to boil, the surface of the wort will turn into a heavy, rocky-looking foam. It will start moving and heaving, and will soon begin to rise up and then break into a rolling boil. You must be watching to prevent the foam from boiling over the rim of your kettle, because it will scorch into one hell of a mess. If it gets too close to the top of your kettle for comfort, use pot holders and lift the kettle momentarily off of the heat until the foam subsides, then put it back down. You might have to do this two or three times, but once the foam "breaks" you will be able to put it down with no further boil-overs.
- Once you are safely boiling, refer to your recipe and add whatever bittering hops are called for. Your total boiling time should be at least one hour. Many recipes call for as much as 90 minutes.
- Notice the changes your wort goes through. You will see gross looking things floating around in it, and also some stringy looking things that make it look like egg-drop soup. These are mostly protein molecules which are coagulating during the boiling process. Later, the wort will look more clear.
- Add any other flavoring and aromatic hops as called for in the recipe at the appropriate times (i.e. if a recipe calls for a certain amount of hops for 20 minutes, then add them with 20 minutes remaining in the total boiling time).
- Add one teaspoon of Irish moss to almost all recipes for the final 15 minutes. Irish moss is a dry, granular "fining" agent made from dry sea weed which helps to pull more proteins out of solution which, in turn, helps to reduce haziness in the beer later on.
- If you have invested in a wort chiller (you can buy one for about $30-40 or make one yourself out of copper coil tubing with a hose fitting on one end to connect to your sink and a plain hose attached to the other end), put it right in your boiling wort for the final 15 minutes of the boil as well. This will sanitize it.
- When your boiling time is up, remove the kettle from the heat and bring it to your sink area. Your job is now to cool the wort down to 80° or below as quickly as you can. A wort chiller is best for this, but an ice bath in your sink will work, just more slowly.
- immersion wort chiller: with the wort chiller already in your kettle, connect the chiller to your cold water and allow the water to flow at a slow-medium rate. Be careful - the initial waste water coming out of it will be extremely hot. You should stir the wort very gently with your sanitized brewing spoon to keep circulating the hot wort around the coils of the chiller, but don't stir too vigorously or you will aerate the wort while it is hot and risk oxidizing it. Depending on the volume of your wort and the temperature of your cold water, it should take between 10-20 minutes to cool your wort down to 80°F (sanitize your thermometer!) by using an immersion wort chiller.
- ice bath: plug your sink or wash basin, dump a half a bag of ice or a couple of trays of ice cubes into the sink and fill it with ice cold water. The more ice you use to make your bath water as cold as possible, the more quickly it will chill the wort. Immerse your brew kettle into the cold water, and using your sanitized brewing spoon, gently stir the wort to help dissipate the heat into the surrounding ice bath. When the bath water starts turning luke-warm, drain the sink and repeat the process with more ice and cold water, until your wort is down to 80°F.
- Before transferring your wort into the sanitized fermenter, it is time to prepare your yeast. If using a liquid yeast strain, you will probably just pour it directly from the pouch which you have previously prepared in the days leading up to brewing day. If you are using a dry yeast, most of them come with instructions to rehydrate the yeast. This is the process of "activating" the dry yeast by dissolving it in a half-cup of warm water (90-105°F) for about 15 minutes. The yeast cells must first absorb water through the cell wall in order to activate. This process takes place more easily in a plain-water environment than in the thick, sugary environment of a wort. Some brewers successfully use dry yeast by merely sprinkling it on top of the wort in the fermenter. This will work, but rehydrating it first will maximize the number of living, viable yeast cells and get your fermentation off to the best and fastest possible start.
- With your wort now chilled and your yeast prepared, put your sanitized strainer over the top of your fermenting bucket, and pour your wort through the strainer and into the fermenter. You will have approximately three gallons, and assuming the recipe you used is for a five-gallon batch, you must fill the fermenter up to five gallons with additional water.
Ah-hah! Back to the question of using tap water...do we risk introducing bad elements (bacteria, chlorine, etc.) to our beer by using tap water to fill the fermenter?
The short answer is, "Yes."
The long answer is, "Yes, there is no question that the safest route here is to pre-boil, and then cool, the two-three gallons of water you will need to fill your fermenter. It doesn't take much time, you can do it the same day or the day before you brew, and you can just keep the water in a cleaned cooler or water jugs, or another pot, before you need it. That being said, if you don't want to do it, the chances are you'll be OK by using plain tap water, or bottled water, so long as it tastes good and has no obvious odors. However, be aware that if your beer turns out with some "off" taste or smell in it, using unsanitized water is a prime suspect."- After filling your fermenter to give you five gallons of 75° wort, remove a small sample of wort with your sanitized baster and fill the hydrometer test jar with it, enough to make the hydrometer float freely. Record the hydrometer's reading at the surface, and make any necessary adjustments up or down for the temperature (Hydrometers are calibrated to read 0 in water at 60°. If the wort is 70°, you need to add .001 to the reading. There are tables in some brewing books which tell you how many points to add or subtract to your reading, depending on what the temperature of your wort is).
- Pitch the yeast and aerate it the wort, to infuse the wort with as much oxygen as possible. The splashing your wort received going into the fermenter was not enough. Take your long-handled, sanitized brewing spoon and beat the wort into oblivion for at least five minutes, or until your arm falls off. Then put the lid on, add your sanitized air lock with water in it, and keep the bucket at room-temperature (68-75°) for a day or so, until you see signs of active fermentation, or regular bubbling in the air lock. At this point, the beer is best treated to a somewhat cooler temperature, closer to 60° for the rest of the primary fermentation period (7-10 days). At this cooler temperature, the yeast will behave better and produce cleaner flavors. Primary fermentation should go for no longer than two weeks, at which time you can do one of two things:
- bottle the beer (not recommended -- it's too soon!), or
- rack the beer into a "secondary fermenter"
Keep on reading about Secondary Fermentation, or go
Back to Table of ContentsSecondary fermentation is most commonly referred to by most brewers as the period of time after primary fermentation, during which a fermented beer is allowed to mature and clarify in a second (or "secondary") fermenter. Typically, the beer is "racked" (or siphoned) from the primary fermenter into the secondary, being careful not to splash it, and also being careful to leave behind most of the sediment resting on the bottom of the primary. Secondary fermenters are usually glass carboys, which allow a good view of the beer as it clarifies. The process is as simple as sanitizing your secondary fermenter, racking the beer into it with as little of the sediment as possible, and sealing it up with an air lock.
There are homebrewing equipment kits commonly available at homebrew supply shops that make no mention of this step in the brewing process. That is for several reasons, all of which have to do with catering to the "lowest common denominator" of the homebrewing world, i.e. those who want to brew beer the fastest, cheapest and laziest way possible. There is no question that beer can be brewed and bottled without secondary fermentation. There is also no question that including a secondary fermentation stage will add significantly to the quality and drinkability of your beers. Adding secondary fermentation to the process adds only as little as one week of additional time, and adds less than $25 to the overall equipment cost.
Secondary fermentation can be as short as one week or as long as several months. When the beer is racked off of the dead yeast cells and other crud (hop residue, proteins, etc.), you are removing a possible source of off-flavors which the beer could pick up if it stayed in contact with these substances for too long. You now have the luxury of time, to bottle your beer when you are ready without the risk of your beer getting funky first. Also, the movement the beer undergoes when you rack it helps even more of the suspended particulate matter to drop out, further clarifying the beer before you bottle it.
And lastly, secondary fermentation is the time when "dry hops" are added to a beer where the recipe calls for it. "Dry hopping" is simply the process of adding a measured amount of hops to a beer after primary fermentation. It adds a particularly strong hop aroma and flavor, for those who like that in a beer.
Specialty grains are any number of versions of barley malt (or wheat malt) which have been malted and kilned in certain ways to gain certain properties from them, whether it be color, flavor, aroma, or body. This is an easy section to write, because it involves the simple insertion of two steps in the prior section about basic brewing procedures using malt extracts. Here they are. They come after paragraph a. in the brewing procedures section (click here to refer back to that section), and I will label them paragraphs a.1 and a.2:
a.1. Referring to your recipe, crush the measured amount of specialty grains you need if you did not get them crushed at the homebrew supply shop. You need to crush them, not pulverize them into dust. Assuming you do not have a grain mill, the best way to crush them is to put them, about a quarter-cup at a time, into a heavy zip-lock freezer bag, squeeze out all the air before you seal it, and crush them through the bag with a rolling pin.
a.2. While the water in your brew kettle is still cold, place the crushed grains into a nylon grain bag (a muslin hop bag will do, but it'll let more of the husks through and into the beer), close the end and drop the bag of grains into the kettle. Let the grains steep while the water heats up, and once the water reaches about 170° you should remove them, and rinse a little hot water through them to get all of their goodness into your kettle.
B. Bottling and Kegging
- Basic bottling procedure
The beer is done fermenting, and you are ready to put it some place, namely bottles. Your kit came with a nifty twin-handled bottle capper which will do a very nice job. You either bought, or have collected, two cases of non-twist-off beer bottles. If you don't already have them, you'll need enough new crown caps for your batch, which if it's a typical five-gallon batch will require between 48-52 twelve-ounce bottles. Here goes, step by step...
- Clean and sanitize the number of bottles you will need for your batch. If they were used, look into them to make sure there is nothing growing inside the bottom that you didn't get out by cleaning...use a bottle brush if necessary. If you sanitize with bleach, you'll need to rinse the bottles before you use them (this is where the "Jet" bottle rinser comes in right handy). At this point, rinsing with unsanitized tap water is considerably less of a risk than earlier in the process, because the beer now has alcohol in it which will kill many of the gremlins we were previously concerned about.
- Sanitize your bottling bucket, bottling spigot, racking cane, bottle filler, and siphon hose.
- Dissolve your "priming sugar" (corn sugar or Dextrose) -- between a half a cup and three-quarters of a cup of sugar -- in a cup of water and boil it for 15 minutes to sanitize it.
- At the same time, sanitize your new crown caps by boiling them in some water, and letting them cool.
- Cool the sugar solution a bit, and add it to your sanitized bottling bucket.
- Siphon the beer into the bucket, being careful not to splash it, and making sure the spigot is "Closed.". Starting a siphon is easy if you are using a carboy with the orange "2-hole" cap. You just shove your racking cane through the center hole, re-attach the cap to the carboy, adjust the racking cane to reach near the bottom of the carboy, and with the siphon hose attached to the top of the racking cane and the bottom end of the hose in your bottling bucket, you give a good blow into the second hole of the carboy cap. The pressure will force beer up into the racking cane and your siphon will start. Otherwise, you have to just suck carefully on the open end of the siphon hose (some people take a hit of vodka or their favorite whiskey first to disinfect their lips!). A third way to start a siphon is to fill the siphon tube assembly with water, then put your finger over the end of the hose, stick the racking cane end into the fermented beer, bring the end of the hose down into your bottling bucket and let go of it...beer will flow. This adds the disadvantage of putting a small amount of water in your beer. Once it's all in the bucket, give it a couple of gentle stirs with a sanitized spoon or the racking cane assembly, to make sure the sugar solution is evenly distributed throughout.
- Make sure that your bottling bucket is at a height above whatever working surface you will use for bottling. An ideal location for this operation is your kitchen counter space directly above your dishwasher. An opened dishwasher door is a perfect place to fill your beer bottles. You can line up several dozen empty bottles at one time, and not worry about spills which will be contained in the dishwasher.
- Disconnect the siphon hose from the racking cane, and connect one end of the hose to the spigot on your bottling bucket, and the other end of the hose to your sanitized bottle filler. The bottle filler is a rigid plastic tube with a nifty valve at one end which is normally closed, but which opens when it is pushed against the inside bottom of a bottle.
- Open the spigot of the bottling bucket, insert the bottle filler into a bottle and push the valve end of the bottle filler against the inside bottom of the bottle. Magically, the bottle will fill from the bottom. When the beer reaches the top, simply release the bottle filler valve by pulling it out of the bottle, and you will be left with a 1-inch head space.
- Repeat this with the rest of the bottles. If you had any foam at the top of any of your bottles when you filled them, you might need to go back and "top off" those bottles with beer, so you don't have too much head space in those bottles when you cap them.
- Line up the bottles on the counter surface and place a sanitized crown cap on each one. Then, doing as many at a time as your counter has space for, slide a couple of bottles in front of you, place the bottle capper squarely on top of one bottle with the cap in place, and push down on the lever handles to "crimp" the cap onto the bottle. You will first feel resistance, then the final "push" will crimp the cap. You'll get a feel for it after just a couple of bottles.
- Every once in awhile, especially with bottles which have been used a number of times, you might actually sheer-off the top of a bottle when capping a bottle. I have done this more times than I'd prefer to say. You might try being a little less vigorous in your technique, but mostly you'll just have to get over it, and move on.
- Optional containers to make life easier
Bottling can take a couple of hours, from cleaning and sanitizing to filling and capping. There are ways to make it go faster and easier, by simply using a fewer number of larger containers. There are larger bottles such as 16 or 22--ounce bottles. Some brewers also successfully use large one or two-liter plastic soda bottles. One nifty touch along the lines of bottles, is to use the large "growlers" which some beers (i.e. DeGroen's) come in. Although they usually involve paying a $12 deposit for the bottle, they hold .53 gallons and they are great for serving at parties.
Between bottles and kegs are several versions of "mini-kegs" and Party Pigs, or Beer Balls. Mini-kegs are 5-liter steel cans with a removable rubber bung in the top. You need four of them for a five-gallon batch. There are several available tapping systems for mini-kegs, which use either hand-pumped air, CO2 cartridges, or a combination of the two methods. The most flexible of these systems is available from Williams Brewing, a homebrew supplier in California whose link is available on our links page.
I have used mini-kegs and I do not like them, for several reasons. First, it is very easy to over-carbonate them, and when you do that you risk a damaged and deformed keg at a minimum, and an exploding keg at the worst. Second, the bungs are a real pain to insert and remove. Third, the system I bought (which was a German-made plastic and metal tap assembly which used CO2 cartridges) leaked CO2 miserably after a few uses.
What I do like, however, are Party Pigs. They are egg-shaped plastic bottles which hold 2.25 gallons of beer. They have an integral push-button tap system, which uses an internal "pressure pouch" to maintain dispensing pressure on the beer. Beer in Party Pigs is primed with corn sugar first, then "bottled" into the pigs, the pressure pouch is inserted, and the tap/valve assembly is attached. The pigs are pressurized with a little hand pump which also "activates" the pressure pouch inside the pig. The Pig is then laid on its side in a dispensing tray, and left to carbonate like a bottle. After a couple of weeks of conditioning, you have 2.25 gallons of clear, carbonated beer ready for dispensing directly from almost any refrigerator shelf. Party Pigs are available from some homebrew supply shops, but I'm uncertain of any nearby shops which currently stock them. Give them a ring, or check out the Party Pig home page (http://www.partypig.com).
- Kegging - a primer on using 5-gallon soda kegs
One of life's simple pleasures for me, is to go downstairs to my beer 'fridge, hold out an empty glass, and pull on one of the two tap handles sticking out the front of the door to dispense a perfect pint of beer...or better yet, watching one of my friends do it. It just doesn't get any better than this.
And when it comes to bottling day, it really doesn't get any better. Kegging beer in 5-gallon soda kegs is just so...so... so...perfect. The kegs are perfect for holding a batch of homebrew, and they're perfectly simple to clean and sanitize. The beer carbonates perfectly. The tap dispenses it perfectly. An 18-cubic foot 'fridge holds up to four kegs perfectly.
While kegging beer is, for those who try it, the best way to go, it does require a certain amount of dedicated refrigerator space. And it does require a bit of cash to get started. Here is the short list of what is required, and approximate costs:
Kegging apparatus:
- 5-gallon stainless steel soda keg, reconditioned ($30-$50);
- 5-lb. tank of carbon dioxide (CO2) gas ($80+ to buy; $9-12 to exchange an empty for a full one). Read below about CO2 before you buy a new one...;
- twin-gauge regulator with shut-off valve ($50+);
- quick-disconnect keg connectors for gas (in) and liquid (out) lines ($6 each)
- keg connectors come in two different styles which differ in how your hoses attach to them: barbed or flared (threaded) fittings. I much prefer the flared fittings because you can easily unscrew the hose from the connector, whereas with the barbed connectors you typically have to cut the hose if you need to remove it for any reason (which is not uncommon, especially if you have multiple kegs, or need to connect it to a different tap).
- gas line with swivel nuts to connect ($10);
- liquid line with swivel nuts to connect ($10);
- picnic tap ($5);
So, if you don't already have any of this stuff, you can see you're going to spend a couple hundred bucks for the works. I have seen "complete" kegging systems advertised by a mail order retailers for less. It only included a single-gauge regulator, but seemed otherwise complete. The CO2 tank still has to be filled (about $9). A twin-gauge regulator is much better (and in this seller's deal cost another $15 or $20 I think), because it allows you to know not only the line pressure going into your keg, but also the tank pressure remaining in the CO2 tank.
Speaking of CO2, you can't just get it at your supermarket...or even most homebrew supply shops, for that matter. You have to find a gas distributor. In Westminster, I go to C&O Distributors across from Random House off Rt. 27. The first time I went there to get my shiny new tank filled (actually, the Spousal Unit took it), they took it away, reached behind the counter and presented her with something that looked like it had come out of the trenches in World War II. Be prepared to trade your shiny new tank for a used one that's already full. If the prospect of giving up a shiny new tank upsets your sensibilities, you have two options. First, call around to see if your distributor will fill your own tank rather than just swapping it out. If they say no, then either find somewhere else, or just buy your tank from them in the first place and swap it out each time you need a refill.
The Beer 'Fridge
One small item not included above is a refrigerator. Kegging requires that you have a refrigerator (or freezer with a temperature regulator attached) in which you can stand a keg upright. That means you either must remove all of the shelves, or you must have a 'fridge with removable "split shelves". This is probably the single-biggest drawback for most people, since not everyone has a spare refrigerator sitting around, or the space to put one.
In addition, it is advantageous to have a 'fridge in which your spousal unit will allow you to drill a hole in the side. This hole is for the CO2 line to run through, to allow you to store the CO2 tank outside of the 'fridge. While not a necessity, it is best not to store the CO2 tank and regulator inside the refrigerator because the cold temperatures could cause moisture to condense on the inner workings of the regulator gauges which, over time, could cause you to repair or replace it prematurely.
Let's talk briefly about the kegs. The kegs we use are cylindrical, stainless steel jobs which used to be used by the soda industry to dispense syrup. Because of changes in how soda syrup is dispensed, the kegs are mostly being abandoned for other methods, which has made them available for our use. Because homebrew shops don't always have a ready supplier of used kegs, they have to get them wherever they can find them and, sometimes supply is short. I have also noticed the prices are markedly higher ($50 at Maryland Homebrew as of March 2005!) than they used to be just a few years ago. Some places also sell new kegs, but be prepared to pay around $100.
There are two commonly-available styles of kegs: "pin-lock" (which was used by Coka-Cola) and "ball-lock" (which was used by Pepsi). The difference refers to the type of fittings which are used for the liquid and gas connections. One is just as good as the other for our purposes, and in fact you can have both types of kegs in your setup as long as you have a set of connectors for each, particularly if you use the "flare fitting" connectors rather than the barbed connectors.
Pay attention to what you are buying, especially if it's from a remote seller. Most retail sources sell kegs which have been "reconditioned." This means they have been cleaned inside to get rid of all traces of soda syrup; any serious dings or dents have been removed, all seals (O-rings) have been replaced and the keg has been pressure tested. It is important to make sure the internal O-rings are new, because they are made of rubber and they will hold the taste and odor of whatever syrup the keg used to hold. If you buy a keg that is not reconditioned, be prepared to put out another $5-6 to replace the rubber O-ring seals. If the poppet valves need replacing, that'll be more...but you have to find the right ones since they're not all the same. And if the keg's connectors themselves are faulty (i.e. dented, etc.) replacing them will cost about $10-15 each.
So, you got your keg and you want to use it. First, pull up on the pressure relief valve of the keg's top hatch to release any remaining pressure in the keg. Some kegs have a safety valve that you cannot release at will. If that is the case with your keg, don't fret. Just take a small pointy object like a pen, and push down on the "poppet valve" which is in the center of the gas connector. This will release any pressure inside the keg.
Open the keg hatch and take a look inside. The liquid connector has a long "dip tube" which goes all the way to the bottom of the keg, which draws liquid from the bottom as it dispenses. Inside the top of the liquid connector, as in the gas connector, is a spring-loaded "poppet valve" which seals the valve shut when there is no "quick disconnect" line connector attached. The "quick disconnects," whether pin or ball-lock style, have a center post which, when the "quick disconnect" is attached, depresses the "poppet valve" and allows the liquid or gas to flow. Pretty neat.
Clean and sanitize your keg before you use it, even if it looks clean and shiny inside. Use a standard beer cleaning product like PBW, B-Brite, etc. Rinse it thoroughly, then sanitize it. This is important: you have to get the cleaning and sanitizing solutions inside the beer dip tube, too. To do this, first fill the keg with your solution and make sure whatever you use is dissolved. Then take a pointy object like a pen or a fork, and push down on the center of the poppet valve on the liquid (out) connector on the keg. The dip tube will quickly fill from the bottom, and give a little squirt as it reaches the top. This will let your cleaning solution dissolve whatever gunk might be hiding in the tube. When you rinse the keg, you likewise have to drain the dip tube, so do the reverse: empty the keg first, then just push down on the poppet valve and any liquid remaining in the dip tube will drain into the bottom of the keg.
Every couple of fills, it is a good idea to take the keg apart by unscrewing the gas and liquid connectors. This is not always easy, but it ought to be done because you just can't see what's lurking in those little poppet valves and inside the dip tube.
When your keg is ready, you need to purge any air in it by filling it with CO2 gas before putting beer in it. This will keep the beer away from the oxygen in the air as you fill the keg. With the CO2 tank always sitting upright (and preferably strapped into place), connect the regulator to the tank, and connect the gas line (with the quick disconnect attached on the other end) to the regulator. If the regulator has its own "shut-off" valve, which it should, turn it to "OFF". Put the gas quick disconnect onto your keg. Open the valve at the top of the CO2 tank (unscrew the knob). The high pressure gauge should show the total pounds of pressure in the tank, typically 800 lbs. for a full tank. Then allow the gas to flow by opening the regulator's shut-off valve. You should hear gas flowing into the keg. Allow it to fill for a minute. We're first going to purge the keg of air. With the pressure still on, open the pressure relief valve of the keg lid for a few seconds to allow the air in the keg to bleed off. Let the keg refill with CO2 for a few seconds, then shut off the gas with the regulator's shut-off valve. Bleed off the pressure with the pressure relief valve of the keg, and open the keg lid. The keg will be filled with CO2 gas in place of air.
Siphon your beer into the keg, but do not first prime the beer with corn sugar...we'll force carbonate this beer. Put the lid back on the keg when it's full. (IMPORTANT: When you fill the keg, make sure you don't fill it so full that the beer covers the inside opening of the short gas-line "dip tube". The gas has to be able to come out of that opening in order to pressurize the keg.) Replace the lid. You need to purge the keg of air one more time, so connect the gas quick-disconnect, open the shut-off valve on the regulator and let the gas flow. This time, it won't flow for long because the keg is full with liquid. Pull up on the pressure relief valve of the keg lid a few times to allow the air to escape...as you do so, the keg refills with CO2 gas.
Let the keg sit still for a minute, and then listen if you can hear any gas leaks around the keg opening, or around the quick disconnect or any of the connections in your gas line. It is not uncommon to hear a little leak around the keg lid. With your hand gripping the lid firmly and the CO2 pressure still on, try gently twisting the lid left or right very slightly to help the large O-ring seat more securely. Any leaking there should stop. You should also use one of the "keg lube" products available to lubricate the O-rings each time you use them.
Last of all, adjust the pressure going to the keg. On the front of your regulator is a screw with a nut attached. Loosen the nut, then look at the low-pressure gauge on the regulator. Your goal here is to set the low pressure gauge to read somewhere around 10-15 lbs. to carbonate your beer. If the needle is reading higher than that, then turn the screw counter-clockwise (to the left) to reduce the pressure. Then open the pressure relief valve on the keg lid to bleed off some pressure, and then see where the pressure ends with the adjustment you made. If it is still too high, unscrew the adjustment screw some more, bleed off more pressure, and see where you are. Repeat this simple procedure until the pressure in the keg is between 10-15 lbs. And if the pressure gauge reads lower than 10-15 lbs., simply turn the adjustment screw to the right (clockwise) to increase it. The higher the pressure, the more quickly the beer will carbonate.
At 10-15 lbs of pressure, your refrigerated beer will carbonate nicely in about a week, but it will improve with a little more time. See how it's coming by testing it along the way. You will probably find that 15 lbs. of pressure is too high for dispensing purposes...the beer shoots out of the picnic tap to fast at that pressure. I tend to keep my dispensing pressure between 8-10 lbs.
If you need your beer carbonated in a hurry, there is a way to do that which works, but which usually results in a pretty foamy beer when I have tried it. You need to get your beer very cold first, then pressurize the keg and, with the CO2 pressure turned up to about 30 lbs., lay the keg down on its side with the gas connector facing up, and vigorously roll it back and forth. (IMPORTANT: The CO2 tank must be firmly held upright at all times. If the CO2 tank ever falls over while its valve is open, liquid CO2 will flow through and then expand into gas faster than the safety valves can slow it down, and you can risk a dangerous explosion of your keg.) Laying the keg on its side increases the surface area where the CO2 can be forced into solution. When you roll the beer back and forth, you should hear the sound of gas going through the regulator. Stop rolling the beer. When the gas stops flowing, start rolling the keg again, then stop. Repeat the process until you no longer hear gas flowing into your keg when you roll it. You've pretty much reached the point of saturation. Now turn the keg upright and attach your liquid line. Turn the dispensing pressure back down to 8-10 lbs and try the beer. It should be carbonated, but it will probably be foamy. Let it sit for a while, and try turning the dispensing pressure down lower, say to 4-5 lbs.
I start an article such as this with a little trepidation, because the title might suggest that I think I know more about the subject than I really do. I'm no expert in all-grain brewing...far from it, in fact. The point of this article is to give extract brewers a functional introduction to the process and mechanics of mashing, without getting bogged down in the intimidating technicalities that keep many extract brewers away. In short:
The move from extract to all-grain brewing is just as easy for an extract brewer as was the day you brewed your very first batch of extract beer.I've read over and over about the importance of pH and water chemistry, and used to worry about them...even tested for them. But no more. I've forgotten more of that stuff than I'll ever retain.
Why? Because my beer comes out just fine without all the agony. The books and magazines all go into momentous detail about these things. I don't want to say they aren't important...I assure you that virtually all commercial brewers on all scales take them seriously, and surely many homebrewers do also. It is also possible that extreme water conditions could contribute to problem brews. But I'm not selling the stuff, it's unlikely I'll ever make a living at it, and so long as my beer is good, I'll not burden myself with more information than I need. Some all-grain homebrewers might think that is a cavalier attitude, but it's my hobby and I like to keep it (and my brain) as uncluttered as possible.
Lots of extract brewers ask why, if their extract beers are good, should they go all-grain? That's a good question, to which the short answer is, "You shouldn't if you don't want to." But, if you are interested in learning about trying all-grain brewing, read on.
The process, reduced to its simplest, is as follows:
- Mash.
- Sparge.
- Boil.
What you need:
- A Mash Tun, just a word for the vessel in which you mash. Easiest is a 5 or 10-gallon beverage cooler with a False Bottom installed.
- A Lauter Tun, just another word, is the vessel in which you will Sparge (or rinse) the mashed grains. A mash tun with a false bottom installed also serves as your lauter tun (i.e. same vessel).
- A False Bottom is a dome-shaped bottom fitted to your mash/lauter tun with hundreds of holes drilled in it through which the grain is strained and the wort passes through on its way to your brewing kettle.
- A Sparge Arm or some other method of sprinkling the hot sparge water (called Hot Liquor) over the top of the mashed grains. It's a cool little device that rotates while water flows through the little holes drilled in it.
- A Kettle of at least 8 gallon capacity, since you will start out boiling at least 6 gallons of wort to wind up with 5 gallons in your fermenter
What you do:
Mashing is the process in which the crushed grain, typically 8-10 lbs. for a five gallon batch, is mixed with hot water and allowed to sit for about 60-90 minutes in the mash tun. During the mash, enzymes in the malt convert the grain's starches into fermentable sugars (and other things).The enzyme thing is an area where beginners can really suffer from an overload of technical information. TIP: It is enough to know for now that starch conversion happens all by itself. All you need to do is get the mash temperature pretty close (148-158°), which is easy to do. The neat thing about it is that for given volumes of grain and water, the final mash temperature is very predictable. Thus, most recipes from reliable sources (books, magazine, brewing friends, homebrew shops, or created yourself with brewing software) will tell you how much water to use at what temperature to reach the correct final mash temperature and thickness.
Thickness...huh? Yup, one of the variables in the mashing process, and again over which way too many brain cells are burned. TIP: Just know that one quart of water per pound of grain is typical, and that there is room to either go thicker or thinner, leaving yourself enough leeway to add hot or cold water if you need to adjust temperatures.
Sparging is the process where the grains are rinsed with the hot liquor, and the resulting sweet wort is collected for boiling. While adding hot liquor to the top of the mash, you are simultaneously running wort out from the bottom of the mash, at the same rate in order to keep the same volume of liquid in the mash vessel.
Here are the mechanics:
- Heat your mash water to the temperature as per recipe;
- Assemble your mash/lauter tun with the false bottom, some tubing, a rubber stopper and a clamp;
- Gradually mix the hot water and grain directly in the mash/lauter tun, avoiding over-stirring which will cause heat loss. After about 20 minutes, adjust temperature if needed by adding hot/cold water. There may be different temperature readings at different locations throughout the mash bed...some gentle stirring can help, but as long as you're in the ballpark of your target temperature, you're better off leaving it alone.
- Let it mash for 90 minutes, while you heat the hot liquor and play your banjo;
- Sparge the grains, using hose clamps or valves to equalize the flow rate of both the hot liquor at the top and the wort out the bottom. The sparge rate should start out very slowly, just more than a trickle. If you go too fast, you will leave too much behind and lose efficiency. Sparging 8 lbs. of grain takes about 30 minutes.
- Boil, cool, pitch, etc.
How you set up your vessels to get the proper height for the gravily flow is up to your imagination. Depending on the height of your vessels, it can be as simple as putting the hot liquor tank on the counter/table, putting the lauter tun on a chair, and the kettle on the floor. You just need to make sure you have enough height between the vessels for gravity to get the liquids through the hoses and valves to its final destination.
Some brewers successfully add the hot liquor manually by ladling it carefully over the grains through a colander. This avoids the need for elevating the hot liquor tank, but risks disturbing the grain bed and requires more work.
Whatever.
