CELLAR HOMEBREW: Brewing Tips

Brewing Tips

Recipes
Cleaning
Boiling
Fermenting
Syphoning
Bottling

Malt Extract Recipes: When building your own recipe from malt extracts, try to avoid the "pre-packaged" kits with hopped malt extract and yeast included. Though you may achieve excellent results with these kits, you will never have control of your own recipes. In fact, you'll never even know the ingredients. Most of these kits use specialty grains and hops in quantities and varieties that are not printed on the can.
Every style of beer is composed mostly (80 - 100%) of a light-colored base malt. Even the darkest of malt extracts is made using mostly pale malt. The difference between malt colors and flavors is mostly due to specialty grains, and these differences are definitely passed on to the finished beer. The great ((fact)) for homebrewers is: those specialty grains do not need to be mashed in order to extract their flavor. Extract brewers can use specialty grains in the same proportions as all-grain brewers. You can greatly improve your beer by using a pale/light extract and adding fresh hops and specialty grains. What little extra work this requires goes along was as far as freshness and quality. Plus, you know exactly what your ingredients are.

Carboy Rinsing: Here's a nifty trick. If you rinse your carboy without the aid of a jet-spray washer, you can speed up the emptying of the rinse water by using a racking tube. Insert the racking tube so that the end on the inside stays in the air space, and the other end reaches out to the open air. Since no vacuum is created by the water pooring out, the water will drain away in a fraction of the time.
Bottle/Carboy Rinsing: One gadget that is worth its weight in gold is a jet-spray bottle washer. This device will save you eons of time by letting you rinse and drain a bottle in just a few seconds.

Malt Extract Boiling: When your brewing water comes to a boil, remove the kettle from the heat before adding the malt extract. This will help to avoid scorching the malt which might settle directly above the heat source as you pour the extract into the kettle.
Boiling Volume: Although it may increase the possiblility of a boil-over, you should boil as close to your full batch volume of beer as possible. This boosts your hop extraction and helps to prevent scorching the malt.

Aeration: When your yeast is first pitched, it goes through a phase of reproduction before active fermentation begins. One thing the yeast needs during this reproductory phase is oxygen. After cooling but before pitching, the more oxygen you put into your wort the better. You can accomplish this by shaking, vigorously stirring, or fanning out the wort during syphoning. This is the only time during the entire beermaking process that oxygen is desired, but it is necessary for a healthy fermentation.

Starting a Syphon: Drawing the first beer out of a fermentor to start a syphon is not only tricky, it is also risky, since your mouth can harbor bacteria that you really don't want in your wort. One easy way of getting around both these problems is simply to fill your syphon hose with water. Carry the filled up hose to your fermenter. Close off one end with your clamp or fingers. Place the open end into the wort. Lower the closed end into a bucket, making sure that end is lower that the top level of your wort. When you open up the closed end, the syphon will start. Draw off the water, and close your syphon when the beer starts flowing. Discard the water and place the low end into your receiving container.

Bottle Drying: You might be tempted to set your just-rinsed bottles upside down in their box to drain. But this can weaken the cardboard and lead to musty mold growing in your cases. It's much better to use a bottle tree dryer or dishwasher rack for draining.