Look what I found!

'Bout to start my first batch of homebrew. Just need to go pick up ingredients. Any other homebrewers here?

i don't my brother in law has made some good brews.


SD

so my friends got more into this it's really a lot of fun. were also taking all the apples from two trees in my back ward and making hard cider.

SD

Nice! I've got a hefeweizen in the basement that'll be ready for bottling in a few days, and I'm trying out some lazy hard cider brewing (buying cider from a store and fermenting it in the jug).

I've heard that pressing apples to cider yourself is a pain, though.

Are you adding anything like yeast to the cider or does it naturally ferment?

I've been home brewing for a few months now and it has already taken over the spare bedroom in our apartment. My girlfriend isnt a fan haha. The kits are fun, but I'd like to move on to making my own recipes. Does anyone make their own mash?

Makman - thats a good kit to start with, but if you're like me you can drink alot faster than you can brew, and investing in a few more glass carboys, as well as a wort chiller really pays off in the long run. I like to have one primary and at least two secondaries going at a time, especially as some brews can tie up a carboy for several months. I'm brewing a red lager right now that has to ferment at 40 degrees for up to 12 weeks.

Posted by AdolfHipster Are you adding anything like yeast to the cider or does it naturally ferment? I've been home brewing for a few months now and it has already taken over the spare bedroom in our apartment. My girlfriend isnt a fan haha. The kits are fun, but I'd like to move on to making my own recipes. Does anyone make their own mash? Makman - thats a good kit to start with, but if you're like me you can drink alot faster than you can brew, and investing in a few more glass carboys, as well as a wort chiller really pays off in the long run. I like to have one primary and at least two secondaries going at a time, especially as some brews can tie up a carboy for several months. I'm brewing a red lager right now that has to ferment at 40 degrees for up to 12 weeks.

Re Cider: Just threw in some wine yeast. It turned out potable, but not very good tasting- pretty much what I expected; I think I'm going to try to do it properly (5-gallon batch, in glass, with good ingredients and proper yeast) soon.

Re recipes: You can make your own by buying different kinds of extract and steeping grains, or you can go the next step and get into "all-grain" brewing, where you do your own mashing. I'm planning to get into that as soon as I graduate.

Re the kit: I'll probably be expanding soon- I want to start doing some more complex stuff. On the other hand, classes and work take up a lot of time, so my once-a-month brew schedule doesn't usually present a problem with only one fermenter.

I recently got a temperature controller, so I'm going to commandeer a dorm fridge and start lagering soon. Before that, I'd given serious thought to doing a lagering phase in a local sewer.

Currently have a 1.074 OG stout in primary, and my GF helped brew it!

If you want to get away from kits, just look up extract recipes. It is the next logical step to just make your own recipe. Steeping grains is simple, too, and can add a lot more complexity to your brew.

www.homebrewtalk.com is a great forum for homebrewing. You can read and search without being a member, so it can help you forumlate recipes by seeing what other people have done.

Now the hard part is figuring out what you would like to brew!

Thats a great idea to ferment in a sewer! Haha Urbex home brewing, I love it.

Yeah I think time and especially money have kept me from moving to more intensive brewing process. Have you tried to brew wine at all? Ive always been curious but I'm not patient enough to wait a year or more from start to finish lol.

Where do you order your kits? A local shop here sells a few "brewers best" kits that seem to be pretty good, but I get most of my stuff from midwestsupplies.com as they let you pick which type of yeast you want with the kit, and have a huge selection.

Posted by GodOfThunder www.homebrewtalk.com is a great forum for homebrewing. You can read and search without being a member, so it can help you forumlate recipes by seeing what other people have done.

Awesome resource! Thanks!

Posted by AdolfHipster Thats a great idea to ferment in a sewer! Haha Urbex home brewing, I love it. Yeah I think time and especially money have kept me from moving to more intensive brewing process. Have you tried to brew wine at all? Ive always been curious but I'm not patient enough to wait a year or more from start to finish lol. Where do you order your kits? A local shop here sells a few "brewers best" kits that seem to be pretty good, but I get most of my stuff from midwestsupplies.com as they let you pick which type of yeast you want with the kit, and have a huge selection.

I've generally done kits from http://www.austinhomebrew.com/ - great variety.

Can't say I've ever done wine- from what I understand, it's a lot harder to do 'good' wine on a homebrew scale than beer, and you're a lot more dependent on the grapes available to you.

Posted by GodOfThunder If you want to get away from kits, just look up extract recipes. It is the next logical step to just make your own recipe. Steeping grains is simple, too, and can add a lot more complexity to your brew. www.homebrewtalk.com is a great forum for homebrewing. You can read and search without being a member, so it can help you forumlate recipes by seeing what other people have done. Now the hard part is figuring out what you would like to brew!

You should check out http://homebrew.stackexchange.com/ It's still pretty new, and it's still in beta phase, but it recently merged with brewadvice.com, and we're building up a good repository of the information that used to be spread out over lots of forums, blog posts, newsletters, and books.

Also, http://howtobrew.com/intro.html is awesome. It's free online, but I ended up buying the book anyway.

Anyone doing their own recipes recently? =)