My Jump Into Homebrewing

Before I really got into craft beer, I had an interest to start brewing my own. I had always generally enjoyed non-macro brewed beers before last year. in fall 2009 I went to a restaurant supply store and picked up a Mr. Beer kit and it has since been unused, until last week. I picked up a pack of the Irish Stout kit when I bought the Mr. Beer kit, so I still had that. Last week I went to The Grape And Granary (outstanding homebrew supply store that you should visit if you are in the area.) The folks at the store are very knowledgeable and can help you out with any questions you may have. They also sell supplies online for a good rate.

A little over a week ago I picked up some corn sugar, another can of Irish Stout HME, and a hydrometer(which has since shattered when it rolled on the floor haha) I did a real simple recipe. I used 2 cans of the HME Irish Stout, with a booster pack and 3.5 ounces of pure cocoa powder. Boiled it for about 25 minutes. Didnt really see the need to do it much longer because of the lack of hops.



I did a smaller boil of course, because I don't have an immersion chiller and it would be quicker to chill it down in the fermenter by pouring it in ice cold water. I also purchased a 10 dollar digital thermometer and funnel from walmart the day of the brew. I rehydrated the yeast in warm water with a little bit of corn sugar for 30 minutes before pitching in 72 degree water. Everything went well. My OG came out to about 1.063 which is pretty solid, my brew should come out a little over 6 percent next week.



I am going to start saving all of my bottles from now on, I will be delabeling them in baking soda and cleaning of course. My first batch(the Irish stout) will be bottled in the PET bottles that came with Mr. Beer. I will probably preboil my priming sugar and add it to the beer before bottling for more even carbing. I will bottle condition them for 2-3 weeks. I have done a ton of reading (The Joy of Homebrewing and How to Brew). Plus homebrewtalk forums for even more help, so I am pretty much ready for anything. Also have watched quite a few Youtube videos on all grain and making a mash tun for when the time comes.



After this batch, I have already made a simple extract recipe in Beersmith for an Imperial IPA which will be brewed once my fermenter is free. For now I really like the idea of smaller batches so I will use Mr. Beer for quite a few more batches, then it will be time for a bucket fermenter, and probably a 3 gallon Better bottle for secondary.

Here is my next recipe:

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 2.13 gal
Boil Size: 1.15 gal
Estimated OG: 1.088 SG
Estimated FG: 1.019
Estimated ABV: 9.0%
Estimated Color: 14.0 SRM
Estimated IBU: 112.9 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: - %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
1.50 lb Extra Light Dry Extract (3.0 SRM) Dry Extract 28.3 %
3.30 lb Amber Liquid Extract (12.5 SRM) Extract 62.3 %
0.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 9.4 %
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00%] (60 min) Hops 74.4 IBU
0.50 oz Amarillo Gold [8.50%] (30 min) Hops 24.3 IBU
0.50 oz Cascade [5.50%] (15 min) Hops 10.1 IBU
0.50 oz Cascade [5.50%] (5 min) Hops 4.1 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade [5.50%] (Dry Hop 7 days) Hops -
0.50 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs California Ale (White Labs #WLP001) Yeast-Ale

I highly recommend the Beersmith program, as it is very easy to use and make your own recipes, and it also shows you amount of corn sugar you need by weight for carbing, which makes things so much easier and accurate. Cheers!