Brew Day

Yesterday was my first Brew Day. I made a Scotch Ale, using an ingredient kit from my LHBS (Local HomeBrew Shop). I mostly ignored the recipe, since it didn't mention sanitation at all. Interestingly enough, though, the startup equipment kit included BTF (the link suggests that BTF is a chlorine-based sanitizer, but the bottle actually says that it is Iodophor-based; Iodophor is a very popular iodine-based sanitizer whose only real competition is Star-san).

Everything went pretty smoothly, except perhaps for the wort chilling. Need more practice with that, or perhaps a counterflow wort chiller... Xmas is coming up, I think I'll add the pieces for Bobby_M's counterflow chiller to my list.

The new pot I bought (from Walmart) specially for this and will never be used for anything else (at least until I get a really nice one):

Some of the ingredients (see the end of the post for the recipe). I didn't show the hops or the yeast, since pellet hops all look the same and I forgot to take a picture of the yeast:

The steeping grains:

Some more equipment (the red spray bottle is to keep curious cats from being too curious):

The second best way to enjoy homebrewing (best would be with another homebrew, this was a Saranac Vanilla Stout):

This is why I need a special spoon to go with the special pot:

Baby's first boilover, aww. Lesson learned: always turn the heat off for a few seconds before adding hops; the other two hop additions were uneventful.

Teh kitteh likes teh hops!

This one... not so much. Not sure where the bag came from, either:

And this one is trying to steal my recipe book!

Here is why you should always keep the cable for your digital thermometer dry. Even after 15 minutes in the fridge, it was still reading 194*F when the water felt like 75*F. Thanks to Bobby_M again, here's a trick I may use next time. Anyway, the pic:

Here's a video of how I aerated my wort (that's a whisk attached to the power drill). Thanks to Padstack31 for the idea. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a specific gravity reading until afterwards. Oh well, brew and learn:

And finally, about nine hours into fermentation:

Recipe:

Ingredients (Note: links are only to see details about products; I purchased everything from the LHBS in an ingredient kit):

• 2 lbs Caramel Malt, 120*L (go down to the Briess Caramel Malts section)
• 6.6 lbs Northwestern Amber Liquid Malt Extract
• 1 oz Chinook Pellet Hops, 12% Alpha Acid @ 1 hour
• .5 oz Aurora Pellet Hops (unable to find an online source), 7% Alpha Acid @ 10 minutes
• 1 oz Fuggle Pellet Hops, 4.1% Alpha Acid @ 5 minutes
• 1 tsp Irish Moss @ 15 minutes
• 11 grams Dry Windsor Yeast by Danstar

Procedure:

• Steep the Caramel Malt in a grainbag in 2 gallons of 155*F to 160*F water for 30-45 minutes with the lid on and the heat off (unless the temperature drops too much, then turn it on low for a bit).
• Pour 2 quarts of 170*F water over the grains into the pot. Allow the grains to drip for a bit, then place in a collander over a bowl to collect anything else that might drain out; pour that into the pot also.
• Turn heat to high and add 9 quarts of water. Assuming 1 quart was lost to the grains, this makes 20 quarts or 5 gallons. Wait for it to boil (putting the lid on will help).
• Once boiling, TURN OFF THE HEAT and add the Chinook hops, then turn the heat back on. Set a timer for 1 hour. Leave the lid off.
• Half an hour in, turn off the heat and the timer and add the malt extract. Make sure it is completely disolved (no thick feeling on the bottom of the pot), then turn the heat back to high and wait for it to boil again. Once it is boiling again, allow the timer to continue.
• At 15 minutes remaining, add the Irish moss.
• At 10 minutes remaining, turn off the heat and add the Aurora hops, then turn the heat back on.
• At 5 minutes remaining, turn off the heat and add the Fuggle hops, then turn the heat back on.
• When the hour is up, move the pot to a series of cold water baths. It helps to have a double-sided sink, so you can be filling up one side while the pot is giving up its heat to the other side. Ice is very helpful. (I actually froze a couple of two-liter soda bottles, sanitized the outsides of them, and used them to stir the cooling wort.)
• When the wort has chilled to 70*F to 80*F, take a specific gravity reading. (I forgot to do this until after aeration, unfortunately.) The recipe provided by the LHBS did not mention the target gravity; mine was 1.054 after aeration and at an indeterminate temperature. I am assuming that, corrected, it would be 1.055 at the hydrometer's calibrated temperature, and 1.058-1.059 without the aeration. I will be using 1.058 when I calculate alcohol content.
• Rehydrate the yeast (I did this too early, it was sitting in the water for at least 30 minutes instead of the target 15 minutes).
• Get the wort into the fermentation vessel, add the yeast, and relax.

Here's the rest of the album, in case you want to see more pictures of beer and kitties.