homebrewandbeer.com

It's been a few years since I've done any homebrewing, so I'm very rusty on some of the calculations and I'm wondering if I screwed something up. Anyway...

Yesterday a friend turned up with a couple of kilos of fresh honey. Since I didn't really have the ingredients for a Mead, we decided to make a ...

Over a year since I first posted this message and Cospak have improved their website and now generate quotes within a few days.

Basically, the minimum quantity they'll sell me is 2250 stubbies for $750. Roughly 33c per bottle. I don't know if they're prepared to sell smaller quantities, but their ...

As a general rule, I quite like 330ml bottles. A lot of imported beers come in 330ml bottles and I've got used to them. But paying the same price for 45ml less? Well that just plain sucks.

why don't you ask your local pub to put aside some bottles for you?

I don't really have a local pub but there are a number of restaurants at the end of my street, plus a trendy wine bar. None of them are particularly approachable though, so I doubt I could ask for their bottles... not that I ...

I'm not really sure what people mean when they talk about a distinct "home brew" taste and smell. I wonder if it is actually the yeast?

Where there's a will there's a way. I live in a small apartment in the inner city, but still manage to have the necessities of life on hand. :)

It's a nice setup in no mistake, but I don't live in a small apartment... I live in a really small apartment. I could accommodate a kegging setup if I ...

Chris wrote:The only reason most brewers don't keg earlier is because they don't have the money. You do have the money, and for some reason you are resisting?

*sigh*

Or because they don't have the room for a spare fridge

Yeah, sorry about that... guess it comes from being a geek (possibly even old skool geek... anyone remember 2400 baud modems? :shock:) and using vim for all my day-to-day text-editing needs. :P

vim???

LUXURY! Some of us only had vi to work with.

Oh, and you aren't truly old school unless you've ...

Kevnlis wrote:

rwh wrote:Hehe sorry, I'm being an idiot.

nah, I just didn't understand the s/ part. You are right, the readings will be both accurate and consistant, but will they be s?

s/ is geek-talk for "substitute"

And it's particularly old-school geek-talk at that.

Is it really worth it? whats wrong with getting your mates to give you their empties? i know it takes alot longer to get a collection going , but its a damn sight cheaper.

Well, there's a couple of problems with that idea...

Firstly, a handful of mates don't drink beer (I know, I know :roll ...

I've been looking into the possibility of buying bottles directly from manufacturers rather than paying retail prices for them. I found a couple of places online, like these guys: http://www.cospak.com.au Unfortunately, they tend to sell is large quantities. But I reckon if half a dozen brewers ...

I have a couple of 5 litre glass carboys for experimental stuff. Being glass, I can see everything going on which helps with experimental brews.

Hops aren't essencial for beer. For hundreds of years (if not, thousands) brewers have used various herbs and spices.

Yup. It's called "gruit" for anyone wanting to research the matter further. I've been trying to track down some gruit recipes in order to make some experimental beers. To date, my ...

The real question is why you want to do this in the first place? Are you guys trying to genuinely emulate high-alcohol style beers like trappist ales? Or are you just wanting to have some fun? If so, buy some champagne yeast, or turbo yeast and knock yourself out. You can have all sorts of fun with ...

We are interested in making a brew with the highest alcohol content possible but we have been told that adding extra sugar will affect the quality of the beer severely. Is there any other method for raising the alcohol content without making the beer unbearable?

Yours in anticipation, Hanky and ...

IIRC, both fish sauce and soy sauce are made by fermentation... so you'd think that somewhere in China there'd be folks "brewing" their own. I wonder what sort of gear they use?

My current primary fermenter is a 25l food-grade jerry can purchased from Kmart. It's almost identical in size and shape ...

Is a 4.5cm stirrer going to be big enough to properly stir a 2L starter on a stir plate?

I picked 2 of them up at the local cheap shop for $99 cents each! ;)

You picked up 2 what? Stir bars? Seriously? I haven't been able to track any down. I built my own magnetic stirrer well over a year ago ...

you can see so much more with gladwrap, that's why

But you can buy fermenters with a clear plastic lid. Maybe not quite as transparent as gladwrap, but enough to see what is going on. Besides, I don't really need to see what is going on inside the fermenter, I know what it's doing... it's making ...

Chris wrote:It's all about the 'bloop!' That's unless you are a gladwrap man like myself. Then it's all about the monster krausen

I've never understood the appeal of gladwrap. My fermenter has a lid, why wouldn't I use it?

Just wondering about getting a clear beer for my next brew.

Rack.

I bulk prime by racking into large food-grade bucket that already has my priming sugar (dissolved in boiling water) waiting in it. It's probably not quite as effective as racking to a secondary during fermentation, but it does a ...