Jim's Beer Kit

Based on this thread, I switched to using a pedestal fan to push steam away from the grainfather, as I brew in a back room about 1m away from an outside door. Made a massive difference, and if I angle the fan down so it also blows on the wort it prevents boil over.

Love this. I started modding my KK as I was frustrated with the 8 and 16gm CO2 tubes, and having a tons of sediment after priming meaning the last few pints were murky. I went with a pressure gauge, schrader (car tyre) valve and corny gas post. All AliExpress stuff too. It’s worked well on some rega...

Out of curiosity, are you overnighting lagers or ales? I’m wondering if it would affect the colour on lagers, although I guess malliard reactions are only in the boil phase anyway.


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I steep dark malts in a jug separately. Works well. Also, you might also prefer cold holding overnight as this would save any variation in the recipe timings. Would you include crystal in that, or just the really dark stuff like roasted barley and black malt? I’m pondering now about other overnight...

I am loving beerlabelizer, what a neat site and thanks for pointing out!
Think I might start then with printing on photopaper and with over a bit of wire or the like beneath the tap shank, and go jazzy from there.

Hi all, Do people have any nifty and aesthetically pleasing solutions to labelling their taps on kegerators. I've been looking at a tower with 4x Nukataps. I've seen Kegland do a tap handle that allows you to put a picture on so I could print my own labels. I suppose the other option is the traditio...

Hi all, Looking at moving from King Kegs, where I can fit 25L into a single keg, into Cornies at 19L, whilst doing brews on a G30 (i.e., 30L capacity). Being lazy/efficient as a brewer, I'm pondering the best way to get the most beer per brew without too many compromises. What do other brewers with ...

Reporting back on a first overnight mash - not from a "was it good beer" perspective, more of "did I get away with it with two kids on Easter break" Process: - Prepped the water during the day - I use a Berkey water filter, as although it doesn't remove any calcium or hardness, it does seem to give ...

Thanks all, there's lots to think about here. With fortuitous coincidence, London Amateur Brewers are having an online meet on zoom this evening, so that's a start to the club scene. Hopefully when the pandemic ends and events can be in-person it might also answer the question of "how do I improve t...

I think you may have hit the nail on the head there with recipes, although I do wonder if a lot of the US recipes I see are a bit fussy with the ingredient lists using 6 types of malt. I was pondering for a few hours what I thought was wrong with my current brew, or not quite as I'd like it to be, a...

Cheers Guy. I’ll take that all onboard. I did trial a shorter ferment with a cold crash to zero degrees, but I didn’t really discern any effect and I was worried about yeast health given the temperature change and the way I repitch. I’ll give a shorter fermentation a go. I’m meanwhile eyeing one of ...

Ah, so I can't claim it's all in his mind. For commercial brewers I guess they're filtering to such an extent that there's little yeast left. Chatting to him he's nodding on the allopurinol. I like to think it's a sign of a life well lived though. I do notice he suffers more from bottled beer than k...

Thanks Richard - being in London dealing with hard water is a bit of a nightmare. As to process, and please feel free to critique here: Grain: - I tend to use pre-crushed grain rather than whole, and go through a 25KG bag over about 6 months. I know the American's per Palmer et al tend to believe th...

True. It’d be lovely to be able to do it by design. I think many of my kegged bears are clear more because of having lots of conditioning time rather than my brilliant brewing process. My father thinks the yeast in home brew gives him gout (doesn’t affect me, yet!) so having something that at least ...

Just to clarify, is the cold holding temperature just because you don't want the 63 degree mash to run over 7 hours, i.e., you just want a 2 hour mash to avoid the wort becoming too fermentable, or is it for some other purpose? I thought too that protein rests were only for specific beer types, do y...