My 1st AG - Birch Tree Ale (some more pictures)

[delboy]

Nice one chris

BTW what yeast are you fermenting this with?

Another tip for when you move onto liquid yeast that need starters, that extar bit in the boiler can be tipped out into a colander/seive and reboiled (to sterilise) and then put into or boiled in the first place in a conical flask for your liquid starter, waste not want not

[highwayman]

Never thought about using the extar bit in the boiler as a starter for the liquid yeast...Great Tip Delboy

See what we mean Chris!! There is always someone on here sharing their experiences to help newbies like ourselves

[ChrisG]

Nice one chris

BTW what yeast are you fermenting this with?

S04 and there is a great big yeast head formed.

[Horden Hillbilly]

Well done Chris, looks like it was a smooth 1st brewday, nice one! As others have mentioned, wait until you try your finished beer, I'm sure that you will be delighted with it. Enjoy!

[fivetide]

You must be very pleased - time to clear up and plan the next brew!

[booldawg]

Top work Chris, you'll never forget that 1st pint of AG

[ChrisG]

Well done Chris, looks like it was a smooth 1st brewday, nice one! As others have mentioned, wait until you try your finished beer, I'm sure that you will be delighted with it. Enjoy!

Thanks m8.

Just have to say another big thank you to Horden Hillbilly, your website helped loads!!!

[johnnyk]

Well done Chris, looks a bit complicated for me yet!

I'm looking forward to sampling some

[youreds91]

Well done Chris, looks a bit complicated for me yet!

I'm looking forward to sampling some

Believe me it isn't. I've brewed kits for years, but had no idea of the steps in doing AG until I came on here. My head was spinning at talk of sparging, mash tuns, HLTs.....

In its very basic form, you soak some grain in hot water for 90 mins, rinse them with more hot water & drain, boil the resulting liquid with some hops for 90 mins, cool, add yeast, ferment & stick in a barrel/bottles.

If you are thinking of stepping up from kits, doing an extract brew is a good stepping stone.

CD

[johnnyk]

Well done Chris, looks a bit complicated for me yet!

I'm looking forward to sampling some

Believe me it isn't. I've brewed kits for years, but had no idea of the steps in doing AG until I came on here. My head was spinning at talk of sparging, mash tuns, HLTs.....

In its very basic form, you soak some grain in hot water for 90 mins, rinse them with more hot water & drain, boil the resulting liquid with some hops for 90 mins, cool, add yeast, ferment & stick in a barrel/bottles.

If you are thinking of stepping up from kits, doing an extract brew is a good stepping stone.

CD

That's what I have been reading on here, it sounds more complicated than it is. I will leave it until early next year I think but will give a go hopefully. The only problem is I prefer lager to ales but sure I could come up with something I like

[Madbrewer]

Well done Chris Nice one!! Did you get a chance to 'sup' a beer whilst doing it or were you too busy with those photo's?

Johnny - Regarding lagers. These can be mashed in the same way too but you will need to bottle or use a corny to get the carbination right. If you use the Malts that Hornden uses on his website for his basic lager you will get away with a single infusion mash - so that means the same process as Chris has just demo'd. However doing a temperature stepped mash isn't that much more hassle.

The fermentation temp is lower with a lager yeast though.

We should have our own TV channel, we could so a series on all our different brews one brewer at a time and call it 'A beer is born' .....

[ChrisG]

Well done Chris, looks a bit complicated for me yet!

I'm looking forward to sampling some

Thanks m8, you'll need to come over and take a look at the stuff I built.

It was a lot of work and yeah like you I would want to try a lager.

Took me in total 5 1/2 hours to complete, was fun though and that includes going back to bed at 6:30am!

[coatesg]

Brill! Looks like you had a good one - and 5 1/2 hours for a first brew is pretty good going!

[ChrisG]

Brill! Looks like you had a good one - and 5 1/2 hours for a first brew is pretty good going!

Yeah I though so too.

I reccon I can reduce it further if I set the timer for earlier to get the mash water up to 77 degrees quicker and turn both elements on the boiler when batch sparging.

............now what for the next brew?

[Barley Water]

Looks like you have done well, good for you. Now you need to make another batch, right away. What you are going to find is that your consuption is going to increase (for quality control purposes of course) and also, your friends are going to come out of the woodwork.

Also, make sure you take good notes and organize them somewhere. You want to make sure you repeat the steps that worked out well for you and void those that weren't so successful. What you want to do now is build up a database of formulations so you can make great tasting beer whenever you want. After that, the real fun starts, coming up with you own formulations and new and unique brews.