Tips & Tricks For Making
Great Beer
Me Buddy’s Brew Shop Inc.
Bay Roberts 786-5488
1. Clean all your equipment well using a chlorinated
cleaner. Keep your work area clean. Wiping down a counter or table from where
you are working with your cleaner. Never use a cleaner that is scented ie: Lemon Fresh bleach as this will transfer to your
plastic equipment.
2. To clean labels off bottles try using 1/4 cup of
household ammonia (non-scented) in 2 gallons of hot water. Labatt beer bottles
seem to be easier to clean.
3. For mold in your bottles mix 1 Tbsp of pink
Chlorinated cleaner (Diversol) in 1 gallon of warm
water. For heavy mold, mix 2 Tbsp of pink chlorinated cleaner with 1 liter of
water and add some to each bottle and allow to soak overnight, then rinse.
4. Prevent oxidation at all steps in the brewing
process, no pouring or splashing (always use a siphon hose to transfer from one
container to another (except prior to adding yeast. Yeast needs oxygen to get
started)
5. For beers that are clear but produce a haze once
chilled (Chill Haze) The addition of Polyclar will
fix this. Chill Haze does not affect the taste of your beer. 2 to 3 Tbsp mixed
in one cup of water , then stirred into the beer at
racking time prevents Chill Haze.
6. If you have found your “favorite” tasting malt does
not hold a head when you pour it out, you may want to try adding a heading
compound to your beer such as heading powder or heading liquid
these ingredients help by giving your beer a detergent effect so the head lasts
longer. If using a good quality malt head on a
beer should not be a problem, it may be a lower quality type malt or the glass
may have some residue grease from washing that causes bad head retention.
Increasing the malt content of your batch will help with head problems, use a
malt syrup such as 50/50 ( a combination malt
extract and dextrose), 500 g of dry malt extract or a 1 kg Muntons Beer Enhancer Kit.
7. To cut down on the amount of sediment in your
bottles adding a fining to your beer at racking time will settle your beer out
much cleaner. Use Isinglass, gelatin or something similar.
8. Use corn sugar in your beer brewing. Corn sugar
doesn’t affect the taste of your malt. Adding regular sugar (Cane Sugar) will
add a fruity or cidery taste to your beer. The
addition of brown sugar is fine if you are looking for a unique flavor on your
beer.
9. Do not use bread yeast in beer making as it adds
“off” flavors to your beer. All malts come with good yeast strains for making
great beer.
10. If you like a light beer, then you can use a light bodied malt (like Coopers Blonde, Muntons Blonde, Muntons American
Light or Morgans Blonde) and cut the amount of Corn
sugar from 1 kg to ½ kg, this will give you a light bodied beer with about 4% alc/vol. ½ kg corn sugar is about 3 cups.
11. Carbonation in beer can be adjusted by adding more
or less sugar at bottling day (a good starting point is 1 1/4 cups of Corn
Sugar) for 66 bottles. Instead of adding the ½ tsp to each individual bottle
you can add it a simpler way. On bottling day Rack your beer to a clean Primary
Fermenter (bucket) then mix your Priming sugar (1 1/4
cups) with 1 cup of boiling water stir to dissolve, then add to your beer and
stir gently for about 1 minute. This will give you equal carbonation in all
your bottles. If you get more than 5 ½ dozen beer, you
will need to increase the amount of priming sugar (by about 1/4 cup per extra
dozen beer). If you like a little more carbonation, add about 1 1/3 cups of
sugar for 66 bottles.
12. Once you have bottled your beer, give it time to
mature. Beer bottled and aged a couple of months
tastes, looks and holds its head much better.
13. To attach the siphon hose to the Racking Tube or
the Bottle Filler run it under some hot water to soften it first.
14. Don’t re-use old bottle caps, they are not
reliable. If you spoil just 5 or 6 beer by not sealing proper you have not
saved anything at all. It only costs about 3 cents per bottle to ensure you
have carbonated beer.
15. Keep records of your brewing activity. If you make
that Great batch and want to copy it it will be easy
if you have taken the time to write down what you did. If you write down what
you do it will also help you avoid making the same mistake twice too.
16. To save time and a mess use a Sulfiter
to get the cleaning solution into your bottles when cleaning them. Just a
couple of pumps into each bottle then set aside, when all bottles have been
flushed with sanitizer use a Bottle Jet Washer that attaches to your
sink faucet to rinse away the cleaner (saves a lot of time and hot water).
17. When making beer it is important to have the
proper temperature without too much fluctuation. If you are brewing in a cool
basement or spare room and the temperature is a bit cool or fluctuates, try
using a Brew-Belt. It wraps around your batch of beer or wine and plugs
in to keep the proper temperature for your yeast to ferment at.
18. If you added too much priming sugar at the
bottling stage and it’s difficult to open the beer without it foaming out, try
putting it in the freezer for a few minutes before opening, the colder it is,
without freezing, the more gas it will hold in the beer.
19. When adding cleaning solution to carboy don’t have
it too hot, the shock make crack the glass.
20. Don’t try to get more beer than 5 gallons of beer
from 1 can of malt, you will just dilute the flavour
of the malt, cause the beer to not hold a head and remove most of the intended
character of the type of beer you were trying to make.
21. The addition of extra hops will enhance your beer,
depending on the type and way that you add them. Boiling hops for more than ½
hour (like tea) will cause them to add bitterness, boiling them for a few
minutes (finishing hops) will give your beer aroma and flavour.
There are many different types of hops.
22. If you choose to boil your malt, add Irish Moss, this will aid in clearing your beer.
Irish Moss is a natural ingredient made from dried
seaweed.
23. Stick-on Thermometers are a great way to
see at a glance what the temperature of your Primary Fermenter
or Carboy is at.
24. If when you mixed up your batch of beer the
temperature is too high and you don’t want to wait a few hours to pitch your
yeast, you can have a 2 litre bottle of water that
has been frozen on standby. Just drop it
into your sanitizer for a few seconds, then rinse off and drop into your
Primary Fermenter. Once temperature of brew is within
range, pitch your yeast.
25. To get a nice head on your beer, pour down the
side of your glass, when you get down to the last 1/3 of your bottle,
straighten up the glass and let the beer splash, leaving behind about a
teaspoon or so of sediment.
26. To clean the inside of a carboy use a Carboy
Brush, give it a little bend so you can clean the hard to reach shoulders,
then rinse with a Bottle Jet Washer.
27. To start your siphon without using your mouth,
simply fill it with water, then clamp the hose off with the white clamp, stick
one end in you beer or wine, the other end to a container, let the clamp go,
then draw off the first cup or so of water.
28. If you notice that you beer has some yeast
sediment clinging to the inside of your bottles, hold them by the neck and give
them a quick spin to dislodge the sediment, then allow
the beer to resettle. Do this about a week or 10 days after bottling, then
leave your beer to mature, preferably somewhere cooler, this sediment should
then slide down the sides leaving your beer very clear.
29. Pick up a good Home Brewing book like The
Complete Joy of Home Brewing by Charlie Papazian.
This book is excellent for the new brewer to someone that likes to experiment.
30. Keep the alcohol percentage within reason. Beer
between 4% and 6% can be enjoyed by anyone, if you go
over this the beer will lose its character, better to enjoy a few cold ones
than to need a nap after one or two.
31. Use your hydrometer and thermometer, if you should
have problems with a fermentation these are the two
instruments that could pinpoint the problem.
32. Don’t be in a hurry to get that beer bottled. Beer
in the Primary for a week to ten days, then racked to
carboy with fining added for another week. This allows plenty of time for beer
to finish fermenting and settle out to give you a nice clean tasting beer.
33. If you would like to try a variety of malts
without having to make it all yourself, get a Brew Buddy or two, then each make
a different kind of beer and split up your batches. Some you may like, others you may not.
34. Keep your hands dry when lifting the carboy, they
can be slippery when wet, or better yet, add a Carboy Handle to it.
35. After drinking your home-brewed beer, rinse out
your bottles so they won’t be hard to clean and sanitize the next time you use
them.
36. When adding a fining to your beer or wine, remove
the brew belt if one is used.
Tips and Tricks by Mike Porter “Me Buddy’s Brew Shop
Inc.”
Bay Roberts 786-5488 or 1-888-290-3311
Monday - Saturday 10:00 am to 5:30 pm
Thursday and Friday Nights until 9:00 pm