gurgle
02-09-2004, 01:58 AM
hi everyone,
I'm very new to homebrewing. My second batch is fermenting right now, and I was very pleased with my first batch. Not the best thing I've ever tasted, but I didn't screw anything up and it tasted pretty good. My only major stumbing point was the bottling process and the carbonation.
I have the Charlie Papazian book (which doesn't seem to be terribly popular around here, from the threads I've browsed through), and he recommended 3/4 a cup of corn sugar for priming. I went with 1/2, because I think that most beer is generally overcarbonated, and if I am going to screw this part up I'd rather be under than over. But even with just 1/2 a cup my first batch still felt overcarbonated. Not much of a head to it, but I'm not quite sure what makes for good head retention so I have no idea what to attribute that to. My main question is this: should I prime my next batch with even less than a 1/2 cup of corn sugar, or am I destined to be dissapointed so long as I'm using corn sugar to prime? Right now I'm making my beer with pre-packaged kits (liquid malt extract, grains, hops, yeast, and priming sugar, all measured out). I've read that a lot of people would sooner use dried malt extract to prime. Would this make my beer taste less bubbly? Does this create the smaller bubbles and less intense carbonations that you find in "real ale"?
I also read about kraeusening... this sounds appealing but does half a cup of extra sugar really make that much difference? If going about it this way would produce significantly better results I'd be up for it, but my gut tells me that it wouldn't be any different than using DME.
My other question is about the bottling process itself. My first bottling experience was a mess - I only ended up with 37 12oz bottles of beer out of what was originally 5 gallons. I lost my siphon 4 times in the process. I had a friend holding the bottles underneath the siphon, while I held a pair of pliers in my hand and cut off the flow when the beer got to the top of the bottle. In addition to uneven bottling, I spilled loads of beer. A co-worker of mine (who is also new to homebrewing) suggested just sticking a tube on the end of the tap on my plastic fermenter and just bottling with the tap. Are there any downsides to this, because it sounds like it would be much much easier and much more precise? (I had a pot underneath my bottles when I was bottling to catch all my split beer... I ended up with enough to get drunk off of. It was flat, yes, but I couldn't bring myself to put it down the drain)
Thanks in advance for any advice/suggestions. It looks like there are lots of helpful people here and I'd much rather ask questions to real people (with real experience) than try to find answers in a book.
I'm very new to homebrewing. My second batch is fermenting right now, and I was very pleased with my first batch. Not the best thing I've ever tasted, but I didn't screw anything up and it tasted pretty good. My only major stumbing point was the bottling process and the carbonation.
I have the Charlie Papazian book (which doesn't seem to be terribly popular around here, from the threads I've browsed through), and he recommended 3/4 a cup of corn sugar for priming. I went with 1/2, because I think that most beer is generally overcarbonated, and if I am going to screw this part up I'd rather be under than over. But even with just 1/2 a cup my first batch still felt overcarbonated. Not much of a head to it, but I'm not quite sure what makes for good head retention so I have no idea what to attribute that to. My main question is this: should I prime my next batch with even less than a 1/2 cup of corn sugar, or am I destined to be dissapointed so long as I'm using corn sugar to prime? Right now I'm making my beer with pre-packaged kits (liquid malt extract, grains, hops, yeast, and priming sugar, all measured out). I've read that a lot of people would sooner use dried malt extract to prime. Would this make my beer taste less bubbly? Does this create the smaller bubbles and less intense carbonations that you find in "real ale"?
I also read about kraeusening... this sounds appealing but does half a cup of extra sugar really make that much difference? If going about it this way would produce significantly better results I'd be up for it, but my gut tells me that it wouldn't be any different than using DME.
My other question is about the bottling process itself. My first bottling experience was a mess - I only ended up with 37 12oz bottles of beer out of what was originally 5 gallons. I lost my siphon 4 times in the process. I had a friend holding the bottles underneath the siphon, while I held a pair of pliers in my hand and cut off the flow when the beer got to the top of the bottle. In addition to uneven bottling, I spilled loads of beer. A co-worker of mine (who is also new to homebrewing) suggested just sticking a tube on the end of the tap on my plastic fermenter and just bottling with the tap. Are there any downsides to this, because it sounds like it would be much much easier and much more precise? (I had a pot underneath my bottles when I was bottling to catch all my split beer... I ended up with enough to get drunk off of. It was flat, yes, but I couldn't bring myself to put it down the drain)
Thanks in advance for any advice/suggestions. It looks like there are lots of helpful people here and I'd much rather ask questions to real people (with real experience) than try to find answers in a book.