How To Brew Your Own Beer: The Basic Steps Involved In The Process
This is a basic rundown of how to brew your own beer. You will already need to have the equipment necessary to do it, but don’t worry it’s actually very affordable if you pickup an all in one kit like the Cooper’s home brewing kit. It’s only about $100 and it comes with everything you need to make your own great tasting beer. It’s the one I use and I love it!
You always want to follow the individual instructions that come with your home brewing kit, but a basic rundown gos as follows…
-Sanitizing your brewing gear: This is a very important step when trying to learn how to brew your own beer and should not be skipped. If you don’t sanitize the equipment then you run the chance of spoiling the taste of your brew once it’s finished. Some of the popular sanitizers used are B-Brite and Star San which are made especially for brewing equipment cleaning. You can use your basic household bleach but if you don’t clean out the bleach thoroughly after the sanitizing, you might end up with a funny tasting beer.
-The type of water to use: The kind of water you use does have a small affect on the outcome of your beer but it is an affect none the less. Basically if you use tap water you could get a finished taste reminiscent of the different chemicals that might be in tap water. If your tap water tastes okay at room temperature than it will probably be okay, but its always a little safer just to simply use filtered water.
-It’s boiling time: Now you heat the water and add the malt extract once the water starts to boil. Stir the mix frequently so as to prevent the malt extract from settling on the bottom of the pot and getting burnt. Then add the hops to the mix and continue boiling for about an hour or so. Make sure you keep an eye on the boiling process because the water could boil over and make a mess.
-Cooling the wort: After the boiling process you now are left with what is called the wort. You want to cool it down as fast as possible to 80 degrees Fahrenheit by placing the pot in a sink full of ice water. Stirring to help in the cooling process is recommended but make sure the spoon you use to stir is clean.
-Setting the wort to ferment: When the wort is as the correct temperature, you want to transfer it to you properly sanitized fermenting tank using an also sanitized funnel. Once in the tank, you’ll should mix or splash the wort around in order to get oxygen circulating for the yeast.
-Testing with a hydrometer: If you have a kit, it will come with one of these. Basically this is a tool to test the wort to make sure it is properly mixed by how well it floats. After this step it’s time to add the yeast.
-Adding the yest: Once you’ve added the yeast you add the rubber stopper and airlock and let the yeast go to work in fermenting. You’ll want to make sure room temperature is around 70 degrees F. A lot of people also recommend when teaching how to brew your own beer to keep the fermenting tank in the dark during the process. It depends on the the type of beer you’re brewing but the entire process can take up to 2 weeks before bottling takes place.
There’s your basic rundown on how to brew your own beer. It’s very easy to do and you’ll save a lot of money in the long run. Also, if you still do not have your own brewing kit, don’t forget to check out the Coopers home brewing kit. Cheers!