Monday, March 1, 2010

A Homebrewer Is Born

Lauren gave me a Mr Beer Homebrewing Kit for Christmas, and let's just say that I was quite excite to receive said gift...maybe too excited, but who are you to judge. The kit came with a 2 gallon fermenter, 8 Plastic 1-Liter bottles and caps, and the ingredients for a West Coast Pale Ale Style beer. Thus, for my inaugural brew I decided to go with the West Coast Pale Ale.

WCPA Recipe:

Ingredients:
1 Can of West Coast Pale Ale Hopped Malt Extract
1 Package of Booster (a brewing adjunct made from corn syrup solids that adds body and fermentable sugars)
1 Package of Standard Mr Beer Dry Brewing Yeast

Process:
Step 1- Sanitized all equipment using One-Step No Rinse Sanitizer
Step 2- Brought 4 cups of water to a boil and slowly whisked in 1 package of Booster
Step 3- Removed the pot from the heat and slowly whisked in the West Coast Pale Ale Hopped Malt Extract (this mixture is the wort)
Step 4- Filled the fermenter with 4 quarts of cold water
Step 5- Poured the wort into the fermenter
Step 6- Added more cool water to the fermenter until it reached 8.5 quarts and mixed very well
Step 7- Pitched the yeast and allowed it to rehydrate in the wort for 10 minutes
Step 8- Mixed the yeast into the wort and sealed the fermenter
Step 9- Moved fermenter into laundry room and let the yeast do their thing
Step 10- Filled 8 1-Liter bottles with 2 1/4 tsp. of granulated sugar each (this is how the beer becomes carbonated)
Step 11- Filled bottles with the beer from the fermenter and put the bottles in the laundry to condition at room temperature for 1 week
Step 12- Moved bottles to the refrigerator to cold condition for about 3 days

Results: Tasted a little sweet and flat without much body...but was drinkable and did not make anyone ill, so I consider it a successful first attempt.

Here's a pic

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