Your First Home Brew Beer

Are you ready to go?

Have you read the articles that lead up to this one?

Basic Home Brewing Equipment Essentials.

Basic Home Brew Beer Ingredients

Once you are up to speed with those and you have the equipment you are ready to go.



Step1 Rinse all of your equipment and then sterilize with sodium metabisulfate or home brew sterilizer.

This includes can of concentate, fermenter container, fermenter lid and tap(twist the tap on and off making sure sterilizer comes into contact with as much of the internals of the tap as possible), large spoon, airlock, can opener and anything else that may come into conyact with your hands.

Cleanliness can not be over stated because it only takes one small error to contaminated your brew. Make sure your fermenter is sterile around the threads of the tap and lid and even on the outside. You can never be too cautious.



Step2 sityour can of concentrate in some hot water. This will make the malt runny and will come out of the can easier.

While your can is warming up boil 2 litres of water and pour into you fermenter after all the sterilizer has been poured out. If you are using a sterilizer with a soapy feel to it it may be a good idea to rinse it with boiled water. Soapy chemicals can affect the surface tension of your beer leading to poor head retension.



Step3 Remove the lid from your can of concentrate with a can opener and pour contents into your fermenter. Begin stiring this with your big spoon and pour in your secondary sugar source. eg Dextrose, Light Dry Malt. Usually about a kilogram.



Step4 Fill the fermenter to the point that your concentate indicated that its would make. (Usually 22.5 or 23 litres)

Continue to stir until all is disolved and no residue remains on the bottom.



Step5 Check the temperature of the mixture using the thermometer stuck on the side of your fermenter. If it is between 18 and 28 derees Celsius pour the sachell of yeast supplied with your can of concentrate.

If it is too hot you may need to put ice in, if it is too cold you may need to warm it up in which case pour the yeast in and move it to a warm location after the lid is on.



Step6 Assemble your lid and airlock. put some sterilizer or sterile water in the airlock and place the lid on as soon as you pitch the yeast in.

Try to keep the time it takes to do all of this as low as you can as the more exposure the wort(mixture in the fermenter) has to the enviroment around you the more chance of it being infected.

Now you can play the waiting game.

Fermentation takes around four to eight days depending on temperature. Try to maintain that 18 to 28 degree window. Too low and fermentation will slow and even stop. Too hot and the yeast will die.

Iff it gets too cold just warm it up. use an electric blanket under it or heat belts can be purchased from your home brew shop. It should start again once it warms up.



If it gets too hot and fermentation stops then all is not lost. You will however need to pitch another yeast in, make sure it is the same yeast strain as the first as odd flavours have been known to accur with different yeast strains in one ferment.



So the airlock has all but stopped bubbling after four to eight days.

This is where the beer hydrometer is handy.

You just pour some beer out of your fermenter using the tap into the vessel that your fermenter is stored in and drop your hydrometer in. The finish SG should be between 1008 and 1000.

It will indicate on your can of concentrate where it will end up when it is finished.

There are many variables that come into play when working out a finishing SG.



Once it is done and the SG is satisfactory it is time to bottle.

Rinse and sterilize your bottles.
If you are using the smaller 375ml bottles you will need to put a half tea spoon of sugar into each bottle. If you are using the larger 750ml bottles 1 tea spoon is required.
This is called the priming sugar and the yeast will consume this small amount of sugar to produce the CO2 that will carbonate your beer.

WARNING: Do not add more sugar than recommended as bottles may explode.

It is best to prime all of the bottles one after the other so you do not miss and or double prime them. If you think a bottle is double primed do not use it. It may explode.

Now all of the bottles are primed it is time to bottle your first home brew beer.
Sterilize your filling device with the valve on the bottom push it into the mouth of fermenter tap.
Place a bowl below the filling device(this is to catch any beer that leaks out of the filler).
Turn the tap on, beer should fill up inside the tube of the filler but not pour out because the valve will be shut.

Take your first bottle and slide it over the filler, as the valve pushes against bottom of the bottle the bottle should start to fill.
Sometimes the beer will froth and you may find it hard to fill just set it aside and move on to the next bottle and come back to it later.

The reason for the frothing is the sugar in the bottle is in crystal form and as it disolves it causes some Co2 that is in the beer already to be released.

As each bottle is filled cap it.

Some cappers have a magnet in the middle of the capping flange and others don't.

If yours does have a magnet then the cap will hold agaist the flange if it doesn,t just sit the cap against the opening of the bottle and bring the capper down over it.

As you pull the lever there will be some resistance as the cap is formed around the seal of the bottle. ( Do not try to turn the cap on the bottle this will break the seal).
Once the lid is on turn the bottle upside down a couple of times in your hand to stir up the sugar in the bottle and you are done.

Sit them in a dark place that has temperature of around 18 to 30 degrees celsius for a minimum of two weeks and then you can refridgerate and enjoy your HOME BREW BEER.