TAN # 192 - A unique welTANschauung (Page 37)

Cool. What kind did you make and you have to think of a name for the beer.

pizza.....I will miss you!

Yeah, most of the time was spent getting out the gear that has been stored away and cleaning/sanitizing.  I'm so paranoid about that.  Not that it's the end of the world.  I'm out 30 bucks if the batch goes bad, but I still would hate for that to happen.

You can be pretty "sloppy" with wine, but I hear there is less room for error with beer.  So I tried to be meticulous with this first batch.

So question, I did NOT get the grains pre ground so they said I needed to take a rolling pin or bottle to them and slightly crush them.  So I poured them out on a large cutting board and used my rolling pin and rolled over them with a LOT of weight.  To be honest, it didn't seem to do much.  I heard some slight crunching, but that's about it.  They didn't look much different.  I steeped them for 30 minutes and only got a slightly discolored water with slight smells of the grain.  Maybe like green tea, but not even that dark.  Does that sound right?  Next time, I may just order them pre-crushed.

Perhaps look into something like a conical-burr coffee grinder for this?  You could then get a grind as fine as you wanted with total consistency and still buy the unground stuff (which I'm assuming is cheaper in bulk).  It'd be like $75, but it'd give you repeatable results every time.

I get little single serves at Albertson's, 10 for $10.  They are only 380 calories each if I want a snack.

Or is it pizza?

Yeah, most of the time was spent getting out the gear that has been stored away and cleaning/sanitizing.  I'm so paranoid about that.  Not that it's the end of the world.  I'm out 30 bucks if the batch goes bad, but I still would hate for that to happen.

You can be pretty "sloppy" with wine, but I hear there is less room for error with beer.  So I tried to be meticulous with this first batch.

So question, I did NOT get the grains pre ground so they said I needed to take a rolling pin or bottle to them and slightly crush them.  So I poured them out on a large cutting board and used my rolling pin and rolled over them with a LOT of weight.  To be honest, it didn't seem to do much.  I heard some slight crunching, but that's about it.  They didn't look much different.  I steeped them for 30 minutes and only got a slightly discolored water with slight smells of the grain.  Maybe like green tea, but not even that dark.  Does that sound right?  Next time, I may just order them pre-crushed.

pizza

I have one and even thought about it.  But being my first attempt, I followed the kit recipe to the letter since it also matched the technique in "The Joy of Homebrewing" book.  The instructions said rolling pin, so that's what I did.  It may have done it perfectly, but it the results were not what I was expecting.  But my expectations could have been wrong in the first place.

I should say, they offer the grains pre CRUSHED, not ground.  But even then, it's like crushing rice with a rolling pin.  Doesn't really work.  MAYBE it just cracked the husk enough to get to the germ.

In that case, I get it for free.

In that case, I get it for free.

No man gets it for free.

For that one you are probably fine, it's supposed to be pretty light.  I usually go with the pre-crushed version just because it is easier and I really didn't notice a difference from when I did it myself.  

As far as cleaning, it's a real pain, but important.  For the future I would say don't worry about sanitizing anything that sees boiling (or will be boiled at a later time), i.e the pot, spoon, cooling coils, etc.  The boiling wort will take care of that for you.

Whatever you do, don't grind them up!  The reason why they crack them is to get to the germ on the inside without breaking up the husks.  The husks get really bitter if they are boiled.  It could ruin an otherwise good batch.

No man gets it for free.

Yeah, I realized that.  Had to dig out my air lock and stoppers and soak them, as well as wash out the dust and film and sanitize the carboy. 

So this may sound crazy, but I think it's ok.  Instead of soaking the wort in an icebath to get it down to 80 degrees, I secured a sanitized lid on it and put the pot on the first step of my swimming pool.  It's a MUCH larger "heat sink" and cooled it down in about 13 minutes.  I did worry about any air-born items when I took the lid off to check temp, but figured it can't be worse than the air in my kitchen.  Plus the water is heavily chlorinated, so that's probably as safe as soaking the pot in tap water.

If you read up, we were just talking about it.  I cooked my first batch last night.  I'm hoping to go home after work and see the little yeasties working away!  They were lively little buggers when I opened the test tube...

Talk about one of god's perfect little inventions - yeast.  You pay them with sugar, and they return BOOZE!  Fantastic trade.

pizza.....I will miss you!