Vook - Brewing Beer at Home: The How-To Guide

Those first enterprising homebrewers went on to open the first microbreweries in the U.S. In the past 30 years or so, there has been an exponential growth in the microbrewing industry. There are now over 1,500 craft brewers America.

One of the first questions aspiring homebrewers ask is how long does it take to make beer? Well, the typical length of time required to make a simple beer from start to finish is four to five weeks. This depends on a number of factors, including whether the beer is a lager or an ale and the specific beer style (including alcohol content of the beer).

This timeline covers the entire time period from brewing to consuming. Keep in mind that most of this time frame is spent waiting for the beer to ferment, age and carbonate on its own. Actual hands-on time is only about 6 to 7 hours; this is time spent cleaning and sanitizing equipment, brewing the beer, transferring the beer from one vessel to another and packaging the beer in bottles.

Another question that comes up is how much does it cost to make beer at home? Well, for someone just getting started, a good equipment kit will cost in the vicinity of about $100. Each time you brew a batch of beer, the ingredients will cost you roughly $30 to $50, depending on which beer style is being brewed and whether top-quality ingredients are being used (a standard batch of beer is 5 gallons).

Anyone can brew beer in their home, but it takes skill and dedication to brew good beer. Like cooking delicious meals, brewing tasty beer requires the brewer to follow directions and to use quality ingredients.

Todays homebrewer has access to a virtually limitless marketplacenot just for equipment and ingredients youll need to brew great beer but also for creative ideas and recipes. There are scores of sites on the Internet where you can get beer recipes and tips and hints about how to make your beer even greater.

Chapter 2

W hether beer is being brewed at a commercial brewery or a home brewery, it all starts with the same four principal ingredients:

• Malt
• Hops
• Yeast
• Water

Malt is the brewers term for malted grain. Beer is usually made from malted barley as the base maltoften with the addition of adjuncts such as corn, rye, wheat or rice. Wheat beers are usually made from malted wheat and malted barley combined.

• Color
• Flavor
• Fermentable sugar (maltose)
• Proteins and Dextrins (for body, mouthfeel and head retention)

Malts are typically classified as being base malt, meaning the grain upon which the recipe is based, or specialty grain, meaning additional grains that are used to enhance the color and flavor of the base beer.

At the beginners level of homebrewing, malt extract takes the place of grain for ease of use. Malt extract is made from barley and other grains, so its basically a convenient, pre-made syrup that just mixes with water to create beer.

Hops werent widely used until about the second millennia. Prior to their widespread use, leaves, grasses, herbs, nuts and berries were all used in an effort to cut the cloyingly sweet flavor of the malt.

Hops are the flowers of the female hop plant. These hop flowers contain tiny yellow lupulin glands which, when boiled, release resins and oils that impart these important attributes:

• Bitterness
• Flavor
• Aroma
• Resins (contributes to mouthfeel and aids in head retention)
• Beta Acids (provides product stability)

It was discovered as recently at the late 1800s that hops also contribute to beers stability, or shelf life. Hoppier beers tend to stave off oxidation and staling better than less hoppy beers.

There are now over 70 different varieties of hops grown around the world, each with its own distinct flavor, aroma and bittering attributes.

Yeast is a single-celled living organism that is responsible for fermentation. Yeast consumes liquefied sugars and converts them to alcohol and carbon dioxide.

Unlike back in the days when brewers simply brewed their beer and left it in open fermentation vessels for spontaneous fermentation to take place, todays brewers use sterile yeast slants. And because yeasts are also available in a wide variety of style-specific strains, brewers have greater control over the fermentation process and the character of their finished product. Generally speaking, yeast is classified by two major genus:

• Saccharomyces cerevisiae (top-fermenting ale yeast)
• Saccharomyces Uvarum (bottom-fermenting lager yeast)

Homebrewers have access to most of the same yeast strains that commercial brewers do in both liquid form and freeze dried form.

Few people think much about the water that is used to make beer, but in reality, water quality is of paramount importance considering that beer is 95% water. Many classic beers from around the world are considered just that because of the effect of the local water source on the finished beer.

At the homebrewing level, it is important to use good water, but not nearly as important as on the commercial level. Homebrewers with municipal-supplied water should de-clorinate their brewing water by boiling or filtering, or buy bottled water. Well water should be boiled to kill micro-flora or fauna. If your tap water is from a rural well and it tastes minerally or sulfury, consider buying inexpensive bottled water to brew with.

Chapter 3

H ere is a list of equipment items you should start out with and descriptions of their use. Most are inexpensive and easily obtained through your local homebrew supply shop or a reputable Internet homebrew supply site. The following items are typical found in pre-packaged brewing kits costing around $100 - $125.

• 6.5 gallon HDPE (High Density Poly Ethylene) plastic fermenter with lid
• 6.5 gallon HDPE plastic bottling bucket with spigot
• 5 gallon glass carboy with rubber stopper
• 3 pc. fermentation airlock with rubber stopper
• 18 plastic brewing spoon