Coming back to home brewing

[Melbourne12]

I haven't made any beer for years, and was prompted to have another go by a thread on another forum. But unlike back in the day, when you were lucky to get a choice of more than three types of malt, hops, and yeast, there are now literally dozens readily available to the home brewer, and software to design your own beers!

So I decided to treat myself to a "Grainfather", which is a nifty device that allows you to control mashing much more closely than the old method of stirring the grains in a plastic bucket with warmish water and hoping for the best.

Links to Grainfather here: http://www.grainfather.co.uk/. There are even more sophisticated systems like the Braumeister, but they cost REALLY serious money.

Blog entry with pix here: https://johnnorman.wordpress.com/2015/06/10/grainfather-brewday/

The wort looked and smelled lovely.  Mind you, I haven't tasted the end result yet, and won't do for several weeks, but so far so good.

The lag phase, in which the yeast grows and establishes itself, lasted 27 hours, which made me extremely nervous since it's normally 15 hours max, but it's now fermenting steadily. I may have not given the yeast enough time to develop before pitching.

[Melbourne12]

[BarriedaleNick]

Hmmm - Sparking my interest there...

I sued to be a larger man but recently have rediscovered the delights of proper beer.  South London is full of small breweries now and you can take your pick of a huge variety of ales brewed just a couple of miles away.

I have been thinking of starting up brewing again,  I used to brew back in the day but it was all Boots kits and none of it much good - looks like there is much more choice these days..

Ooch though - that isn't cheap!!

[pumkinlover]

That looks very professional John