Sunday, July 3, 2011

Coopers Brew!

I made a batch of Coopers Lager today. My wife bought me a Coopers kit for my b-day.
I'm a LOT worried.

First, the stove is upstairs in the kitchen. The laundry sink which will fit the Coopers fermenter is in the basement. I did the initial brew process in the kitchen, then carted the fermenter to the basement to fill with cold water.
I think my first mistake at this point was stirring the wort/hot water/sugar before adding the cold water, as it created A LOT of foam. Once I started adding the cold water (from the tap) the foam only expanded! By the time I got it to the 23 litre mark, the foam was overflowing the fermenter, and I had left the lid upstairs.
So.. with the wort and it's foam offspring exposed I ran upstairs to grab the lid, but I forgot the airlock. So I ran upstairs again to get the airlock, but I forgot the yeast. So I ran upstairs again to grab the yeast.
I installed the airlock incorrectly and sealed the lid. Upon noticing I installed the airlock incorrectly I unsealed the lid and correctly installed the airlock and sealed the lid..again, but I forgot to add the yeast. I unsealed the lid, again, sprinkled the yeast on top of the mountain of foam in the fermenter and stirred vigorously, and resealed the lid.
What am I worried about? Oh I don't know.... the multiple exposures to the outside because I'm a moron comes to mind.

What did I learn?
A. Plan brew day better. I need to figure out how to do it all in one place, not two floors.
B. I LOVE my Mr Beer kit a lot better for the simple fact the fermenter will fit in my kitchen sink!

God I hope I don't get 23 litres of bad beer..







1 comment: