Well...

[tullaroan]

Well following our first meeting I've managed to:

- put on a white wine kit and fermented and bottled it. It's good! Better than the cheap Lidl wine I was buying and only 1.10 or so a bottle. I got around 30 bottles from the kit which was 36 euro.

- started a full extract beer, pretty basic but I wanted to start easy, got 2 more waiting but after that I'm going to do some malt extract plus hop additions (ie some boiling etc) using John Palmer's How to Brew as a tutorial. If anyone wants to share costs and spoils and work with me when brewing let me know (djdownie AT gmail com) and we can buy the stuff and do it together at my place (Tullaroan). It's simpler than the club stuff but will suit me as a beginner and perhaps we can learn doing it together and sharing costs/more brews. Probably a few weeks off. I sort of think malt extract plus adding hops etc should be mastered before trying to jump into all gain solo.

-  just for the craic I bought 2 frozen berry bags from lidl (1.25kg in total), 1 liter of grape juice, 1 liter of apple juice and 1kg of sugar and put it in the plastic container the wine kit came in along with the juice of 2 lemons and a tablespoon of country wine yeast (and some water to fill the container). It bubbled furiously for a week or so and I've now bottled that it's quite delicious. I boiled up the berries to mix with the sugar first.

One question, where is everyone buying their hops/grains ? Ireland seems to be a bit stuck for brew stores compared to Oz/US. Have you found the selection quite limited. In one US video the homebrewer walked in the store and the grains were all laid out in containers like nuts in a supermarket. He just munched and grabbed whatever he wanted. Is there a decent store here that does the same?

Has anyone converted a cheap two fermenter freezer? I wouldn't mind checking it out if you don't mind as I think temperature control is on the agenda.

Any sign of the next meetup/bottling or whatnot.

Thanks
David

[darren996]

Good to see that you have been busy, I wouldn't  mind having a go at your wine, could you bring some to our next meet.

I get all my gear from thehomebrewcompany.ie and geterbrewed.ie. Unfortunately there is no walk in store close to us but these sites will have anything you would need.  I would suggest that we group buy from them and maybe get the stuff delivered to the school.

The freezers at the school have been converted using an stc controller and a tube heater, have a look at it at the next meet.

I think we should aim for bottling the last batch this week


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[tullaroan]

thanks - I'm around tue-thur night for bottling duty. some practice today with my wine!

[Dunkel]

Glad to hear the club is up and running  If you're ever in Dublin, Mottley Brew has grain buckets similar to your description, about 50 different types I think, and you just tell Ian what you want and he grinds it for you.

And I reckon he owes me at least a packet of yeast for the free advert 

[darren996]

Hi David,  what was the wine kit you got,  gonna give it a bash

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[Leann ull]

There are 4 main HB shops on the Island, 3 as mentioned above and in the interests of balance Homebrew West as well.
All have an area in the for sale section of the forum.

All have an online presence and all have walk in shops.

I shop online a lot in the US and have seen pics of the pick and mix you talk about.

That service is here also just not in person.
Also in the US you have the potential for homebrew houses, which are commercial entities allowing you to choose ingredients, use their top stainless kit to mash and boil and fermenters even to bottle and keg!
Can't do that here because of licensing laws

Having visited all the shops on the Island in person I would probably suggest their listings are comparable if not bigger to those online shops in Aus/US and of course they are all lovely people and offer great advice on the products they sell

[tullaroan]

Thanks for the replies. Here is the wine kit:

http://www.homebrewwest.ie/australian-blend-pinot-grigio-1330-p.asp

I will check the home brew sites out ! And hopefully visit the one in Dublin.

[Will_D]

Also in the US you have the potential for homebrew houses, which are commercial entities allowing you to choose ingredients, use their top stainless kit to mash and boil and fermenters even to bottle and keg!
Can't do that here because of licensing laws

Hmm not sure about this. The law is very clear on how the finished home brew is distributed (ie Not sold, but can be given away to friends and family.

It isnt clear about who's equipment its made on.

I am sure that a home brewer doesn't need to own the kit to brew beer (would just need to do the work).

In the UK some time ago groups set up small brewing co-operatives , a bit like our regional clubs but they had a building and a lot of nice kit for the "members" to brew on.

Sounds like Tog doesn't it!!


I am sure this model is legal here