Where do you buy?

[pk]

Hi, I succumbed to late night purchasing on the Internet last night and bought a boiler and chiller and an extract kit of Irish red ale from "the Homebrew company".

Just wondering if you guys see a recepie you like online where do you buy from? Just send the list of ingredients to th Homebrew company or some other online crowd?

Sorry I am new to this really.
Paul

[Will_D]

Hi pk welcome!

THC do do there own extract kits:

http://www.thehomebrewcompany.ie/extract-beer-kits-c-164.html

However if you find a recipe then its up to you to order the required ingredient amounts ( in their standard units of measure )

[pk]

Thank you gents. I had a go making my first extract "Irish red ale" yesterday.  It's a bit more work than a kit!

Could I ask, what do you add to the bottles when bottling? I use 500 ml bottles with 2 carbonation drops per bottle usually when I do kits. I'm just not sure what you do for an extract. Any advice?

Thanks
Paul

[Ciderhead]

Paul do you find 2 carb drops in 500ml makes your beer gassy? or are you drinking it young?

[pk]

Probably drinking it a little young alright, the last batch of kit lager I made had some bottles with 1 carb drop and some others with 1/2 teaspoon of ordinary table sugar and both were good.

What do the experts use?

[Kevco5]

Batch priming is the way to go! Carb drops can be inconsistent in size imo, plus to get carbonation levels right you may have to split or cut the drops which is a pain.
http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/recipator/carbonation.html

[Ciderhead]

Kevs right but batch priming can be fiddley v's popping in 1 drop

[pk]

Hey great, what is batch prime? I don't understand what you do? Is this something you add to the bottles or the fermentation bucket?
Paul

[Ciderhead]

Process is simple you dissolve the amount of sugar into sterile solution and add you beer on top, then bottle, gives much better distribution of sugar and in theory better more uniform carbonation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_We91VuYH0M