National Homebrew Club Ireland

Booked in for 7pm. Usual craic, please add yourself to the list and tell us if you're bringing a beer.

1. Thomas (stout, maybe)

Sorry guys but I'll be in Vicar St Dublin as the missus and myself have booked to see Thunder playing with an overnight stay.
Definitely need to get more regular meets as there is quite a large gap.
I have a two stouts from the same batch one dry hopped and the other not.
There is also a Pale Ale and a Chestnut Ale which i was going to give to @Stuart.Still be interesting to hear some feedback 🍺

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Quote from: irish_goat on March 14, 2017, 10:29:30 AM
Booked in for 7pm. Usual craic, please add yourself to the list and tell us if you're bringing a beer.

1. Thomas (stout, maybe)
2. CeeDee (Ciaran) New brewer, so nothing ready yet, will only just have bottled the week before.

Quote from: Ceedee on March 14, 2017, 07:45:18 PM

Quote from: irish_goat on March 14, 2017, 10:29:30 AM
Booked in for 7pm. Usual craic, please add yourself to the list and tell us if you're bringing a beer.

1. Thomas (stout, maybe)
2. CeeDee (Ciaran) New brewer, so nothing ready yet, will only just have bottled the week before.

Hi Ceedee I take it you are local or thereabouts....

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Not really, Portglenone, but have friends in Muff and I'm up that end of the country a few times a month.

That's good too hear.I'm sure we'll meet at sometime.

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Quote from: Ceedee on March 14, 2017, 07:45:18 PM

Quote from: irish_goat on March 14, 2017, 10:29:30 AM
Booked in for 7pm. Usual craic, please add yourself to the list and tell us if you're bringing a beer.

1. Thomas (stout, maybe)
2. CeeDee (Ciaran) New brewer, so nothing ready yet, will only just have bottled the week before.

3. Beanstalk (smoked porter, pecan nut ale, belgian single maybe)

1. Thomas (stout, maybe)
2. CeeDee (Ciaran) New brewer, so nothing ready yet, will only just have bottled the week before.
[/quote]
3. Beanstalk (smoked porter, pecan nut ale, belgian single maybe)
4. Brendan (various aged ciders)

New member I will bring a session ale and a stout.

Great stuff.

Quote from: irish_goat on March 27, 2017, 08:40:08 PM
Great stuff.

Just wondering if there is going to be a regular meet although I know you're up to eyes in it at the minute?

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Think we can make it regular yeah. Should aim for every 4-5 weeks anyway.

Quote from: irish_goat on March 27, 2017, 09:22:04 PM
Think we can make it regular yeah. Should aim for every 4-5 weeks anyway.

Thanks that sounds great.Just give me a heads up so I can check my shift pattern as I would like to get to a few.
Cheers 👍

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Folks I'm wile sorry but I need to pull out due to bus strike (not only for myself to get home but I need to drive other half down country) :(

Will go next time for sure!

Think I'll make now, I'll bring along a Belgian blond and a Belgian wit.

might get my brother to come along hes just getting back in to brewing after a long break!

I'm planning to attend but might not make the 7pm start. Bringing along some beer (think it was Boom) that was made for us at the walled city brewery brew masters course. I'll have two samples, one where I didn't add enough sugar during the bottling process and later added some sugar. So it will be interesting to see the difference. Also, I got a BIAB All Grain Starter Kit from Geterbrewed. http://www.geterbrewed.com/biab-all-grain-starter-kit-includes-a-mash-kit/ It hasn't come with instructions but has various packets with times on them (minutes). I'd be interested in what water is being used in Derry.
Catch you all later.

Where abouts in the brewery, do we have to buy off the menu,unsure of the procedure some info please

We'll be in the section to the right as you walk in the door. No need to buy food but we would all normally buy a pint or two as a thank you for allowing use of the space.

Anyone bringing beer, usual amount would be 2 bottles.

Thanks thats great will bring two bottles of session ale and my last bottle of stout will see you at seven Matt

Just found an excuse for a trip into Derry this evening! Woop. See yous there. I'll bring stout also.

Til then.

Great meet up tonight great to have so many new faces and plenty of different beers down! Great venue and much thanks to James did that!

Some great beers last night, highlights were Mat's stouts, couldn't fault them.

Hope the beer I brewed turns out ok, could maybe try and have the next meetup the same time it's tapped up.

I'll be up for that! When you thinking it'll be on tap?

Quote from: irish_goat on March 31, 2017, 04:56:35 PM
Some great beers last night, highlights were Mat's stouts, couldn't fault them.

I'll second that. Did James say when he'd be looking to tap up that brew you brewed?

Didn't say. Will be cold crashing it next week so should be good  to go by the end of the month. 

Yup, really enjoyed the night at the Walled city brewery. Great to feel so welcome as a newbie and got some great tips for my next brew. I was a big fan of the Belgian wit.
@Fatcontro11er - I've 5.5~6kg of Hoppy APA grain, but then after looking around the geterbrewed website that shows recipe for the ingredients I brought the other night http://www.geterbrewed.com/hoppy-american-pale-ale-all-grain-ingredient-kit/


Here's the notes I wrote after during our chat
Mash

• Bring water up to 73^O with 2.5 litres per 1 kg of grain
• Add grain straight from the pack to the hot water, stir well and bring it up to 66^O
• Cook for 90 minutes (could do a litmus test, if it's blue, there's not enough sugar. Also could add gypsum at this point

Sparging

• In a separate pot, heat around 20 litres to 73^O
• Release the mash into a spearate bucket and while it starts to reveal the mash, slowly sprinkle the 20 litres of water
• It's no necessary to use all 20 litres, run enough until what comes out of the mash is no longer sweet (or runs clear)

Wort

• Bring the to the boil for around 30 minutes
• Add the packet of hops that says 60 minutes
• Continue to boil for 50 minutes
• Add the packet of hops that says 10 minutes
• Continue to boil for 10 minutes
• Turn the heat off and drop in wort chiller to bring down to ~80^O
• Leave for 10 minutes
• Run water through wort chiller to bring down to ~15^O/16^O (Pitching temperature)
• Have the sterilised fermentation bucket and paddle. Pour wort and stir to introduce lots of air/oxygen
• Drop in the sterilised hydrometer into the fermentation bucket and take a reading, aiming for around 10.50
• Sprinkle the packet of yeast on top, no need to mix or stir in, and place lid on top (with hydrometer in)

Fermentation

• Leave for a week or so and check the hydrometer. We're aiming for 10.10
• Even if it reads 10.10, give the bucket a little shake, there could be carbon deposited on the hydrometer
• Return again to see if the hydrometer still reads 10.10 and it's good to bottle

Bottling

• Add 1/2 tea spoon of sugar into each bottle
• Siphon from the fermentation bucket into the bottle
• Leave for a week and taste
• If desired carbonation is reached, then get the bottle into a fridge ~5^O to prevent any further development of bacteria

If I get the chance, I'll give it a go this weekend.

Hi bazza90,

Great to meet you on the night, and impressed you were able to make such detailed notes with all that beer flowing about ;-)

On the bottling, I tried the method of adding sugar to the bottles and found it too fiddly and messy and trying to siphon from the primary fermenter into the bottles runs the risk of sucking up debris and introduces too much oxygen. I would advise dissolving the sugar in a saucepan with a few cups of water and putting this into another (sterilised) bucket with preferably a tap in it and then siphon your beer into this, being careful not to introduce too much air and carefully mixing the beer and dissolved sugar. Then you can attach a bottling wand to this second bucket and fill away. I like this system as it ensures that each bottle has the same amount of sugar.

Well Ciaran. Yeah, I recall you mentioned this approach as I had a doubt in my mind that to siphon from the primary fermenter may introduce some debris. Good point and I have a spare bucket.

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Quote from: bazza90 on April 06, 2017, 10:18:23 PM
Yup, really enjoyed the night at the Walled city brewery. Great to feel so welcome as a newbie and got some great tips for my next brew. I was a big fan of the Belgian wit.
@Fatcontro11er - I've 5.5~6kg of Hoppy APA grain, but then after looking around the geterbrewed website that shows recipe for the ingredients I brought the other night http://www.geterbrewed.com/hoppy-american-pale-ale-all-grain-ingredient-kit/


Here's the notes I wrote after during our chat
Mash

• Bring water up to 73^O with 2.5 litres per 1 kg of grain
• Add grain straight from the pack to the hot water, stir well and bring it up to 66^O
• Cook for 90 minutes (could do a litmus test, if it's blue, there's not enough sugar. Also could add gypsum at this point

Sparging

• In a separate pot, heat around 20 litres to 73^O
• Release the mash into a spearate bucket and while it starts to reveal the mash, slowly sprinkle the 20 litres of water
• It's no necessary to use all 20 litres, run enough until what comes out of the mash is no longer sweet (or runs clear)

Wort

• Bring the to the boil for around 30 minutes
• Add the packet of hops that says 60 minutes
• Continue to boil for 50 minutes
• Add the packet of hops that says 10 minutes
• Continue to boil for 10 minutes
• Turn the heat off and drop in wort chiller to bring down to ~80^O
• Leave for 10 minutes
• Run water through wort chiller to bring down to ~15^O/16^O (Pitching temperature)
• Have the sterilised fermentation bucket and paddle. Pour wort and stir to introduce lots of air/oxygen
• Drop in the sterilised hydrometer into the fermentation bucket and take a reading, aiming for around 10.50
• Sprinkle the packet of yeast on top, no need to mix or stir in, and place lid on top (with hydrometer in)

Fermentation

• Leave for a week or so and check the hydrometer. We're aiming for 10.10
• Even if it reads 10.10, give the bucket a little shake, there could be carbon deposited on the hydrometer
• Return again to see if the hydrometer still reads 10.10 and it's good to bottle

Bottling

• Add 1/2 tea spoon of sugar into each bottle
• Siphon from the fermentation bucket into the bottle
• Leave for a week and taste
• If desired carbonation is reached, then get the bottle into a fridge ~5^O to prevent any further development of bacteria

If I get the chance, I'll give it a go this weekend.

At your final 10mins of the boil when adding hops add your wort chiller as well so as to sanitise it prior to chilling.

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Well folks,
Thought it was time to give an update. Started my brew on Saturday 22nd April and it went pretty well. Annoying though, one of the bags of hops burst so I've just kept all the hops in the fermentation bucket as I've read that the hops don't add much after they've been brewed in the wort.
Some notes for next time though

• When adding barley to the water, move the temperature to different parts of the boiler as it seemed to be reading low and then jumped quite high
• The element brings the temperature in the bolier up quickly.
• Don't cover the wort with a lid, the boiling wort rises and any loose hops stick to the lid

I've a siphon arriving tomorrow and I plan to bottle this weekend. I haven't tasted yet or measured the hydrometer. It's been fermenting around 16~17 degrees but I should have tasted, measured and probably bottled on Saturday past, but hey ho.