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| By Molly Snyder Edler OnMilwaukee.com Staff Writer E-mail author | Author bio More articles by Molly Snyder Edler |
| Published March 1, 2008 at 2:41 p.m. |
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OnMilwaukee.com Bar Month officially ended last night at midnight, and to celebrate a fantastic month of alcohol-related articles, I brewed my first batch of beer. It also happened to be "leap day" so inadvertently I made a batch of "Leap Year Beer." (In fact, I think a local brewery like Sprecher or Lakefront should brew a special "Leap Year Beer" every four years!)
In all honesty, I was more of a brewing apprentice to my husband, Jamie, who brewed beer about a decade ago with his then roommates and knows way more about it than I do. I did, however, name our home beer "Jamol's" which is a combination of our names and was the name we (jokingly) told people we were naming our son while he was in utero.
A couple of weeks ago, we invested $100 in basic brewing equipment from the Purple Foot, 3167 S. 92 St. The Purple Foot is a friendly, family-owned business that I was happy to support, even though they are more winemaking experts than home brewers. Hence, for the next batch, I think we'll take a family field trip to Brookfield's Brew & Grow, 285 Janacek Rd.
Overall, our home brewing experience went well. We purchased a kit from Brewer's Best to make a batch of "American Light." It's not a low-calorie beer, rather a light bodied, refreshing type brew. After reading the information, Jamie was slightly disappointed to find out that the beer is rice-based. "Great, we're home brewing Budweiser," he said. Luckily his enthusiasm rekindled once we started the process, which took about three hours.
First, we boiled four gallons of water on the stovetop, which took forever, and then added the malt extract (next time we are definitely going to make our own mash), the rice syrup and the bittering hops. We boiled all of that for about an hour, then added the finishing hops, boiled some more and then took the five-gallon vat of boiling brew outside and stuck it in a snow bank until it cooled to 70 degrees. (Finally, a reason to appreciate the snow!) Then, we siphoned the liquid into a plastic fermenter, took an original gravity reading to find out the alcohol content, added the yeast and said a little prayer before putting the lid on the fermenter.
In about a week, we'll transfer the brew to a carboy, which is a glass five-gallon container with a stopper, and then, according to the instructions, wait about three weeks until bottling.
I think the instructions were a little dicey. We're going to do more research and talk to more home brewers before the next batch, but it looks and smells like beer, which is a good sign. We might add fruit -- lime or strawberries -- once we transfer the beer.
Speaking of fruit, our home brewing system can be used for winemaking, too. I have grapes growing in my backyard and plan to have my own purple feet someday, but for now, I'm just hoping my first batch of home brew is drinkable.
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2 comments about this article. Post a comment / write a review. |
Posted by WJeff2008 on March 18, 2008 at 1:55 a.m. (report)
Molly, Rhinobrau is right. the Milwaukee Beer Barons meet the 4th Wednesday of every month at Clifford's in Hales Corners. On March 26th, we host Aran Madden from Furthermore Beer Co. We always have homebrew to sample at our meetings, and we have some certified Beer Judges to evaluate homebrew experiments. Wanna get some more homebrewing tips ? Coming June 7, we host the World of Beer Festival at the Schwabenhof, with homebrew demonstrations and Mead clinics. Hope your lager turns out alright. Ales are a bit...quicker and more forgiving, sort of like Black paint: you can throw a lot of Red & Yellow in there, and it still stays Black. Other homebrew shops in the area to consider, include The Marketbasket (Brookfield), Frugal Homebrewer (Waukesha) and Homebrewing Depot (West Allis). Happy Homebrewing !!! Whispering Jeff
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Posted by rhinobrau on March 5, 2008 at 1:44 p.m. (report)
If this is something that you enjoy doing, you should check out The Milwaukee Beer Barons homebrew club. We meet on the fourth Wednesday of every month at Cliffords on Forest Home where we sample beers and discuss homebrewing. Be careful, it's an addiction...
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