I've done my first brew

[Jimbo]

Howdy BrewCrew,

Managed to score myself a beerdroid from a mate who wasn't using it. 

First thing I did was gave it a clean with a droid cleanse tablet where I discovered I needed a new tap and drain plug as the seals were done for and I also had a small crack in the tube the tap goes into. Big shout out to Liam from the Brewart team for sending me a replacements and advising solution on sealing the crack.  Top notch customer service. 👌 

I have gone with top end crisp for my first attempt at a brew. Learnt after reading the forum YEAST FIRST after already adding ingredients but I now know for next time. 

The droid has said its ready for kegging which I wasn't anticipating at 7days in. I poured a bit into a glass to taste. Smells and taste like beer but colouring looks a bit off to me. Could it be infected from poor clean? 

I'm not ready to bottle yet so have put the droid into store mode until I'm ready (which should be in the coming days) 

Should I still go through with the bottling? 

Any other advice for a first time user? 

 

 

 

[Gillies Brewing]

Congratulations Jimbo and welcome 😁

If it smells and tastes like beer it's almost definitely not infected. The reason the colour looks like that is because the tap is at the bottom. This means it's next to where all the sediment or "trub" settles and so the first however much will have extra sediment. Really, everything straight out of the bottle will be a bit cloudy, but once it's finished conditioning it should be a lot clearer!

It's absolutely ready to bottle and great move kicking it into storage mode while you wait. That will also help settle the sediment!

One tip is that if you're pouring it out of your bottle, for a nice clear lager like that, you'll want to pour it a bit slowly and leave the last bit in the bottle so that as much of that sediment stays at the bottom and it looks and tastes nice and clear!

Edited July 22 by Gillies Brewing

[Jimbo]

Cheers.

I had a feeling it might been sediment in the bottom but I like to over think things haha 😄 

Just waiting on some sanitiser and bottle cleaner to turn up and it's bottling time, clean and then onto the next brew. 

[Gillies Brewing]

Do you have a particular brew in mind for round 2?

[Jimbo]

I have the australian lager brewprint. Got to order the hop filter. 

Got any brew recommendations? 

[Gillies Brewing]

I'd definitely recommend getting the hop filter and getting some dry hops. Dry hopping really makes it taste fantastic and also gives it a bit more head and body. Most brewers in the forum replace the H packets with some similar dry hops, even if it's not a "dry hop recipe". It can be a good idea once you know the kind of beers you like to make to get bigger packets of hops from a brew shop it works out better.

Speaking of which, of you hadn't seen already, it also often works out better financially to buy the individual ingredients for your brews (still from the BrewArt store of course) than buying them as a "brewprint", which is a nice tip for new players. For example to make your Australian Premium Lager you'd buy 1x E1, 1x E5, 3x X1, either the 2x H5 or a DH or some other dry hops, 1x Y9. Plus some carbonation drops (I get them from the supermarket) and a droid cleanse if you want (some people prefer their own sanitiser rituals). With the cleanse tablet and using the H packets (most expensive hopping option), but assuming you already have some carbonation drops that would currently cost $33.60 instead of $42 if you bought it as a brewprint. About $25 if you already had the dry hops pellets lying around the house and didn't have to buy the H packets.

As for what brewprints to brew, it really depends what you like to drink normally! Almost all the brewprints are pretty universally enjoyed (although some people do find the top end you've brewed a bit watery, although they usually think the same thing about great northern so it's probably an accurate recipe). If you like lagers, the range of European ones are pretty great, Monch is a good place to start. If you like things like Stone and Wood the Lighthouse and Cooper's Pacific Ales are a good way to go, they have galaxy dry hops. Same as the Australian Lager which is apparently good, I haven't tried it. If you like IPAs there's a fair few of them, I liked the West Coast Pale Ale and Jolly Roger but there's some very strong ones too if that's your thing.

[Jimbo]

So many options. 

I did indeed do the sums as you mentioned. Seeing as I'm bottling(at this stage ) i didnt want/need keg primer so got to calculating the ingredients separately and was surprised it was cheaper. 

Will be putting another order in shortly for the hop basket and a bunch of ingredients and maybe some more bottles. 

Maybe Santa can get me a keg system from Christmas 🎄 

I grabbed my carbonation drops from bigw tonight and my sanitiser and equipment turned up today so tomorrow will be bottling day and then onto cleaning and prep the droid for another brew. 

 

 

 

[Jimbo]

Bit of an update.  

I've done 2 brews now, top end crisp and the Australian lager. 

Both currently 2nd ferment/ maturing in bottles awaiting tasting 😋 

Top end will be at 2.5 weeks by end this week so getting the itch to try a bottle 🤞 

 

I've rinsed everything then cleaned the droid with a brewart cleanser with the hops filter, bottle wand and connectors inside . Have drained and then sprayed inside with stellarsan with all the bits awaiting next brew go time.

Once I've emptied out the first lot of brew bottles then will start another brew. 

 

Have the ingredients to do the

Aztec cerveza

Belgian lager

Coopers red ale. 

 

Guess the question is Which one 🤔

 

Will refine the setup whilst not brewing. 

 

[Gillies Brewing]

2 hours ago, Jimbo said:

Guess the question is Which one 

Coopers Red Ale will be the one that's the most different to the other ones you already did. I reckon that's the way to go next!

Is it the Coopers Sparkling Ale or the Coopers Regency Park Red Ale? Either way it will be a good bit of variety to compare with your lagers.

Belgian would be worth a go to try a more European style lager

[Jimbo]

My thinking as well seeing as I've done lagers time to switch it up. 

I grabbed the Belgian simply cause of it's popularity. 

[Jimbo]

Great success 

[Jimbo]