A big thank you goes out to my good friend Greg, a fellow beer enthusiast who was the main catalyst in helping this goal come to fruition.
I'm not entirely sure where the desire to complete this goal first came from. Maybe it could be traced back to the brewery tours I've done. Or maybe from hearing a lot of friends talk about their home brewing experiences (it's seriously an enormous deal in Colorado). Maybe it's just the promise of one day being able to brew a beer that's uniquely catered to my own taste. Maybe it was the failure of my one previous attempt at brewing: Peanut coffee.
This happened.
Regardless, Greg and I picked up our brewing supplies from The Brew Hut in Aurora, which just so happens to be attached to my favorite mircobrewery, Dry Dock (check them out here). We decided to go with an extract brew, the simplest method of beer brewing. It was the first time brewing for both of us after all. (Peanut coffee doesn't count.)
The first step was to sanitize everything. Equipment. Counters. Tables. Everything. We probably spent as much time sanitizing as we did brewing. Once that was done, we could move on to the meat of the matter.
Rather than laboriously describe the process, here are some photos:
The brew pots.
The bag of grains.
Adding the grains
Brewin' up some wort.
Adding the malt extract.
Greg pitching the yeast.
Checking the specific gravity.
After a week-long period of primary fermentation and settling, the beer was racked (siphoned) off of the spent yeast into a container for secondary fermentation. After another week there, it was racked again into a bottling bucket, priming sugar was added, and the beer was put into bottles for conditioning.
Overall, we ended up with about 40 bottles of beer.
After a couple of weeks of bottle conditioning (during which the carbonation develops and the beer clarifies), it was ready to be tested. And just in time for my birthday:
Cheers.
The result? Not bad for our first go. A respectable brown ale.
Greg and I are already planning what our next beer is going to be. I was advocating for something with cilantro in it. Mainly because I'm out of my mind. Greg Vetoed. I'm sure we'll agree on something soon. A hefeweizen, perhaps?
