Today is "Learning to Homebrew Day!" Yes, this is an official holiday in the beer world!! In honor of this awesome holiday, we have presented 5 of the most helpful tips we wish we knew while learning how to make beer.
1. The key to a successful brewed beer is in the sanitation. You can make the most yummy beer, but if you forget to sanitize, say goodbye to your 'liquid gold.' This happened to us once in the early years. We had sanitized EVERYTHING ( so we had thought.) We bottled our beer, came back two weeks later, and saw floaty-s in the beer. It wasn't just one bottle, it was all of them. We thought it was yeast that got into the bottles during transfer. To make sure it was ok to drink, we took a bottle to Brewmaster, a local brew supply store, and they confirmed it as bacteria. We had to ditch the beer. We figured out we didn't sanitize the bottles good enough. Something must have been at the bottom of the bottles that we missed while cleaning them. Lesson learned!
2. Don't drink so much beer that you boil over. You have to drink beer while you brew, it's the law of home brewing! But just watch yourself on brew day! We had a brew day where four different brewers (two had won awards for their beer, the others were just learning) came over, with their equipment and supplies. One of the award winners kept saying through out the day about not boiling over. You can lose a lot of beer when it happens and then your recipe is off. (There are work arounds, it just plain sucks when it happens!) This advice quickly turned into bragging rites, with the more beer he drank. Soon his warnings turned into jokes, "How can you tell a beginner brewer from an expert brewer? If he boils over!!!!!" And guess who was the only one to boil over that day? Yep, the "expert"of the bunch! He will never live this story down!!!
3. Don't forget to transfer your beer! Always write down your transfer/ bottling schedule on a calendar. We forgot to transfer our beer into secondary in a timely manner ( 2 weeks is the norm, we transferred at 6 weeks!) As a result, the water in the airlock got so low that air got into the carboy and bacteria started to grow. We had to dump 10 gallons of beer.
4. If you're brewing in California, or a place that is experiencing a drought, make sure to capture your water as you are cooling it with your wort chiller. We run our water into barrels so we can later use the water for hydrating our plants.
5. It's ok to start with an extract for for first time to get the hang of brewing. There is a big learning curve when starting to brew. Start slow and small. A kit is a great way to learn to process and jargon, while successfully creating a drinkable beer!
So Happy "Learn To Homebrew Day!" We hope you find these tips helpful. We would love to hear any tips you have! And feel free to learn more about brewing with our article, "Making Beer."
We get a lot of questions about beer soap. Test your knowledge to see how much you know about Handbrewed Soap's Beer Soap! Answer True or False to each question. Then check your answers below! Good luck and have fun!
1) I will smell like beer if I use beer soap.
2) If I get pulled over while driving for intoxicated driving, I can blame it on the beer soap.
3) Beer adds lather the the bar.
4) Beer used in the soap is the wort.
5) If I suck on the soap, I can get drunk.
6) Handbrewed Soaps is made by a wife and husband team that love to homebrew.
Answers:
1) I will smell like beer if I use beer soap. False. The alcohol burns away in the soap making process. Therefore, there is no alcoholic smell the soap will give you. (If you are experiencing an alcoholic smell, you might want to remember what you drank last night as it may be coming out in your pores!) Fragrance Oils and Essentials oils are added to compliment the type of beer used in the soap!
2) If I get pulled over for intoxicated driving, I can blame it on the beer soap. False. All I can say is that if you blame it on the soap, you will most likely be getting into more trouble....
3) Beer adds lather to the bar. True. Beer (along with the coconut oil) used in the soap adds to the lather. Handbrewed Soaps have a great lather.
4) Beer used in the soap is actually the wort. False. We ACTUALLY use beer in our soap! I know many are concerned that we are wasting a good beer. I promise you that in relationship to how much we brew, it's very little. We also add our spent grains as an exfoliant in some of our bars!
5) If I suck on the soap, I can get drunk. False. As stated in number one, the alcohol burns away in the soap making process. The best you would get is a clean mouth.
6) Handbrewed Soaps is made by a wife and husband team that loves to homebrew. True. We married our passions together, his for homebrewing and mine for making soap. Homebrewing has a special place in our hearts as it is a time when friends and family come together to create and share in beer! Read more here to learn about why we homebrew.
I must say, I am falling in love with Oregon. It's beautiful country and the people are super friendly! The food is amazing! I ordered a side salad expecting iceberg lettuce with carrots and tomatoes, but instead received a bed of fresh mixed greens with beets, cucumbers, tomatoes, garbanzo beans, croutons, corn, and carrots! Then when I ordered milk for the kids, the server asked, "Cow or soy?" "One of each!" I responded as my lactose intolerant daughter beamed because no restaurant EVER has soy milk! I can go on and on about how awesome Oregon is (there are gas attendants that pump your gas. I mean they tell you to get back in your vehicle if you try to pump your own!), and I just did!!! The day kept getting better. We then went to Rogue Farm in Independence, OR. Basically, everything they grow is what they put into their beers. We were greeted with acres of hops fields. As you enter the actual farm, there is a tasting room on your left that offers food with a kids menu.There are picnic tables that line the perimeter of lawn where you are welcome to play corn-hole, frisbee, giant chests, or giant scrabble! You can take a tour with an employee or walk around yourselves (just make sure you don't go into any areas that say Employees Only). We spent a good two hours there and would have stayed longer had the heat not gotten to us! So the next time you are in Oregon, stop at Rogue Farms! It's a very chill, family beer environment!
As we all know, beer was safer to drink during colonial times than water was. And it was a major dietary staple from the cradle to the grave. Infants were fed it, and it was recommended to breast feeding mothers. In the formative colonial years, beer was brewed at home and most households built a brewroom on the side of their house. Hops grew wild in the forests around the towns, which was a huge plus for these homebrewers. As currency was established in the colonies and trade was possible with England, taverns began to pop up. Taverns were not just a place to get a drink, but to socialize and hold meetings. The tavern actually became one of the most important meeting places a town could have. And, many of the constitutional ideas were formed in taverns. (As we know, Thomas Jefferson wrote the first draft of the Declaration of Independence. But did you know that he wrote it while drinking Madeira at his usual table in the Indian Queen Tavern in Philadelphia?)
But how do we really know that the founding fathers as a group drank a lot? Well, believe it or not, there are records of their shenanigans. In 1787, two days before they signed the Constitution, the 55 delegates to the convention went to a local tavern. According to the bill, they drank 54 bottles of Madeira, 60 bottles of claret, 8 whiskeys, 22 porters, eight hard ciders, 12 bottles of beer and 7 bowls of alcoholic punch. They did have a reason to celebrate!! And keep in mind, that may seem like a lot, but the average American at the time drank many more the times as Americans of today do. Getting drunk, but not losing control, was much more acceptable than it is today.
So there you have it! As we celebrate our nation, don't forget to drink a beer ... it's a tradition!
(Handbrewed Soaps is NOT endorsing getting drunk, just to celebrate... responsibly!)
At Handbrewed Soaps, we believe that brewing beer and soap
are both a science and an art.Just like
a science experiment, you must follow some basic rules in order to produce the
desired outcome or product—in our case, beer and soap.And, as with art, individual interpretation,
experimentation, and improvisation are encouraged and expected.While many brewers
feel that they have found the “best way” to brew beer, there are so many
variables in the brewing process, that there’s a good chance that a homebrewer
in your own neighborhood is doing something radically different or just subtly
unique enough that you could apply to your own brewing process to make more
interesting or flavorful beers… and soaps!At Handbrewed Soaps, we have developed our own unique style of brewing
and soap-making by reading, researching, and hanging out with fellow
homebrewers and soapmakers.We hope that
you enjoy the methods, tips, and tricks that we use in our brewing and
soapmaking process!
If you are new to brewing beer or soap, and want to learn
more about the basics of either (or both!), we highly recommend How to Brew byJohn
Palmer and The Soapmaker’s Companion
by Susan Miller Cavitch.Of course there
are hundreds, if not thousands, of resources online to help you get started and
support you every step along the way. Below
is an overview of how Brew Master Eric Swihart brews the beer, and how Soap
Lady Alyson Swihart transforms the beer into soap.Don’t worry, we don’t use all of the beer to
make soap-- we drink a lot of it too!!!
The VERY basics of
Homebrewing
We’re going to assume that you already have some basic
brewing supplies (boiling pots or kettles, buckets, fermentation vessels (glass
or plastic carboys), etc.).If not, head
down to your local homebrew store, and they will hook you up with everything
you need to get started.Likewise, we
assume you already have some basic soap making supplies including stainless steel
pots, hand mixer, and molds.Don’t go overboard.Start small and keep it manageable.It’s no fun to jump in over your head, only to get discouraged and
quit.Do what’s manageable for you right
now.Don’t jump in to all-grain brewing
until you have the time, equipment, and brewing experience to make the
jump.I brewed about 10 extract batches
before making the jump to all-grain.I’m
very glad I did, but if I had jumped in to all-grain brewing before getting
some experience with simple extract kits, I would have been very
overwhelmed.Have fun, start small, and
grow your homebrewing setup as your brewing skills advance.
Put together a recipe
What kind of beer should you brew?Brew the beer that you (and your friends)
like to drink.You’re going to be making
5 to 10 gallons of beer, and it would take one person a long time to drink that
much beer.So, make the kind of beer
that you—and your helpful/thirsty friends like to drink.At Handbrewed Soaps, our three most popular beers
(and soaps) are I.P.A., Oatmeal Stout, and Hefeweizen (American Wheat Beer, to be specific.)We decided to share our Orange Honey Wheat
Ale Recipe with you.We will first
explain the beer-making process, and then describe how Alyson transforms Eric’s
beer into soap.
Clean and sanitize!
Everything that comes in contact with your brewing
ingredients needs to be clean and sanitized.I personally recommend PBW (Powdered Brewery Wash), which is an
environmentally-friendly, biodegradeable alkali cleaner.After everything is clean, I sanitize it with
Star-San, an odorless, tasteless, food-grade sanitizer made from phosphoric
acid.I have never lost a beer to contamination
or infection, when I have used these two products to clean and sanitize my
equipment.Of all of the steps in the
brewing process, this is one of the most important.
Let’s make beer!
After everything has been clean and sanitized, you can and
should start making beer!In order to
make beer, you need four main ingredients: Water, Grain, Hops, and Yeast. Technically, any combination of grain can be
used to make beer, but the most common grain is malted barley, which serves as
the “base” for most beers.Additonal
grains (rye, oats, and wheat) and a supporting cast of specialty grains
(carmel/crystal, roasted, and dark malts) and adjuncts (honey, spices, herbs,
etc.) can be used to make some very tasty homebrew.Typically, the grain bill for wheat beers
(hefeweizens) is 30-70% wheat.The
grain bill for our orange honey wheat ale is going to be 40% wheat, with some
additional support from orange honey wheat and orange zest.
All-Grain Brewing
All of the beer we brew at Handbrewed Soaps (for drinking
and soap-making) is brewed on a three-tier, all-grain brewing setup built by
our friend and fellow homebrewer Jaston Hopkins, (aka Jaston of the
Woods).
Starch Conversion
The first part of all-grain brewing involves cracking or
“crushing” the grain you’ve selected.By
cracking the grain, two things are accomplished:1) you’re making the starch accessible for
conversion, and 2) the husk of the grain settles in the bottom of the mash tun
and acts as a filter to prevent grain from transferring into the boil
kettle.We are going to soak our grain
in hot water (at approximately 152° F) for about 60- 90 minutes. At this
temperature, enzymes in the grain start acting on the starch to convert it to
sugar (fermentable).This is a process
called saccharification.
Lautering and Sparging
Once the starches in the grain have been converted into
sugar, you need to separate the sugars from the grain.This is a process called lautering.Sprinkle 170° water over the top of the grain
to 1) stop the enzymes from converting starch and 2) wash the sugar off the
grain and into your boil kettle.The
process of sprinkling water over the grain to remove the sugar is called
sparging, which literally means “sprinkling.”The sugar water resulting from the mashing and lautering process is
called wort.(We have to go through a
few more steps before we have actual beer.)
Boiling
Once you’ve collected the wort in the boil kettle, and the wort
is boiling, add your hops at the times indicated on your recipe.Hops
added at the beginning of the boil are called bittering hops, because the
extended boiling time allows you to extract the highest amount of oils
(bittering qualities) from the hops.The
hops added during the middle part of the boil are for flavor, and the hops
added at the end of the boil are used to give the beer aroma.After 60 or 90 minutes, depending on your
recipe (and the style of beer you’re brewing), cool the wort with a wort
chiller.
*Wort is what we call beer before the yeast has eaten the
sugar and created alcohol.
Fermentation
1)Once wort reaches 75° (people have their own
preferences for higher and lower temps) transfer the wort to a sterilized carboy,
aerating it as much as possible in the process.Aerating the wort is helpful to ensure a vigorous, efficient, and
complete fermentation.
2)Leave 4” of headroom at the top of the carboy.During peak fermentation, the yeast will rise
(“krausen”) up to 4-6” above the liquid level in the carboy, and if you haven’t
allowed room for this to occur, prepare for a very messy result!
3)Put on
airlock or blowoff hoses, to allow for the yeast to “burp” off CO2 while
preventing external air from coming into contact with the beer
4)Put in a
cool dark place, and monitor frequently.When the “peak krausen” has dissipated and the airlock bubbles less than
once per minute, transfer the beer to secondary fermentation.
5)After 7-14
days, transfer the beer into keg or bottles, for carbonation.Beer can be carbonated in a keg in 2-3 days,
with forced CO2.Bottle-conditioned beer
takes approximately 2 weeks to become fully carbonated, by adding corn sugar to
the bottle prior to filling it with beer.
At this point, we take the beer to make the soap. See Part Two of our from Grains to Soap series to learn more!
