Homebrew - and I don't mean HQ

[torilen]

Just curious - anyone here homebrew their own alcohol? I started about 6 weeks ago, and
I'm having tons of fun. And on top of that, I have quite a bit more alcohol to drink for the
cost. For example...I made a grape wine that I bottled on Friday. I ended up with a full
750ml wine bottle, plus 3 quart canning jars that I put away to age. All of that for roughly
$8.00 or so. And I make lots of ginger beer. I can make a gallon of ginger beer for roughly
$4.00 to $5.00, and it is a lot better than the stuff you can buy in the stores.

[Anderas]

Here in France a lot of people make wine as hobby.
It is a lot lot of work though. If you do it right it produces a lot more than you can drink... the officials take it into account. As soon as you have more than ten bushes you'll have to pay taxes for producing.

[Goblin-King]

I really want to try and brew beer, but haven't gotten around doing it yet. I want my brother to be in on it too. But coordinating projects between two people full of projects... well...

[cynthialee]

I have brewed on and off for years.
Not a master brewer but I do know my way around the brew shop.

My advice is to get some books, a hydrometer, good top shelf yeast and glass brewing vessels. Brewing in glass carboys is the best way to go. Metal, plastic and wood vessels can negatively influence the brew taste.
My next piece of advice is temperature control is your best friend. A brew that has to fight to survive makes far more fusil oil and that is headaches in a bottle.

[slev]

I'm sure I saw someone make an 2Heroic Brew" bottle lable in the past...

[cornixt]

Been brewing for years, although I can't drink it much any more. Tried my hand at wine but it didn't come out very good.
Food-grade plastic is fine for brewing and much easier to deal with than glass when you have 5 gallons in it. Just sanitize everything, get your temperature nice and low before pitching the yeast, and don't leave it in the back of a cupboard for 4 years.

[cynthialee]

I must disagree with the food grade plastic. It leaves a small amount of plastic chemicals in the brew. They said that these plastics were safe, but they are not. Not at all.

[cornixt]

If you could point towards a scientific study then that would be great. Or is this just BPA? The HDPE buckets used for fermenting are BPA-free.

[cynthialee]

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/ ... afe?page=2

In March 2011, the Environmental Health Perspectives paper by Jordan and researchers from CertiChem and PlastiPure appeared online. They'd tested 455 store-bought food containers and storage products, including several made from Tritan. The results? Seventy-two percent leached synthetic estrogens. And every type of plastic commonly used in food packaging (polypropylene and polystyrene, for example) tested positive in some cases, which suggested there was no surefire way to avoid exposure.

Food safe is just a buzz word the plastics manufacturers use to convince us of the safety of their products. We don't know enough about plastics to be sure. (I do admit that when I rack the wine I siphon into a "food safe" plastic container if my other glass carboy is busy, but that wine sits in the vessel no longer than 10 minutes. If my other glass carboy is available I will not rack into the plastic vessel. I just don't like the idea of alcohol coming in contact with plastics, we don't know what could be leaching out of the container.

We know glass and ceramics are safe. So I would stick with glass and ceramic.

A 4-6 gallon glass carboy is heavy, but not so heavy it is too heavy. I can lift one full of wine with out too much effort. (ok some days I make my stronger sweetie lift it for me)

[torilen]

I've only done a bit of studying myself, but I have to agree that "food-safe" plastics don't feel all that safe
to me, either. I use glass carboys (gallon size - I do small-batch brewing right now). If you have a few spare
bucks, I would suggest getting some glass fermenters when you get the chance. I got my two off Amazon
for about $10-$11 a piece, with free shipping (if you're a prime member).

http://www.amazon.com/AGC-OC-EP2C-0K74- ... ass+carboy

Of course, I don't use the microwave, either...call me a nut if you want. I know there are a lot of varying
studies about it. But here's my proof: We have three kids, and every doctor we have talked to says to never
microwave breast milk. Not only because it can overheat it and cause burns, but because it kills any special
vitamins and antibodies that the milk contains that are good for the baby. If it does that to breast milk, it is
doing to to food.