Last Sunday morning was bottling day here at Castle Turling for our very first brew, a brown ale. I spent quite some time getting through two cases in order to have enough bottles. Then, the day before bottling day while I was washing all of the bottles I realized twelve of them were twist offs! This will never do! So, I had a choice, buy 12 bottles or drink all 12 of the Sierra Nevada Celebration's I had in the refrigerator. Mrs. Turling gave me the raised eyebrows when I told her of my predicament that could only mean one thing. I was buying 12 bottles.
The one thing I am noticing about this whole brewing process is the dedication to cleanliness. Now, I garden and build furniture, neither of which would be considered clean pastimes, so this takes a little work for me. I washed down all of the bottles and then needed to sanitize them. Our dishwasher has a sanitize function! Saved! Into the dishwasher they went.
See? It says it right there. Sanitized.
If my brew goes bad due to unsanitarinous (I'm pretty sure that's a word), then Kenmore owes me a few bucks!
After sanitizing the bottles, I set in to sanitizing everything else. Including me. Ok, I just washed my hands, but that's better then usual. After transferring the brew out of the fermenting bucket and into the bottling bucket that contained my priming sugar, it was a hop, skip and a jump to get it into the bottles. The kit worked like a charm containing everything I needed to make two cases.
I did taste the beer prior to going into the bottles, though, and I'm a little concerned. The beer carbonates while in the bottles, so it's flat coming out of the fermenting bucket. But, this brew had a sweetness to it I just didn't like. Hopefully, it was caused by it being flat, but we'll find out in two weeks. In the meantime, I'm thinking a pale ale might be my next target...
What exactly does your dishwasher 'sense' when it is 'sensing'? Is it a touchy-feely kind of machine? Splendid to see it full of beer bottles though.
ReplyDeleteVB, we bought the Dr. Phil of dishwasher's. It listens to me and then says I'm fat and lazy.
ReplyDeleteOh man. Well, I suppose it still beats doing them yourself.
ReplyDeleteFear not; that 'sweetness' will be eaten up and shitted out by the yeasties to give your beer a certain fizzazz. If you open one and it's still sweet, then you've opened it too early.
ReplyDeletePut it back, walk away, keep your hands where I can see them, you freak!
There, that my American bit for today.
So long as you didn't overdo the priming sugar, there's nothing to worry about. By the by, sanitising in a dishwasher is hit and miss. I recommend StarSan. I really do, StarSan is great. See, I did.
You bought 12 bottles when you had 12 in the fridge? Ha ha, your wife just did you an 'Ashley Cole'.
Thanks, IG. Your American impression was spot on. I used StarSan for everything else, but was tired of cleaning the damn bottles, so I thought to give the dishwasher a try. I'll hit them with the StarSan on the next batch.
ReplyDelete