Anyone on here make there own alcoholic beverages?
Getting my kit on saturday and for my first attempt I will be having a go at cider, if that works out ok i will move on to beer 
I have got a few recipes from the net and my favourite so far is toffee apple cider 
Anyone have any tips or recipes?
if you canât remember anything, 1 of 2 things happened;
1 went really really, really well, you got absoutly â â â â â â â and as a bonus youâve got most of the worlds brewers sat on you front door wanting youâre recipe
2 it went really really really bad, your home is a bomb site, and youâre wanted in every state of the US for moonshining.
which ever way it goes good luck
Few years ago I made some lager for bottling, 40 pints. After being left standing for the correct time at the right temperature etc I tried some and it tasted like pure sewage!!! The remaining 39 bottles where put in the old coal shed and forgotten about. About 6mths later they resurfaced and another bottle was opened, it now had a magical taste and alcoholic content was 11.4%. 
Half a pint of that was more than enough. Was made by Edme Home Brew.
Make sure all equipment is sterilised, buy all the correct gear, will work out expensive to start but the more you make the cheaper it gets. Nothing like getting plastered and saving money at the same time 
raymundo:
Few years ago I made some lager for bottling, 40 pints. After being left standing for the correct time at the right temperature etc I tried some and it tasted like pure sewage!!! The remaining 39 bottles where put in the old coal shed and forgotten about. About 6mths later they resurfaced and another bottle was opened, it now had a magical taste and alcoholic content was 11.4%.
Make sure all equipment is sterilised, buy all the correct gear, will work out expensive to start but the more you make the cheaper it gets. Nothing like getting plastered and saving money at the same time
Yeh been told that everything has to be kept clean because one bit of bacteria will ruin your batch and you will end up with 10 years supply of vinegar lol.
I gotta buy all the kit so thats gonna be the biggest cost but i can get my ingredients in bulk from makro, gonna pop down there on saturday to get the sugar, apple juice and other bits and bobs.
Will post a diary on here to show how it goes.
I dont drink beer any more so mine would have to be a still, but very muchly frowned upon by HMCE. 
AS raymundo says sterilise everything,it might be a good idea to boil all of the water that you are going to use .The water companies in England let a lot of bugs and other nasties through the taps.I found that a 1 pint bottle of beer was too much so started to use screw top jam jars instead.
I have always fancied doing it but my attempts at making pickled eggs or onions are wasted because I eat them before they are ready. I fear the same thing may happen with homebrew 
All you need to know about brewing below I found it very goodâŚ
hope it helps. 
Wheel Nut:
I have always fancied doing it but my attempts at making pickled eggs or onions are wasted because I eat them before they are ready. I fear the same thing may happen with homebrew
If you want to be able to crap thru the eye of a needle⌠go ahead
raymundo:
Wheel Nut:
I have always fancied doing it but my attempts at making pickled eggs or onions are wasted because I eat them before they are ready. I fear the same thing may happen with homebrewIf you want to be able to crap thru the eye of a needle⌠go ahead
After drinking Marstons Pedigree for 9 years I can already do that, not a problem 
fermenting yeast in your gut, think about the consequences⌠better you than me 
If youâre going to try it let me know where you will be so I can keep well away
Righteo.
Bought the equipment today which consisted of -
5 Gallon tub
Siphon
Hydrometer
Thermometer
Airlock
Sterilizer
Total cost ÂŁ28
Ingredients -
12 litres apple juice
1kg honey
tin of pear halves
yeast
vanilla extract
Total cost ÂŁ17
First step was to sterilize all the kit, I put it all in the tub and added 1 gallon of water and 2 teaspoons of sterilizer.
Next step was to heat the honey up for 20 mins, i made 2 major mistakes
Number 1, I forgot about it 
Number 2, I left the back door open, the smell of the honey attracted quite a few wasps, i counted 7 at one point i killed 2 and managed to get the others to retreat back outside
I then had to blend the pear halves
I then had to leave the honey to cool down then add it to the tub (after i emptied it out) with the mushy pear halves and 12 litres of apple juice. I gave it a good mix and then used the hydrometer to get the OG (original gravity), it was 1.065, if the FG (final gravity) is 1.000 then I will have a cider with an ABV (alcohol by volume) of 8.53%
I then added the yeast and sealed the tub up with the lid and air lock, I put in in the spare room which is above the boiler so will keep warm.
The total cost per pint including the equipment is about ÂŁ2, excluding the equipment it is about 70p a pint
raymundo:
I dont drink beer any more so mine would have to be a still, but very muchly frowned upon by HMCE.
And the Lincolnshire Fire Brigade
This is going to be interesting - it seems quite an adventurous start to homebrewing. Looks like youâll need 16 bottles there. Donât forget to clean all equipment when syphoning off too. Iâve only ever used beer kits which always surprisingly end up quite like the real thing, but just brew it all in my beer sphere which saves all the faff having to âdecantâ.
bubsy06:
Righteo.Number 2, I left the back door open, the smell of the honey attracted quite a few wasps, i counted 7 at one point
You daft bugger - thatâs the best bit of the flavour youâve lost 
Snudger:
This is going to be interesting - it seems quite an adventurous start to homebrewing. Looks like youâll need 16 bottles there. Donât forget to clean all equipment when syphoning off too. Iâve only ever used beer kits which always surprisingly end up quite like the real thing, but just brew it all in my beer sphere which saves all the faff having to âdecantâ.
I have bought another 33 litre tub and 24 x 500ml bottles.
I have to filter it thru some cloth into the new 33 litre tub to get rid of all the gunk, then leave it for another week then bottle it up. I clean everything I use just to be on the safe side, cant let all that potential cider turn into vinegar
Its been bubbling like hell and loads of foam on the top of the brew so the yeast is working well, gonna check the gravity when i get home on the weekend and see where its at. Gonna buy one of those beer kits and that will be brewed up as soon as i bottle this cider, also found my next project, its a kegerator homebrewing.livejournal.com/413981.html
The kegerator. Fantastic! Shame I only like real ale, though I wouldnât mind it chilled a little in the summer time, when the weather is high. Canât be bothered to bottle it then put it in the fridge even though it tastes even nicer somehow like that. You are supposed to put a hock of bacon it and leave the bits in so the big bits can chase the little bits for it to be proper scrumpy I believe.
Just in case you were thinking of getting a heater, I wouldnât bother. On on â â â â -up in a brewery once they said that they have to cool it down (it wasnât lager either) because of the heat generated. The copious foam in your example shows that itâs going fine and it also protects the brew from contamination. I like my beer fresh but they say leaving it for a few weeks usually improves it, but it takes a month to drink it anyway. Keep us updated!
Vodka is distilled ,where beer is brewed there are just a few differences in the process.There are instances of beer bottles exploding because they have been primed with too much sugar or the bottling has been done before fermentation has finished.Take care use your head and enjoy.