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hey everyone Im new this forum and homebrewing, im hoping to start up my own homebrew soon, and heres my first question:
When I told my dad that i was goin to start homebrewing he said he made many batches wihen he was younger and only got about 2% alcohol content. When you homebrew with a kit and all the equipment do you usually get aproximately 5% or so?
let me know guys
thanks
I was, and remain, one of the less cnoscientious brewers in these forums. So you can take my advice for what it's worth.
However I can state with a good amount of certainty that homebrew is usually stronger than 2% and can easily be elevated anyways. If you do decide to elevate the alcohol content, then the trick becomes how to do so without it badly affecting the flavour of your beer.
If you just use one of the kits, and do not add any sugars, then the alcohol content will stay somewhere in the 3%-4.5% area. If you want to measure the content more accurately, you can buy a hydrometer, a simple device which measures the density of the solution both before and after fermentation.
When I first started to brew in high school (lo, these 25 years ago!), I used to simply dissolve a 5lb. bag of sugar into the wort and let 'er rip. I would end up with a thin "beer" with about 8%-10% alcohol and lots of unfermented sugar remaining in the brew. And I drank it anyways, despite the unwholesome, tinny taste.
A slightly better suggestion is to buy a 2lb. bag of corn sugar at the brewing supply store, add that to your wort and then let the yeast go to town. (Save a little corn sugar for bottle fermentation.) The advantage with corn sugar is that it leaves fewer residual flavours in the beer. If you want you can experiment with fructose, corn syrup, molasses or maple syrup. Anything sugary and fermentable, just be certain to open a fresh container so that you do not infect your beer with something that's been hanging around the fridge for a few months. Also remember that fermentation tends to change the flavour of things -- flavoured beers, like maple and fruit beers, tend to have the extra sweetening and flavouring added after the initial fermentation.
Another simple trick is to add two cans of extracts where you would normally use one.
I have two suggestions if you want to brew stronger beer. 1) Bottle it in smaller bottles. (Go out today and begin downing Grolsch.) And 2) don't inflict your homebrew (of any strength) on your friends unless they ask for it.
thanks for the input guys, im prob gonna be heading to brampton to the wine and beer factory to pick up some supplies. They seem to be the best store around. Il let you guys know my progress as i proceed wiht this endevour.
