Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Brewing Beer

While looking for the mailer list aliases, I came across this one, home brew. I was so curious about it, that I added myself to this group.

Brewing your own beer at home.... sounds interesting, isn't it? But it looks like it's no simple job. When I read this, I was so much tempted to try it.

If you haven't tried it, and are so inclined, the Pliny the Elder recipe (or Pliny the Younger) is a fantastic brew. If you're a hop head, you'll absolutely love it, and I've poured it for women who don't like beer and they loved it too. It's truly a beer-lover's beer, and one that will even satisfy those looking to try a good home brew. I obviously can't say enough good things about it. It's *just* right, and the citrus overtones must be what captures the non-beer fanatics. :)

So I tried to read more about the beer making and how to start with it. I went through couple of mails and it started dawning on me that I don't understand anything of what they talk about (except of course for smell and taste of the finished products).

I tried to google for the "Getting Started" stuff. One needs a toolkit - buckets, bottles, carboy, hydrometer, thermometer etc. etc. I could understand the equipments but then I got lost.

What's all-grain? what's keg?
What's hops? and rhizomes?
what's extract brewer? and finishing cones? and lagering?

Sheesh, I feel so illiterate. Will I be able to brew any beer at all?

8 comments:

aaditya sood said...

I say, go for it!

(/me promises to give you all the moral support you need...)

Anonymous said...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homebrewing

neurohavoc said...

i would like to add self to ur list of supporters. if you could give a tentative date of when the brew will be ready i could book tickets in advance :)
as for all-grain, i have heard it only for whiskies and there its a whisky where u dont use malt. supposed to be the worst kind of whisky... as for the rest of the words i am almost clueless but they all sound very interesting :p

emanish said...

hmm you should be the inspiration to many (girls who are getting married). I mean i have heard about girls learning to cook. But brewing at home... now that something :)

Aadis is lucky, You sure are a good 'home-maker' !

emanish said...

Check my post - Daku's Rule

Moonjungle said...

My dad tried beer brewing at home when we were kids. He went through 5 disastrous trials. Then he found is halo & came up with some strange brew that vaguely hinted at beer & kicked like a mule.

As a kid & a spectator: all the transparent tubes & funnels & drums were a riot to watch. I used scare my sisters with the whole set up. I told them my dad wanted a a 4th child, but not a human child, but a yeast monster.

pbc said...

I brewed 2x a month for 10 years, and then I moved to Bangalore a while back.

I don't even know if it's legal in India. Where to get barley or malt? Hops?

Where would you even start?

How to brew is the easy part. Getting the supplies is the hard part.

V said...

Hmmm, When I wrote this post, I didn't know anything about brewing. Later I found out that it's not legal in India.

:-(

And then as you said, getting the supplies is really hard. But I would definitely like to try it at least once, when I am in some other country.