Making craft beer requires a lot of dedication and effort on the part of the brewmaster. Making beer before the industrial revolution was a complex process involving years of knowledge and experimentation.
Currently it requires measuring instruments and technical knowledge. Without a doubt, having a good manual it is very easy to have a good batch if you have the appropriate tools.
Honestly, having a good batch of beer depends on the quantity and quality of the equipment you have, but without a doubt we invite you to do it for the first time and little by little you become interested in improving your process and can invest enough to have a high quality beer.
80% of the final result is in the planning
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If it is the first time, I recommend that you adapt a recipe to the amount of product that your equipment allows. I do not recommend brewing less than 4 liters or the equivalent of a gallon of beer.
In general, the following instruments are required for manufacturing, it is important to note that the best materials are stainless steel in one piece, secondly copper and thirdly glass. Make sure that all the equipment you use is made of these materials and if you use plastics or other materials, make sure that they are authorized by the FDA for use in the food industry. |
The basic equipment is as follows:
1 boiling pot
1 Mashing pot (some use a pot, others a cooler or bag)
1 Stove or burner
1 Siphon (I recommend the auto siphon) and siphon hose
1 Spoon
1 Thermometer (laboratory 100 degrees Celsius)
1 Fermenter (Stainless steel, copper or glass)
1 Scale (that can measure ounces and fractions, as well as kilos)
1 Mill (or buy ground grain)
1 PH meter (I suggest a digital one and only in case of worse is the ph strips nothing)
1 Gravity measuring equipment (densimeter or refractometer)
1 air trap for the fermenter.
Additional:
1 Stainless steel centrifugal pump, connections and hoses.
1 Heat exchanger.
Note: Cleaning must be extreme at the beginning and at the end, we must use special soap for beer and special disinfectant.
Having clarified the point, we are going to put the water in the pot to boil, either on the fire using a stove or using a stainless steel electric heater.
For this we must already have the ingredients or raw materials ready: Water, Hops, Malt and Yeast.
If you want to know about specific points to take care of for each of the materials, leave me a comment.
THE FIRST STAGE: The hot stage
Once the water reaches the desired temperature regularly of 66 to 70 degrees Celsius, we begin the mash. That is, water at the desired temperature is added to the mash pot. The temperature in this pot should remain at least 45 to 60 minutes, trying to keep the temperature constant.
Once the time has been reached we must separate the grain from the liquid, now called wort, to boil it. Before passing it, we must recirculate it for 15 minutes regularly, adding water at a few higher degrees to maximize the extract we obtain from the grains and not allow temperature to be lost in the process.
After 15 minutes of recirculation we are going to boil the wort. The function of boiling is to help the sugar in the wort dissolve and eliminate water. When it starts to boil, we add the third ingredient, which is hops.
Hops are the most difficult ingredient to weigh, if the production is small, since a small variation will make a big difference in the amount of bitterness. That is why I recommend no less than 20 liters of production per minimum batch.
Now yes, depending on the recipe, the hops should remain during the 60 minutes of the boil. If the recipe says less time for one or two types of hops, these should be added almost at the end of the boil. That is, if it says that one hop should only last 10 minutes and the total boil time is 60 minutes, at 50 minutes we will add the hops marked with a boil of 10 minutes. Hops are used to give bitterness and add aroma. Those that boil for longer add bitterness and those that are added for less time (10-15 minutes) add aroma.
Once the boiling process is finished (60 minutes or what the recipe establishes) you must cool the wort and you have just 45 minutes for the temperature to drop to 25 degrees or less, depending on the yeast you are going to use. It is very important to add the yeast as soon as possible, but it must be within the fermentation temperature range of the yeast, if it is too hot the yeast will die due to the high temperature, if it is too cold the yeast will stop working as it will be in a low temperature and could even freeze to death. I recommend that if you do not have a refrigeration system, you use the yeast available at your local ambient temperature to prevent the wort from spoiling and not getting beer in the end.
If you do not manage to cool in less than 45 minutes, you will not have pasteurized the wort, which is why you will have a lot of contamination and the yeast will have competition from micro organisms ready to take your wort from you and turn it into their food and way of life. If you want beer you must make sure that everything is favorable for the growth and multiplication of yeast, which ultimately ferments the sugar and gives us the beer we want.
SECOND STAGE: The cold stage
We must add the cold wort and the yeast to the fermenter that we are going to use, before closing it make sure that the pH marks 5.2, the temperature is within its survival range and do not forget to take the gravity at which we will say initial gravity.
Almost all beers go through two or three fermentations depending on its evolution. The first fermentation occurs between 7 and 14 days, the second at the end of the first and no more than 21 days in the second, if a third fermentation is required it will be longer than 30 days.
If you use a conical fermenter called a single fermenter or unitank. During the entire process it will be the only fermenter to be used, therefore at 7, 14, 22 and 30 days you will have to purge the yeast settled at the bottom of the tank cone. If you do not have a conical fermenter, you will have to change the fermenter from the first to the second fermentation and the same thing happens when starting the third fermentation.
The act of using faith
At the end of fermentation you should have a gravity of approximately 1.009 to 1.012 unless the recipe says otherwise. If the gravity matches the recipe you can end the fermentation.
If you have filtering equipment you will have to start filtering or simply prepare for natural or artificial carbonization.
You can filter it with a 1 micron filter, or you can also cool the beer to the coldest temperature.
THIRD STAGE: Bottling
Once filtered, you must start the carbonation process using forced carbonation or natural carbonation. You achieve natural carbonation by adding a little must, sugar and yeast. But if you want to artificially carbonate, you must add a CO2 tank and regulate the pressure so that within two days, at a constant flow, the pressure inside the container is maintained and the water particles mix with the gas and form a single liquid.
Now carbonated you can wash, disinfect and fill your bottles.
I wish you much success in your first production, if you would like to participate in a production, contact us, maybe we can help you.
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