Home Brewing

With the price of shop bought beer rising astronomically, home brewing is not only a money saver, it’s
an interesting and enjoyable hobby. Gone are the days when you simply opened a can of Brigalow, added two pounds of sugar and left it to ferment on the end of the kitchen bench or out in the garden shed. Now it’s a more scientific process, and with the many products available today a keen home brewer can produce a beer as good as the best craft beers our there on the market at a fraction of the price.

Home brewing can be turned into an art form or made as simple as you wish. Some home brewers like to start from scratch and boil the malt or wheat grains rather than buy the ingredients already converted in a can. This is a more labor intensive process but the purists say it produces a finer tasting beer. I believe I can brew a beer just as good as the purists by using the easy method, mixing up a can of Coopers and a kilo of light dried malt.

The secret to home brewing is to ferment the brew in a fridge with a temperature controller plugged in. This allows the beer to ferment at a constant temperature and produces a much nicer beer without the off flavours associated with fermenting at too high or too low a temperature. I remember the old days when my beer fermented between 15 C and 30 C and tasted like pure vinegar.

Kegs are the big thing now but I still bottle my beer. It’s easier to wash out a bottle every night than fool around with flushing out beer lines, cleaning the keg, fixing leaking connections and wondering why your glass is full of gas and not beer. And the temptation not to pour a cold beer every time you walk past your keg would be overwhelming.

The internet is full of “how to brew beer” help and instructions from seasoned home brewers and experts alike for anyone wishing to take up this exciting hobby. Don’t settle for drinking overpriced commercial beer when you can enjoy home brewing and save money.