Help a noob

Fill with vodka/bottled water/sanitizer and put the lid back on

 

You're fine. It just makes a mess really.

 

Not only will you stick with it, but you will be addicted...watch out!!

The most important thing for your first brew is to just go through the motions and learn the steps...all the kinks get worked out over time...

I can assure you that no matter how hard you try, you will screw up at least one thing...I've brewed 50 plus batches and I still feel like something goes wrong on every brew day...and I've still made a lot of awesome beer!!

 

This guy speaks the truth. In fact, he still owes me some awesome brews.

 

And let the paranoia begin!

 

Don't touch it for two weeks. That's 14 days. Seriously.

If you have another fermentation bucket, brew another before this one is ready. You've already learned a lot from your first batch.

 

What he said. Yes, keep an eye on it for the next couple days, make sure you get a bit of action from the airlock, and things don't blow out, but no matter the temptation, DO NOT OPEN THE BUCKET for at least two weeks, longer if there appears to be action for a week or more. I generally check my beers a couple times a day for the first 48 - 72 hours, then forget about it till 3 weeks after brew day.

 

Your on the right track my friend. I highly recommend John Palmer's 'How to Brew', it was my bible in the beginning and I still refer to it (although I designed an Excell workbook for formulating my recipes, containing info from many sources), it will serve you well and packed full of info for starters and vets alike.

 

3 weeks is good.

2 weeks is also good. I really like being on a 2-week brewing schedule, with one batch brewed each weekend, and every week you also bottle the one you did two weeks ago. This maximizes production (at least with my facilities). However, you are somewhat restricted on what beers you can make with this schedule. You can't be making bretts, RIS, berliner-weiss, sours, rosary blend yeasted beers, lagers, etc because they're not ready to bottle or keg in two weeks time. No biggie for me, as I usually make simpler ales anyway, blonde, wheats, IPA, pale ale, SMaSH, oatmeal stout, etc, which can be completed in this timeframe. But anytime something runs over, I miss a weekend's brewing, or whatever, it's no big deal, the beer will be fine.

Less than two weeks is bad. Yeast may not be done, or may not be done cleaning up at least. Resist the temptation to rush things. Beer is about patience, which is probably why beer is the natural drink for fishin'.

I've actually left one beer in primary for five weeks before. I still have a couple bottles of it left (cascade/vienna smash). Came out fine. Only way to mess that one up would have been to open it too early.

 

It's your first batch, don't get too over the top. I started with a basic home brew kit (the standard with a fermenting bucket, tubing, a plunger thing for filling bottles, and capper. I had to figure out how to get the siphon going (filled tube with water, etc.). I used extract kits and a 5 gallon pot used for canning and sealing preserves. Keep it simple to start. If you feel it's too much work, you may lose interest.

Your temp control sounds good, however... I've found that using ambient air isn't as good. I got better results when I put the fermenting bucket in a big tub of water (either the bathtub or one of those big Rubbermaid storage bin things). For my system, the fermenting temp is consistently within 2 degrees of the ambient water temp. I found greater variation with using ambient air temp. I think it's because of the thermal mass of the water.

I just wanted to add my 2 cents.

 

Sure, beers are probably, generally done or at least can be bottled in 2 weeks. For some reason, thought, with my equipment and so forth, 3 weeks seems to be the go time for beers. I used to run 2 weeks all the time, and while me beers were good, there was a something there. I had to leave one for 3 and it was the best I had brewed by a long stretch. I went back to 2 for a couple batches and that something was there again. Been doing 3 since then, and I feel the beer has improved. Note that this was also independent of any other changes I had made.

 

May have to appropriate this for a fly-fishing forum signature line.

 

thoughts:

• now that you've done it with ice, I see a wort chiller in your near future
• if you had gunk in the airlock, you were at least flirting with the idea of explosion. have a blowoff tube setup handy for situations like this. essentially for a standard bucket that would be a piece of hose that fits tightly into the hole where the airlock goes, the other end going into a container of starsan solution
• a little yeast making its way from the fermenter to the bottling bucket ain't no biggie
• I always test one bottle of each batch at a week or so to see how they're doing.
• I have found that five ounces of priming sugar is about the upper limit of what you probably should use for a five gallon batch, if reasonable to slightly on the high end carbonation levels is you goal. Five ounces is also the amount I happen to use on most of my batches. I don't like under-carbed beer.
• Five ounces also seems to result in the beer reaching ample levels of carbonation faster, but this may be my perception and not be based in true facts
• regardless of any carbonation ramblings or early samplings, all of my beers so far have tasted better after at least two weeks in the bottles, some longer. My current batch of elderberry wheat is a bit slow to carbonate, and probably still hasn't reached perfection after two weeks. I think they'll be fine next week.
• what's up for batch two hoss?

 

One of my early beers and early recipes was an extract hoppy amber. It came out really good, and I'll probably make it again, all grain this time, but same basic idea, similar or identical hops. I think this is a good style for you for batch 2. Well, whether it's hoppy or not is more up to you, but don't shy away from the idea of a hoppy amber if that floats your boat. You'll make a real tasty beer, solidify your process, learn more, and have a high probability of success. You've put a lot of effort into batch one, I have confidence you'll make tasty beer for batch two.