I know there are quite a few knowledgable people on here that home brew so I figure I would ask my questions here. First a little background. After reading this forum one day while browsing the boards I was struck with the urge to home brew. After reading some of the threads I came to the conclusion that a home brew supplies place down the street would be able to get me set up, so I bought their kit.
1 5gal glass carboy
1 6.5gal glass carboy
1 bottling bucket with nozzle
1 4' length of 1-1/4" od tubing
1 siphon
1 bottle capper
1 bag of bottle caps
1 triple scale hydrometer
1 hydrometer sample tube
1 stick on "fermometer" (for the carboy)
1 bottle of Star San
1 rubber stopper
1 airlock
1 big honking spoon
I also bought the Complete Joy of Home Brewing by Charile Papazian and an American Wheat kit from Brewcraft. I spent the last week reading the instructions with the kit and also Papazians beginner and intermediate sections of the book. So here come the questions:
1 5gal glass carboy
1 6.5gal glass carboy
1 bottling bucket with nozzle
1 4' length of 1-1/4" od tubing
1 siphon
1 bottle capper
1 bag of bottle caps
1 triple scale hydrometer
1 hydrometer sample tube
1 stick on "fermometer" (for the carboy)
1 bottle of Star San
1 rubber stopper
1 airlock
1 big honking spoon
I also bought the Complete Joy of Home Brewing by Charile Papazian and an American Wheat kit from Brewcraft. I spent the last week reading the instructions with the kit and also Papazians beginner and intermediate sections of the book. So here come the questions:
- Should I rack to secondary for this brew, so initial fermentation in the 5gal with blow of tube, then rack to 6.5 gal with the airlock?
- When fermenting in the 5 gal carboy with the blow off tube, does the tube go into a glass of water or just an empty container to catch blow off? My concern of the empty container would be allowing contamination.
- That spoon has to be 2 feet long, how the heck do you sanitize something like that? Maybe 1/2 at a time? Or does it need it since the wort will be boiling?
- My kit didnt come with a funnel, would any new funnel do or should it be food grade?
- The beer kit that I bought has no mention of when to add the specialty extracts, should I add after the grains have steeped when you would add the DME that the instructions mention? I have a feeling this is right but since it is my first time I would like some reassurance from someone who knows.