Home brewing.

Funky_Bold_Ribena

I don't drink but we have been making our own wine for around 4 years now; the OH just doesn't buy any wine anymore as he has plenty to drink here, and we give oodles away for presents etc.

Not done beer as I can't stand the smell, but making your own really is fab; and the equipment pays for itself fairly quickly.

For example we spent £15 on a 5 gall bucket, we make 5 galls of elderberry wine [to a secret recipe] each year, which involved only buying the yeast once a year and 5 bags of sugar; and so each 750cl bottle of wine actually costs 40p each if you factor in the up front costs, and 10p once you are in season 2.

Honeythief

My husband home brews and seems to have minimal equipment beyond the actual brew kit. A big bucket with a lid and a valve on it to let gases escape as the yeast does its thing, and when it has done brewing he decants the baby beer into bottles and caps them with a cap press thingy (I'm sure that's the technical term!), then sticks it in the garage for a few months. The outlay really doesn't seem to be that high.

Another friend has a still and that cost a lot more to set up, but he takes turns with other mates to make spirits and then they split the proceeds. I'm tempted to join in with them, but I suspect having strong drink in the house all the time would end badly, LOL.

CiderImbiber

I've tried several kits (lager & bitter) and they're not bad, but now I only make cider. You need:

• 5 gallon plastic tub
• 23 litres of cheap apple juice (Sainsburys Basics is now 70p/L, recently gone up from 65p/L)
• 1 or 2 bags of sugar (2 bags for very strong (>10%) brew)
• about 5 teaspoons of yeast
• large clingfilm
• flexible plastic tube
• bottles (glass or plastic) able to withstand pressure

You can sterilise the vessel with 2 pints of boiling water + a tsp of sodium metabisulphate (or just boiling water might do actually). Pour all the juice and sugar into the tub, mix with eg a large wooden spoon, and sprinkle the yeast on top.
(If you want to know the final alcohol content, take a sample of the juice before adding the yeast and measure the initial gravity using a hydrometer, then measure the final gravity when fermentation is finished and the alc. % = (initial gravity - final gravity) x 0.139).
Stretch a square of clingfilm over the vessel so that there are no gaps. In about a day, a large foam blob (the krausen) will rise up from the brew. After this subsides, it will start bubbling for about 2 weeks (and the clingfilm should bulge into a dome shape as CO2 is released by the yeast). When the clingfilm goes flat and the mixture begins to clarify, it's ready to be bottled. I add about half a tsp of sugar to each bottle before capping, so the cider will be fizzy.

Tastes great and gets you smashed.

Badrick

CiderImbiber wrote: »

(If you want to know the final alcohol content, take a sample of the juice before adding the yeast and measure the initial gravity using a hydrometer, then measure the final gravity when fermentation is finished and the alc. % = (initial gravity - final gravity) x 0.139).
.

Or take your readings and use this link.
http://www.brewersfriend.com/abv-calculator/