My first attempt at home brewing

[mantasm]

All right, everything's finished up for the night, here's a quick report of how the process went for me.

This was Austin Homebrew's Double IPA "mini mash" kit, which means it uses a combination of crushed grains and malt extract instead of just the malt extract. The guy at the store recommended it over all extract version.

Step 1: Sterilize equipment. I put everything in the bathtub and washed it with dish soap then the cleaner that came with the kit. I figure that should do it. My dog kept sneaking into the bathroom and sniffing the fermenter while I was boiling though.

Step 2: Put grains in the grain bag, soak them in water at 155 F for 45 minutes. This was pretty easy. Just kept the heat on low the whole time and periodically dipped the bag in and out. It smelled like strong tea and was an opaque brown color by the end of the 45 minutes.

Step 3: Add malt extract, dissolve, and bring to a boil. The extract was pretty nasty looking. It was brown and very thick.

Step 4: Add bittering hops, boil for 45 minutes, then flavor hops, then aroma hops. Adding the hops (in pellet form) made the pot boil over. Once I started adding the hops, the mixture had a very strong, fairly unpleasant smell. The whole house smells like it now, and my girlfriend is in bed with a headache.

Step 5: Cool wort down. I put the pot in the sink and ran water around it while I stirred it. It cooled down to 80 F in about 15 or 20 minutes. Pour into primary fermenter, add water, and measure specific gravity. Mine was about 1.08. Whatever that means.

Step 6: Add yeast, stir, and seal.

Everything went pretty well even though it was messy and smelled bad. I should be able to start secondary fermentation pretty soon after I get back into town after Christmas.

Here's the ingredients if anyone is interested:

Grains:
1 lb. Munich Malt
2.5 lbs. 2-Row
.25 lbs. Crystal 20

Malt Extract:
9 lbs. Pale Extract

Bittering Hops:
2 oz. Chinook
2 oz. Centennial

Flavor Hops:
1 oz. Centennial

Aroma Hops:
1 oz. Horizon

Dry Hops:
2 oz. Horizon