Bottles or barrels?

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Bottles or barrels?

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Treacodactyl
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
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Posted: Sat Feb 05, 05 7:55 pm Post subject: Bottles or barrels?

For Christmas I made a 4 gallon batch of beer from just malt (liquid and crystal grains), hops, water and yeast. I followed my own recipe. I bottled half in mostly plastic bottles and put the rest in a handy 2 gallon beer barrel.

Although it didn't fully clear and was a tad too bitter if produced a very drinkable winter ale.

There was a noticeable difference between the bottles and barrel with the barrel beer tasting much better. The barrel is also much easier to use but it's not good to have 16 pints to get through in a week.

What do other beer brewers use and do you have a preference?

jema
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28235
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Sat Feb 05, 05 8:08 pm Post subject:
When I got back in wine making in the Summer I also got a couple of barrels and started beer making again as well. Barrels are better and more convenient..... but you have to drink the beer and at the end of the day we are not big beer drinkers and so have given up on this one again. jema

rhyddid

Joined: 30 Jan 2005
Posts: 228

Posted: Sat Feb 05, 05 10:37 pm Post subject: Re: Bottles or barrels?

Treacodactyl wrote:

What do other beer brewers use and do you have a preference?

I use kegs, casks, and glass bottles.

None of this equipment was obtained from homebrew shops. Most homebrew shop equipment is <opinion>toy-town stuff</opinion>.

Each storage method has it's own merits.

Bottles are time-consuming to prepare, but once the beer is in the bottle and properly carbonated it will keep for a long time. Also very portable.

For that spontaneous barbeque.

Plastic PET bottles are useful, particularly if you use the 2 litre (4 pint) sizes. The only problem is that they do 'breathe'. I'm not sure what the technical term is, perhaps permeable. The quality of the brew will deteriorate over time.

Glass and plastic bottles cost nothing. You can of course pay for
them if you're not prepared to find them.

Kegs require the expense of the keg itself/gas/gas regulators/dispense equipment. And some skill. BUT kegs offer the most precise method of carbonating beer. Just to clarify,
by 'keg', I mean a real keg, as used by a brewery, not the
stuff you would pick up in a homebrew shop.

Casks (the type of things used for real ale) require a beer engine to pull the beer up from the cask. The cask require a small investment in bungs/keystones/shives. And some skill. No gas equipment required. Gas pressure provided by natural fermentation. Real ale tends to served flat (certainly, flat in comparison to the fizzy swill most people drink).

I prefer the cask method because it produces a beer with a superior and more complex flavour. As CAMRA would say, real ale is a living product. I believe the cask accentuates the true flavour of good beer.

Good luck with your brewing !

jema
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28235
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Sat Feb 05, 05 10:53 pm Post subject:
I can only agree about homebrew kegs being toytown stuff even if that is what I have jema

rhyddid

Joined: 30 Jan 2005
Posts: 228

Posted: Sat Feb 05, 05 11:12 pm Post subject:

jema wrote:

I can only agree about homebrew kegs being toytown stuff

even if that is what I have

I don't know if you're a real ale fan, but you can use homebrew shop kegs with a beer engine. You just dip the tube coming off the beer engine into your keg, and tape a makeshift seal on the keg. Voila,
you can serve your homebrew real ale-style

I was very fortunate to pick up a beer engine at a car boot sale for �10, when in fact, it was worth around �50. The first time I used the beer engine, I put the tube straight into my 5 gallon secondary fermentor.

It worked a treat. It was only many months later that I finally got enough money together to buy a cask.

jema
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28235
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 05 12:23 am Post subject:
I love well conditioned real ale in a pub atmosphere, but at home I still think wine and whiskey would reign supreme jema

Gertie

Joined: 08 Jan 2005
Posts: 1638
Location: Yorkshire

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 05 6:26 am Post subject:

Lundy and I are going to get back into beer-making this year. A couple of years ago we made some really strong dark beer, not as nice as Guinness but a close second. Only thing is we had so much we got sick of it and ended up giving it to the horses - who love it!!!!

Will have to buy Lundy a new keg as I've been using it to fill the water buckets in the field with (dare not show him the state of it now!).

The only wine I have made is elderberry wine. Here, Jema, how are you doing with your wine cellar - drank it all yet?!!!!

jema
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28235
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 05 7:56 am Post subject:

Gertie wrote:

The only wine I have made is elderberry wine. Here, Jema, how are you doing with your wine cellar - drank it all yet?!!!!

It certainly ain't there for show

Just as well another 150 bottles worth is in the works

jema

Treacodactyl
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 25795
Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 05 9:34 am Post subject:

I love real ale. I like a little sparkle but hate the creamy heads or the artificially carbonated stuff. A fresh cask of conditioned beer is heaven.

My little barrel is not artificially carbonated and if I'm careful when I serve the beer has a pleasant sparkle for about a week. I wouldn't want to make much more than this for myself.

What's the smallest cask you can get?

It may just be the plastic bottles I'm using, but the beer tastes a bit too like the sediment, sort of plasticly. I wouldn't expect this as the bottles are clean carbonated mineral water ones.

For the spring/summer I'll make a session bitter than can be drunk in larger amounts.

Mrs Fiddlesticks

Joined: 02 Nov 2004
Posts: 10460

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 05 4:29 pm Post subject:
we did our 1st lot of beer just in time for Christmas and we put it in a barrell(t'was an offer from the homebrew shop) Very pleased with it! Its a Norfolk Nog type. I have wondered how long it will keep for, it shows no sign of going flat ( not that there's a great deal left! ) but I guess it must have a shelf life?

rhyddid

Joined: 30 Jan 2005
Posts: 228

Posted: Thu Feb 17, 05 8:03 pm Post subject:

Treacodactyl wrote:

What's the smallest cask you can get?

I've only ever seen firkin (9 gallon) size casks in the drinks industry, but on the other hand there is bound to be smaller casks out there somewhere. I've seen pin (4.5 gallon) size kegs.

Treacodactyl
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 25795
Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism

Posted: Thu Feb 17, 05 8:27 pm Post subject:
Thanks Rhyddid I'm also tempted with used whisky barrels for making cider. Just need to get a little more space.

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