On many home brewers wish lists is a Brew fridge / kegregator or fermentation chamber.


 I for one have been one of those brewers, and I also know for one that you can drive your wife nuts going back and forth in deciding do you actually need one, rather than just wanting one!

I had all the parts to my keg setup already - Keg ✓ Keg Taps ✓  Co2 Canister ✓ Various lengths of 3/8" inch tubing ✓  All I really needed was a way to constantly keep the temperature, I was struggling to keep up with keeping 2 kegs chilled as water bottles in my cool brewing bag were defrosting too quickly and the temperature was fluctuating by about 7 degrees. Our main fridge/freezer was also struggling to freeze 8L of water in 2l bottles too.

So with abit of birthday money I bought a Beko fridge, one that could cope with the ambient temperatures that an outhouse/garage has.



Currently I have fridge magnets from the main fridge and a calendar to mark F1 dates and brew days. I'm looking at doing fridge magnets of the keg/tap labels to show what's on tap. Eventually I'll have a magnet chalk board but at the moment I like the randomness of the decoratations and the keg/tap labels will look really good once I print them off on magnet paper.

Now for the important inside.

 
I have 2 perlick 650s flow control taps, the one with the wooden handle is a newer model and seems better, has an extra gasket inside the tap and the flow handle is peiced together better.

I have a three way John guest splitter from my co2 canister, two tubes feed kegs and one spare to purge any bottles or growlers.

Each of the 3/8" tubing have a flow control cut off close to the spilter, useful when I only want to focus on 1 of the outlets. At the end of each tube is a quick release/push fit connector, making it easier for maintenance/cleaning.

The co2 canister lives outside the fridge so I can monitor the pressure easier.
I also use my inkbird temp controller so that the fridge is only on when it needs to be, saving electricity. It holds the temperature well however when I open it in this heat it quickly rises a few degrees but chills back down just as quick.

All seems pretty good and a solution to my problems, especially when I had the taps and didn't want to drill the fridge door to put proper shank taps in to make a proper kegregator.
Hopefully this gives some pointers for other brewers if you've been thinking of doing the same steps.

Until next time...... Happy brewing

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I've been wanting to try Denali hops for a few brews now but haven't come up with a suitable recipe/hop schedule. However after reading an article in a recent BYO magazine on Award Winning Home brew APA recipes, I got a few pointers and fleshed out a new recipe. Even though I have a few cans from them I also wanted to create something like thairannocitrus from staggeringly good, using Kaffir Lime leaves too.

I aimed this brew day to coincide with Fathers day, so my dad could have a full keg (of my 9l keg) and I could have some too.
During the mash the target temp was more like 70oC than the 67oc target. While I over spared my preboil gravitiy was 10.40 instead of 10.35, I did this sparge as my boiler was heating up, so it seemed to take less time to hit boiling temps which has been litterly like watching & waiting for a kettle to boil in the past - pain staking!

SG was 1050 and FG was 1014 making it 4.7%

When it came to kegging it filled my 9l keg full for my dad (as it was a fathers day present) and probably about 1/2 that amount in one of my full sized kegs for myself.

The very small sample when I kegged it had a sweet pineapple/peach aroma, tasted the same but the lime came through after. Not too overpowering.

I waited 4 days after applying the gas, and although still slightly under carbed it tasted so so nice, full of citrus (aroma and flavour), then the aromatic lime taste from the kaffir lime leaves.

Basically was like Staggeringly Good's Thairannocitrus but super charged! If I have a craving for their beer now I might just have to brew my own.

Very pleased with the results so far. Have to drink this fresh! I could be the first new batch that gets added to my 'core range' (brews to brew again). 

See the full recipe on brewers friend.






Until Next Time...... Happy Brewing

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Have you ever wanted to give your home brew as a gift/present but only have a keg setup? Since moving house and using my keg equipment more I have been thinking the same..

I use to syphon some beer off into a bottling bucket and condition x amount of beers (usually 6 or 12) to give to, say my dad, as a gift or fathers day present. However in the past the carbonation of the bottles have been somewhat inconsistent and on one occasion (bottled version of my Breakfast Stout) a bottle bomb could of happened. Well almost - upon opening it frothed out more than the Kilauea volcano (too soon?)  so my dad didn't end up having much apart from a big head on a few bottles. You also always get unwanted sediment and the time to condition is always an extra factor to take into effect.

So I thought of the idea to use my keg and use my bottle filler to bottle from my keg directly. Knowing I can get the carbonation right and will eliminate the issues I've had with bottling.
One problem however is that if I give a full 6/12 pack to my dad he could not drink a bottle for a few weeks. Which could mean that the carbonation levels drop in the bottle. All the how to videos I've watched state you should cap on foam and you purge the bottle before filling.

Something that is quite common when bottle filling from a keg, regardless of the way you transfer it. Counter pressure fillers work well but I wouldn't want to leave for 2/3 weeks to find it was flat. A week seems the cut off before carbonation starts to drop.

Transferring to a Flip top bottle.

So this leaves me with doing some 'Beer Tokens' that I intend to give to the amount (in pints/bottles) that I would usually give. In my case for this Fathers Day I intend to fill my 9l keg for my dad and have beer tokens to the amount (in pints) that the keg holds.

If you have someone that lives close you could do a few bottles a time to take around/they come to you whenever they want, it'll be like having your own personal tap room!

It might even be a bit more fun for them to get stamped for the beers.
I still have my old bottling bucket so can give this a try this time and if it doesn't really work then I can go back to bottling. 
Have you any other good ideas to give your home brew away as gifts?

What beer tokens could look like

Until Next time......Happy Brewing

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