Hallo!
After receiving a Coppertun kit for xmas (with an ESB bavarian wheat 3kg can instead of the default kit ingredients), i spent most of my holidays reading a mind-bogglingly large amount of often-contradictory information about this whole crazy homebrew scene, and I've got to say, I'm fascinated. It's all so sciency, and at the end of the day, there is (hopefully) tasty, tasty beer.
So, after confusing myself sufficiently with lots of different information, I plunged ahead and got the fermentation running. I was happy that the next day, the airlock seemed to be bubbling away nicely, so I figure I got it mostly right. I left it go for twelve days at roughly 22deg which I understand is slightly high (next investment will be a temp mate), I then took a gravity reading (1.01), decided it was finished (bubling had stopped 5 days previously), tasted the result (surprisingly good!) and added the finings before cold crashing the fermenter for another three days. (Yes, I know. Should have taken multiple gravity readings over several days, but I figured with the slightly high fermentation temp and the length of primary fermentation, I was pretty safe. Also, the timing fit nicely with Aus day [when i added the finings and started the cold crash] and bottling yesterday.)
Bottling into the 750ml PET bottles was relatively straight forward (using carb drops), although the mate who helped me insisted that we add an extra drop to two bottles. "For science". I told him he can clean it up when it explodes. I placed those two in a bucket to condition, separate from the rest. They haven't expoded *yet*...
I am slightly confused about the length of time to condition though - from what I can gather, the "standard wisdom" is forget about it for a month, and then start tasting, however I've seen a few people say that wheat beers are better when young, and should condition no *longer* than a month.
What say you all? Should I put one in the fridge (to stop/slow the carbonation process - is that right?) after two weeks, then another at three, and try and compare the two? Or should I just chuck half in at two and the other half at three, in case the two week option is better?
Grateful any advice, and thanks for reading.
After receiving a Coppertun kit for xmas (with an ESB bavarian wheat 3kg can instead of the default kit ingredients), i spent most of my holidays reading a mind-bogglingly large amount of often-contradictory information about this whole crazy homebrew scene, and I've got to say, I'm fascinated. It's all so sciency, and at the end of the day, there is (hopefully) tasty, tasty beer.
So, after confusing myself sufficiently with lots of different information, I plunged ahead and got the fermentation running. I was happy that the next day, the airlock seemed to be bubbling away nicely, so I figure I got it mostly right. I left it go for twelve days at roughly 22deg which I understand is slightly high (next investment will be a temp mate), I then took a gravity reading (1.01), decided it was finished (bubling had stopped 5 days previously), tasted the result (surprisingly good!) and added the finings before cold crashing the fermenter for another three days. (Yes, I know. Should have taken multiple gravity readings over several days, but I figured with the slightly high fermentation temp and the length of primary fermentation, I was pretty safe. Also, the timing fit nicely with Aus day [when i added the finings and started the cold crash] and bottling yesterday.)
Bottling into the 750ml PET bottles was relatively straight forward (using carb drops), although the mate who helped me insisted that we add an extra drop to two bottles. "For science". I told him he can clean it up when it explodes. I placed those two in a bucket to condition, separate from the rest. They haven't expoded *yet*...
I am slightly confused about the length of time to condition though - from what I can gather, the "standard wisdom" is forget about it for a month, and then start tasting, however I've seen a few people say that wheat beers are better when young, and should condition no *longer* than a month.
What say you all? Should I put one in the fridge (to stop/slow the carbonation process - is that right?) after two weeks, then another at three, and try and compare the two? Or should I just chuck half in at two and the other half at three, in case the two week option is better?
Grateful any advice, and thanks for reading.