Aqua Vitae

Brewing: Process

A Note On Yeast Preparation:

Preparation: Day Before
1. Boil 2 gallons of water and put in freezer overnight
2. Bring all brewing tools up from basement

• 4 gallon pot
• 5 gallon pot
• 2 fermenting buckets
• hydrometer
• sanitizing solution & measuring cup
• airlock
• thermometer
• mesh strainer

3. Mix enough sanitizing solution for 4-6 2-liter bottles of water plus enough to soak bottles in (probably additional 1-2 gallons
4. Fill 4-6 2-liter bottles of water and freeze overnight

Preparation: Brewing Day
1. Mix 3 gallons of sanitizing solution into one of the fermenting buckets
2. Place all brewing tools in the sanitizing solution
3. Mash

• bring specified amount of water to 170 in 4-gallon pot
• add grains and maintain temperature between 150-160 for 38 minutes
• place mesh strainer over wort pot (use metal cooling rack if necessary)
• after 38 minutes, pour grains and wort through mesh strainer
• continue sparging with the same wort solution 4 or 5 times to maximize extraction

4. Wort

• Place pot with wort on stove and bring to boil
• Remove from heat, add extract and anything else specified by the recipe
• Return to heat and bring to boil
• Boil until hot break (10-15 minutes, typically)
• Add first hops addition immediately following hot break
• Boil for 60 minutes following first hop addition

5. Cooling

• While wort is boiling prepare two ice baths, one in sink and one in plastic bucket
• For each, fill with water and 10 pounds of ice and 4-5 frozen water bottles
• Ideally, temperature of each should be 50 or below
• After boiling wort for 60 minutes, remove from heat and place in first ice bath
• Add 2-3 2-liter frozen bottles to hot wort
• When wort nears 100 degrees, take temperature reading of water bath, and transfer to 2nd water bath if necessary
• Cool wort to 70

6. Preparing for Fermentation

• When wort reaches 70, transfer to a fermenting bucket
• Take a gravity reading
• Add enough water from 2 gallons of water boiled the previous night to reach expected original gravity
• When specified OG is hit, pour the wort back and forth between the two fermenting buckets several times, for maximum aeration

7. Pitching the Yeast

• After aerating the wort, pitch the prepared yeast***
• After pitching the yeast, place the lid on the fermenter, and rock the bucket back and forth vigorously many times, to mix in yeast and aerate wort
• After aerating wort/mixing the yeast, fill the airlock with sanitized water and place in lid of bucket
• Place the bucket somewhere dark and warm/cool (as ambient temperatures dictate) and leave it

Bottling:
1. Clean and sanitize the following:

• ~50 12 oz. bottles, or some combination of 12 and 22 oz. bottles.
• a 5 gallon bucket to rack the beer to before bottling. It is ideal if this bucket is specifically a bottling bucket, i.e. has a spout.
• a racking cane, a bottle filler, and a piece of siphon of hose

2. Get out your bottle-capper and enough caps for the bottles you’ll fill.
3. Priming solution

• Prepare your priming solution according to whatever your recipe indicates.
• Add the priming solution to your bottling bucket.

5. Bottling:

• Transfer the beer from the fermenter to the bottling bucket.
• Give the beer ~30 minutes to settle a bit.
• If you are using a bottling bucket with a spout, connect the length of hose to the spout, and the bottle filler to the hose.
• If not using a bucket with a spout, connect the hose to your racking cane and bottle filler.
• Proceed to fill the bottles with your beer, capping each as you go.

9. Storing/Conditioning:

• Place the filled bottles in a warm (70 degrees), dark place to carbonate.
• It should take about 2 weeks for the beer to be sufficiently carbonated. And depending on the type of beer, it could take anywhere from 2 weeks to 6 months (or even more in some cases) for the beer to really reach maturity.