I don’t know why we didn’t think of it before, it was so easy. It’s only the second time we’ve bottled our home brewed beer, so perhaps the lack of experience played against us last time. Last night, though, we poured our latest batch of the dark golden stuff into its glass containers, learning some valuable lessons from the last time.
In April, we did it the tried and tested way, following the instructions to, quite literally, the letter. That means connecting the drainage tube with the filter on, and siphoning out the contents by way of an airflow into the bottles. Once it starts, it goes very fast and there has to be two of you; one to direct the siphon into the bottles, and one to have another bottle ready to swap when the previous one is full.
What the directions don’t tell you is that you end up with a very messy floor (unless you use a plastic bowl to stand the bottles in as we did), which the cat would delightfully drink up given half the chance. It’s undoubtedly a quick way of doing it, but as we found out, a bit too speedy. Then, it’s a case if wiping everything, and then capping the bottles themselves.
This time the method was a little longer, but much the better (and simpler) one. An initial siphon is given to separate any drinkable liquid from the sediment at the bottom of the fermenter, and any added wood chips which give the beer its ‘aged’ taste. Just the same as when we did the wine a few weeks ago, another fermenter is more than handy at this stage.
Then, rather than siphon the cleared brew into bottles, we used a large glass jug and a funnel to manually pour the beer into our brown bottles, which we’d already put a teaspoon of sugar into, to condition the liquid while it sits for a couple of weeks. And what a difference this method makes. While it may take a little longer, the whole process is much less messy, and virtually hassle-free.
In fact the only problem we had was a shortage of bottles. The home brew kit told us that we would make near 50 pints of ale, and as we only had 27 500cl bottles, we had to pour more than a good amount into a demijohn, and the remainder into one of the snap-top bottles we use for the fruit-tinged spirits. Even the capping seemed easier this time, too.
All in all, after just over an hour (and a little over a week to brew), another success. We had a taste, and our finished Woodforde Great Eastern Ale is very pleasant, and should be even more palatable once the sugar has worked its magic, giving us plenty of perfect brew, ready to be cracked open and drunk over the festive period and beyond.
