Brewing Beer With the Coopers Home Brew Kit-Part 2
November 16, 2009
Recently I decided that it might be fun to write about my experience brewing my own beer using the popular Cooper’s Home Brewing kit. This is the second part in our series for The Brew Club!
If you recall in the first post of our Brewing Beer at Home With the Coopers Home Brew Kit series, we basically got the kit, opened it up and checked the inventory. Everything that was on the contents list was in the box, so its safe to move on to step two!
Step two is cleaning. Its critically important to make sure that any item of equipment that is going to come into contact with your beer is sterilized, otherwise you risk contamination of your beer and a waste of a lot of time and effort. Kinda boring, but really important!
So, how do you sterilize sanitize, and what parts need to be sanitized?
Well, thankfully this can be pretty easy and there are some options as you will see. The easiest way to sterilize is to take the Cooper’s fermenter (big white jug) and add 1/2 cup of unscented bleach into the fermenter. Don’t use any orange smelling or floral smelling bleach! Just plain ‘ol bleach please! Also, you do not want to use any type of detergent or soap. Just plain bleach and water. Easy! (See the comment section below for alternatives to bleach)
Next, fill the fermenter with cool water being careful not to splash bleach around. Also remember that this fermenter is going to be heavy when full, so set it up in a way that you can leave it sit. You don’t want to have to move it after its full! (A gallon of water weighs more than 8 pounds!)
Once the Cooper’s fermenter is filled with your water and bleach mixture, place all of the other kit items like the airlock, spoon, tap, and ‘little bottler’ thing in there, and let everything soak for at least 30 minutes. The lid of the fermenter won’t fit inside, so just give it a good rinse with clean water.
The bottles will need to be cleaned eventually, but not now, and not by soaking in the bleach. We’ll cover the bottles when we come to that point later in the process. Remember, it takes awhile before the beer is ready to be bottled anyway. (Somewhere between 4 and 7 days).
After your home brewing equipment has been soaking for at least 30 minutes in the fermenter, you’ll just need to rinse everything well with hot water until there is no longer any smell of bleach and that’s about it! (I decided not to take any pictures of this step because I had to set this up in the basement sink, but I’m sure you can imagine what a six gallon jug filled with water looks like!)
After its been sanitized, try not to contaminate your equipment because one of the biggest reasons home brews don’t work out is contamination of some kind or another. Just a little bacteria hiding in the equipment can ruin a batch!
Once all of your home brewing equipment is sanitized, we’ll be ready to move on to the next step, which is starting to get into the fun stuff of actually making beer at home!
Why not buy a Cooper’s Home Brew kit now and try brewing beer at home yourself? As you have seen, its pretty easy to do so far! We would really appreciate it if you considered purchasing one through The Brew Club and you can do that by clicking on the link below now!
Don’t forget to check back for the third step in our Brewing Beer with the Cooper’s Home Brew Kit!
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November 16th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
Alternatively, instead of bleach, you can use a commercial sterlising liquid, such as they sell for babies bottles.
Then you don’t need to rinse.
Bob the Brit´s last blog ..The Lord Mayor’s Show
November 16th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Technically, you are not sterilizing, you are sanitizing. The two have important differences. In your first few paragraphs you say you are sterilizing and then in your 2nd to last paragraph you refer to it as sanitizing. The last one is correct.
To sterilize you need an autoclave or need to bake the objects for 60 minutes at 338 F.
November 16th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Coopers offers a sanitizer which you can find on the Makebeer website. You can click through one of the Makebeer links on the page here. Alternatively, you can use Iodophor. It is much safer than bleach, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodophor.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
Thanks for the clarifications fellas, and alternatives to bleach for this important part of the process. Sounds like these other product are a bit more human-friendly and might speed up the process too!
@Patrick, I’m not a scientist, but I do believe that sterilizing can be done in ways other than an autoclave. Bleach is actually a widely accepted method of sterilizing – especially if let to sit for a period of time as the instructions advise. I think the idea is to kill any bacteria lurking on the equipment, and for that bleach does a fine job.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sterilization_%28microbiology%29
Still, I’ll go back and make the edits because there is a difference in terminology. Thanks for the catch!
Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Brewing Beer at Home With the Coopers Homebrew Kit
November 17th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Ahhh, the glamorous side of home brewing! This is something folks don’t talk about too much, but I’m sure it’s an important step in the process. You don’t want unwelcomed critters in your beer!
I imagine this is done right before you start the brewing process. Is that correct?
November 17th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Still looking forward to the end result!
Sterilizing/sanitizing…the idea is that you get the stuff clean, and I got that.
I always make semantic “faux pas” but it doesn’t change the process of what I was doing. I always joke that I’m “cookin’ up beer,” and a guy not to long ago (a clerk at the beer store) said , “ah-em….it’s, BREWING beer.” I said, “are you serious,” and then chuckled when I got in the car.
Another pointless story by nate.
nate´s last blog ..A Dragon Tale
November 17th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
@Jim – I think this step is really the foundation of the whole thing. If your gear isn’t really clean, the beer could get infected and funky. Somehow, with Lambics, that’s what you want, (sort of) but for this project we like to introduce our microbial pals to Mr. Bleach for a good beat-down. Yes, this is done prior to any of the fun stuff. I found that it can be made more fun if you wear a party hat.
@Nate, love your pointless stories because they actually make a point! Words do mean things, and its important to use the right terminology while not knit-picking, and you give a great example.
Nobody is checking their gear with microscopes or running cultures on petri-dishes – but just get it carefully cleaned!
Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Brewing Beer at Home With the Coopers Homebrew Kit
November 17th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Hey Scott, congrats on your adventure into the world of homebrewing! Beer-geek brothers 4 life!
I’ve been curious about Coopers kits since you see them everywhere so it’s nice to see a review. My friend who taught me to brew did all-grain (talk about beer-geekdom lol) so I jumped into that fairly quickly after doing extract recipes.
My big issue with these all-in-one kits is that it cost $100 for equipment that isn’t scalable. Eventually you’ll want a carboy, bottling bucket, glass bottles, etc. If you’re going to continue with the hobby, and it appears you are, you could spend $50 more and get that equipment that will last your entire life.
Still though, you’re making beer and that’s the main point. Kudos to you for that. When you start looking around for equipment, I just saw a good deal by Northern Brewer. MoreBeer is good too, or of course your LHBS if you have one.
Take it easy and I’m looking forward to the upcoming posts!
November 17th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
I’m glad you made the plunge. The sterile vs. sanitized thing is not a big deal. Sterilize simply means to render it free of bacteria, which is what you are doing when you sanitize. Any good Thesaurus will show you that these are largely over-lapping terms, depending on context…which, I’m pretty sure, is about brewing. I guess you could get something with UV rays to sterilize…maybe some gamma rays. What’s the difference? Are you ridding yourself of bacteria. Good! That’s the important part, like you said. I hope the terminology doesn’t mess up your batch.
Michael Reinhardt´s last blog ..Burton Baton VS. 90 Minute IPA
November 17th, 2009 at 5:27 pm
@Billy Broas ~ Thanks for the warm welcome! You’re definitely correct. If you’re going all-out beer-geek, spending a little more will get you a decent setup that’s more scalable.
OTOH, if you’re looking to just try home brewing to see what its about, then the Cooper’s kit is hard to beat. Its almost idiot proof (I will surely be the smarter idiot!) so, it serves its purpose in that regard. Everything is measured out, all the ingredients are provided. Easy. That’s where I wanted to start. Easy.
With the kit, if you end up not going all-out beer-geek, then you’re only out $100 and when you decide to do it again, you can just buy a refill kit for $25 or so and make yourself another easy 6 gallons of beer and put it away again.
We’ll see in a couple of weeks how it turns out. Eventually I’ll move on, but for me this is a good start and I wanted to try it without anything but the instructions that come with the kit.
A note to anyone venturing this far down in the comments, people in the home brewing community LOVE to help, share information and offer advice, so don’t feel like you need to get a kit if you’re just starting out. You can definitely go the route that Billy Broas did, and with some help from the community do just fine.
Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Brewing Beer at Home With the Coopers Homebrew Kit
November 17th, 2009 at 5:29 pm
@ Michael Reinhardt – gamma rays. LOL!
Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Brewing Beer at Home With the Coopers Homebrew Kit
November 17th, 2009 at 5:43 pm
@Scott Right on I definitely see your point. The key part of your comment was that if you spend a few bucks more for better equipment, you lose the “foolproof” advantage of Coopers. You’ll need to do more research on the brewing process (read books, etc.) and what/what not to do. I think this is unfortunately, really. A good equipment kit + idiot proof instructions would be the ultimate combo.
BTW I was still talking about a beginners kit, an all-grain set up is a whole different ballgame :>).
Billy Broas´s last blog ..billybroas: "10 Cool Beverage Drinking Gadgets" http://digg.com/d31ADnh
November 17th, 2009 at 9:46 pm
@Billy Broas – gotcha! Actually the Coopers equipment ‘aint half bad. I researched all the popular kits and went with the Coopers. Nothing in the kit is crappy at all, I’m sure at least the fermenter and the hydrometer could be used in the future. In addition, of all the home brew kit makers, Coopers is the only one that is a real brewery. These guys actually make beer.
The other point you touched on is reading and research, which is probably a good idea to do especially if you’re just starting out. That said, I find that by brewing my own beer this basic home brewing kit, I more fully understand what real home-brewers are talking about. It’s given me a context by which I can better understand what other people are doing, and in general how beer is made.
I think after this, I’ll more easily absorb information about home brewing, but I’m a pretty slow learner!
Scott-TBC´s last blog ..Brewing Beer at Home With the Coopers Homebrew Kit
November 18th, 2009 at 1:49 am
OK so let me see if I got this straight,
1) open it up
2) wash it
Are we ready to brew yet?
November 18th, 2009 at 10:34 am
Don, if you don’t simmer down I’m going to add Pumpkin to the mix!
Scott´s last blog ..Brewing Beer at Home With the Coopers Homebrew Kit
November 19th, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Or maybe a Yam…