First post, first brew

Hey Mo, its Ro and I'm on line. Good idea with the blog. I hope your stout turns out fantastic this weekend.....I will be doing much more drinking than brewing this weekend in Kimberley. There is a BOP (Brew on Premise) in Kimberley that sells brewing supplies, perhaps I will take a field trip and do some research. I guess now would be a good time to summarize the first brew that we made;

1. Red Ale "The brew house kit"
2. Problems during brewing; a) Cold fermenting temp in basement (as low as 16 deg C) b) Suspect sanitization practices such as sucking on syphone hose.
3. Finished poduct; We had a couple of good beers after week 2.5, then we had a few bad ones after week 3. Some tasted over carbonated, some just tasted nasty. I will write more as I sample more of them.

Hey Ro, its Mo. Good post. Thought I would add that in the book 'How to Brew: Everything you need to know to brew beer right the first time' by John J. Palmer, it mentioned that over carbonation can happen can be caused from: 1. Too much priming sugar 2. Bottled too soon (before fermentation was complete) 3. Wild yeast. Any of these are probable. One solution that the book recommended and I tried is to vent and recap all the bottles. I did this to my bottles and am having a beer right now, and it tastes pretty good! Not quite as good as it did at 2.5 weeks but a lot better than my two previous beers from 2 nights ago. As I try them I will let you know how they taste.