NICK BUTLER>>: Hi. I'm Nick Butler and I like beer.
I've been drinking it for 20 years, and I realized that my last time I was drinking a beer,
I didn't know how to make it, I didn't know anything about it, and I really want to learn.
So that's why I'm here at Northern Brewer, and I've enlisted the help of a master brewer, Nick.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Hello.
NICK BUTLER>>: What do we have here today?
NICK STEPHAN>>: So this is the Brew.Share.Enjoy® Starter Kit, the Michael Jordan of starter kits if you will.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Thousands of homebrewers and professional brewers have gotten their start with this particular kit right here.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay. Great.
And also it is the perfect size for a stocking stuffer.
NICK STEPHAN>>: If you're Paul Bunyan, sure.
NICK BUTLER>>: If you're Paul Bunyan, which I kind of am.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Hence the flannel.
NICK BUTLER>>: Actually where can I get one of those shirts?
NICK STEPHAN>>: I think we can find one for you.
NICK BUTLER>>: Great. Perfect. I love it.
This shirt fits me really well.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Well, there you go.
NICK BUTLER>>: I love it.
Let's get this box opened.
NICK STEPHAN>>: This thing is enormous.
All right. So the first thing you're going to notice as you open this guy up is our Northern Brewer Product Catalog.
The next thing that you're going to run into is our Welcome Packet.
We have a glossy insert here.
NICK BUTLER>>: You follow this and you've got beer.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Exactly. Exactly.
NICK BUTLER>>: Great.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Next up is your recipe kit.
This one is the Block Party Amber Ale.
It's really simple. NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: You can't screw this up.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah.
NICK STEPHAN>>: The next up, we've got a couple of tops.
We have a lid for a bucket and lid for a kettle.
The reason why this box is so freaking huge is buckets.
NICK BUTLER>>: Buckets.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Food grade Northern Brewer buckets.
Primarily these are going to be where your beer lives while it's fermenting.
One bucket has a little hole down here.
NICK BUTLER>>: Oh, hey.
The bottler -- the bottled beer in here.
NICK STEPHAN>>: You will bottle out of this bucket.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: You will ferment in this bucket.
NICK BUTLER>>: That's the hole.
NICK STEPHAN>>: That's the hole.
NICK BUTLER>>: Ah, I see. Okay.
Putting two and two together.
NICK STEPHAN>>: So the next thing you're going to find actually inside the buckets is our guts box.
NICK BUTLER>>: Guts.
NICK STEPHAN>>: This is going to be all the bits and pieces, the little tools that you need to get you along the way to making beer.
You're going to see this really strange wing looking contraption.
NICK BUTLER>>: It's like the Thy Master.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Bottle capper.
NICK BUTLER>>: Bottle capper.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Not a Thy Master.
NICK BUTLER>>: Not a Thy Master?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Bottle capper.
Next, some siphon tubing for you to create a siphon to move your beer from one vessel to another through the process.
The caps, each one of these Brew.Share.Enjoy® Starter Kits does come with the first round of the caps you will need.
After that, you can choose whatever color or design you want from the Northern Brewer website.
People like to color-code their beers so they know what's what in their beer cellar.
This is a bottling wand.
NICK BUTLER>>: The wand.
NICK STEPHAN>>: The wand.
NICK BUTLER>>: Beer.
NICK STEPHAN>>: This is just your bottling spigot, so you'll have this to control flow of your beer as you go through the bottling day.
NICK BUTLER>>: It seems also simple enough.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Very simple and straight forward.
NICK BUTLER>>: That doesn't seem simple and straight forward.
NICK STEPHAN>>: So this is probably the thing we get the most questions about out of any piece in this -- in this starter kit.
And this is called an airlock.
Essentially you put liquid, generally a sanitizer or vodka, something like that, that microbes can't grow in -- NICK BUTLER>>: Let's go with vodka. NICK STEPHAN>>: Yeah, vodka works.
And you fill it up to this line right here that says 'Max Line'.
As the beer ferments it releases CO2, which creates pressure and flows up through here,
and it's able to escape then through this airlock without allowing oxygen and yeast and other nasty creepy crawlies to get back into your beer and --
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay. So it creates a stopper?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Exactly, a stopper.
This is our oxygen wash.
Everything your beer comes in contact with after the boil needs to be cleaned with this.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: If it doesn't, you're not going to make the best quality beer.
Be cautious and you'll generally make good beer.
The reason people have made beer for as long as they have is that beer is such a low Ph that dangerous pathogens can't live in beer.
NICK BUTLER>>: So it's just not going to taste very good if you don't wash everything down. Okay. NICK STEPHAN>>: Correct.
So those are a lot of few little bits and pieces, but really once you get the feel for them, there's nothing too crazy in there.
Okay. NICK BUTLER>>: All right.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Next up -- NICK BUTLER>>: I like how you did that.
NICK STEPHAN>>: It was in the way. It was in my shot.
The next up is our brew kettle.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right. Standard kettle.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Standard kettle.
But one of the things that sets the Brew.Share.Enjoy® Starter Kit apart is really this kettle.
Most other starter kits don't come with a boil kettle. NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: We thought, you know, it's a really important part of the brew day, not everyone has a 5-gallon kettle, let's include one.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah. NICK STEPHAN>>: But basic kettle, you put things in it, you heat it up, it gets hot. NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: So last but not least, you're going to have this cardboard divider, which isn't important, but what that is doing is that is protecting a few items in the corner here during shipping so that things don't get broken.
Let's start with this guy.
In my opinion, this is the most important piece in your Brew.Share.Enjoy® Starter Kit.
Ironically enough, it is called the Rack Magic® Auto-siphon.
NICK BUTLER>>: Everything about brewing is like witchcraft.
It's all magic.
NICK STEPHAN>>: It is.
NICK BUTLER>>: It's like the wand.
The -- the -- what is this again?
NICK STEPHAN>>: The Rack Magic® -- NICK BUTLER>>: The Rack Magic® --
NICK STEPHAN>>: -- Auto-siphon.
NICK BUTLER>>: What do you call that again?
NICK STEPHAN>>: That's the Rack Magic® Auto-siphon.
NICK BUTLER>>: Rack Magic® Auto-siphon.
NICK STEPHAN>>: This you just pump out, pump back in, and that will start the siphon flow.
NICK BUTLER>>: What in the world is this contraption?
NICK STEPHAN>>: That's a spoon.
NICK BUTLER>>: Spoon?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Spoon.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay. Great.
You've been throwing things out of shot. Can I just -- NICK STEPHAN>>: Yeah, get rid of that.
Perfect we don't need that.
NICK BUTLER>>: That was fun.
NICK STEPHAN>>: That was fun and cathartic.
And last but not least, bottle brush.
NICK BUTLER>>: Bottle brush. NICK STEPHAN>>: Bottle brush. NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
So this brew kit that we have here, how many bottles would I get from one batch?
NICK STEPHAN>>: It depends on how efficient you are, but generally speaking, about 52 to 55 beers -- NICK BUTLER>>: Wow. NICK STEPHAN>>: -- from one batch of beer.
NICK BUTLER>>: Really? NICK STEPHAN>>: Yep, absolutely.
NICK BUTLER>>: That's amazing. NICK STEPHAN>>: It's a lot of beer. NICK BUTLER>>: That was way more than I thought. I was like a 12 pack.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Before you get going, you always want to take a proper inventory of your kit.
There's a lot of items in here and everything should be there but if it's not, let us know. We'll be happy to rush you whatever you're missing.
Should we go?
NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah, let's go. NICK STEPHAN>>: All right. Perfect.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah, we're probably going to need the stuff, huh?
NICK STEPHAN>>: We're good now. There we go.
NICK BUTLER>>: I'm very excited; very excited to brew some beer.
NICK STEPHAN>>: And that's why I was thinking, so I could do this and could walk you through the steps but I'm not going to.
I'm going to stand here and I'm going to let you brew this beer and if you have any questions, you can ask me.
Normally I would suggest for most people that you're going to start on your stove, so we thought we would walk everyone through on our Dark Star Burner.
You know, it's fairly inexpensive.
It's definitely a great way to get outside and get, you know, brewing out of the kitchen if you really want to.
But I promise that if you're doing this at home, doing this on your stove is perfectly reasonable.
NICK BUTLER>>: So I'm doing this alone?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Yes.
NICK BUTLER>>: I'm flying solo? NICK STEPHAN>>: Yep. NICK BUTLER>>: Let's get started.
So we have the Maillard Malt.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Maillard.
NICK BUTLER>>: Maillard Malt, I'm sorry.
What are -- what's the -- what are Maillard Malts?
What's Maillard mean?
NICK STEPHAN>>: The simplest way to put it is it's the difference between bread and toast.
It's the caramelly, burnt flavors that make things wonderful.
NICK BUTLER>>: Maillard Malts; toasty and delicious are two things I want in a beer.
A Mesh bag, which kind of looks like cheesecloth but not quite cheesecloth, but it's a mesh bag.
I believe these go in here -- NICK STEPHAN>>: Correct.
NICK BUTLER>>: -- our brewing yeast.
And we have our Hoptimus Rex, which is a cool little dinosaur pun.
We've got the fermentor's corn sugar.
NICK STEPHAN>>: For priming your bottles after you're done.
There are other starter kit options.
Just make sure to read your inventory very clearly and make sure that you have the ingredients that you're supposed to have for your recipe kit.
NICK BUTLER>>: Can we start brewing?
NICK STEPHAN>>: We can start brewing.
NICK BUTLER>>: I've got 2.5 gallons here on the burner.
Now this is just tap water.
NICK STEPHAN>>: If it's good to drink -- NICK BUTLER>>: We're good to brew. NICK STEPHAN>>: Good to brew.
You know, if you wouldn't drink your tap water, maybe you want to go get some bottled water, but -- NICK BUTLER>>: That's a separate issue.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Separate issue. A separate issue.
NICK BUTLER>>: So let's -- let's fire up this -- the burner here.
Let's do this. Firing on all cylinders here. That smells really good.
The next step is to get the specialty grains into the mesh bag.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Here, hand me the mesh bag and I'll help you out.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right. Thank you.
NICK STEPHAN>>: The best way I found to do is actually to put this right over the top of there and then flip it over.
NICK BUTLER>>: You're a thinker, Nick. NICK STEPHAN>>: I am.
And then just put a knot in the top of that guy, tie it off, and you're there.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Once we hit 160 degrees, we want to add this bag of grains and that will pull all the colors and aromas out of the grains, into the water.
And we'll just need to let this heat up a little bit longer and then we'll toss that bag in there.
NICK BUTLER>>: This smells so good. I'm already really enjoying this. You know, my hands, I love it.
Just plop it in?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Just plop it right in.
And then just like you would with tea, like a teabag, just kind of bob it up a little bit and try -- you want to hydrate everything.
Don't be afraid of it getting wet. That's the point.
The really important thing is at this point in time you want to monitor your temperature relatively closely.
Keep it in that 160 to 170-degree range, so cut your heat, let it sit at 160 for twenty minutes.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay. Yeah, but definitely do not want to boil the bag of the specialty grains.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Correct. Yeah, you definitely do not want to boil the specialty grain.
If you do, you'll get some weird flavors, not pleasant.
NICK BUTLER>>: So we've got the grains in. What do we do now?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Beer? NICK BUTLER>>: Grab a beer. NICK STEPHAN>>: Yeah. NICK BUTLER>>: Let's get a beer.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right. Twenty minutes should be there.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right. Next step? NICK STEPHAN>>: Get this guy out of here.
NICK BUTLER>>: Get it out of here.
NICK STEPHAN>>: So use your long-handled spoon.
NICK BUTLER>>: Spoon.
Definitely don't use your hands.
NICK STEPHAN>>: We're going to need that.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yep.
NICK STEPHAN>>: So just pop that guy right on top of there.
Try to let it drain a little bit to make sure you're getting all the colors and flavors out of the grains.
NICK BUTLER>>: It kind of looks like haggis. Have you ever had haggis?
NICK STEPHAN>>: I have. NICK BUTLER>>: It looks like haggis.
NICK STEPHAN>>: You've ruined it for me now. Forever, I'll just think about haggis.
NICK BUTLER>>: Sorry.
There we go. So pot top.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Actually, nope.
NICK BUTLER>>: No. ready when you are.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Go for it.
Fire.
NICK BUTLER>>: Fire in the hole.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Once you reach your boil, the best course of action is actually to cut heat to the kettle.
That extract is going to shoot right to the bottom of the kettle and it can scorch on the bottom of the kettle, so you want to cut the heat while you're doing that, mixing it all in, and then return to heat and bring it back to a boil again.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right. Here we go
NICK STEPHAN>>: So pour in and I'll stir at the same time.
That will do. NICK BUTLER>>: That'll do. NICK STEPHAN>>: As soon as we achieve a boil, we do our first hop addition.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay. So now this is back to a boil. This is technically now called wort? NICK STEPHAN>>: Yep, so this is unfermented beer. All the sugar's in place. We're boiling. It is now wort.
Now we just have to add our hops and do the rest for our boil and we're there.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay. This is 1 ounce of Willamette Hops.
NICK STEPHAN>>: As you add the hops, it has a tendency to kind of want to rise up on you,
so just stir as you're adding and you'll be in good shape, and go ahead and just dump them all in.
NICK BUTLER>>: There we go.
NICK STEPHAN>>: And now we wait for sixty minutes.
NICK BUTLER>>: Sixty minutes?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Sixty minutes. Beer?
NICK BUTLER>>: Another beer.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Beer seems solid.
NICK BUTLER>>: Please, drink responsibility.
NICK STEPHAN>>: We're professionals. Don't try this at home.
NICK BUTLER>>: The wort has now boiled for sixty minutes.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Cut the heat on this guy.
So we're off. You should put your cover on here now.
NICK BUTLER>>: The cover goes on now.
NICK STEPHAN>>: The cover goes on now, yep.
We want to keep anything airborne from getting into --
NICK BUTLER>>: Contaminates, yeah.
NICK STEPHAN>>: The easiest way to do this at home is to do what's called an ice bath.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: So basically, literally just fill your kitchen sink up with ice water and plunge this guy into it and let thermodynamics do its thing.
It will suck the heat right out of it.
NICK BUTLER>>: It sounds simple enough.
NICK STEPHAN>>: All right. So let's grab that and we'll put it right in the ice bath. NICK BUTLER>>: All right.
So the next step in the process of brewing, per our instruction list, is to wash everything with about 1 ounce of the oxygen wash.
NICK STEPHAN>>: This is a half tablespoon. So I'll put it in two of these. And then if you want to just give that a stir with -- you can use your hand. It's not -- it won't be any big issue yet.
NICK BUTLER>>: This is fun.
NICK STEPHAN>>: And we'll also want to add our airlock to the solution.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right.
NICK STEPHAN>>: And we'll want to clean the inside of our bucket lid with that solution as well.
NICK BUTLER>>: So using your hand and scrubbing that is just fine?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Yep.
NICK BUTLER>>: I like it. You just use your hand. Simple.
NICK STEPHAN>>: It's fine.
So one good tip that also works is that you put a little bit of the solution into a spray bottle and that helps a lot for a spot cleaning as you're going through the brewing process.
You don't have to mix up another gallon of solution.
So our instructions I believe call for 2 gallons of water?
NICK BUTLER>>: 2 gallons of water. We're just going to use the tap water like before?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Correct.
So now it's just a matter of adding the beer in.
So just pour this slowly in there and try and leave behind as much of that goo as you can.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: If some gets in here, again, not a problem, but just try and leave behind as much as you can.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right. Will do.
I think it's going to be easier if I bear hug this.
NICK STEPHAN>>: That's good.
NICK BUTLER>>: Slowly pour the wort into the 2 gallons.
I'm not seeing any sludge yet. I'm a little worried that there's no sludge.
NICK STEPHAN>>: It wouldn't be a problem if there was no sludge but it will be in there. You'll see it at the bottom.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: See, it's starting to get a little chunky.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah, I'm getting chunky.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Keep going. You can get a little bit more off of there.
NICK BUTLER>>: I don't want to get too chunky.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Well, that's probably about as much as you want to do.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah, I see sludge.
NICK STEPHAN>>: We have about 4 and a half gallons of liquid in this bucket, so we're just going to top up with a little bit more cooled tap water to bring this up to 5 gallons.
NICK BUTLER>>: Right about there. NICK STEPHAN>>: That should do it. NICK BUTLER>>: Perfect.
NICK STEPHAN>>: We have our yeast packet there.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yep. NICK STEPHAN>>: Let's go ahead and rip that guy open.
NICK BUTLER>>: I'm having trouble opening things today. When you have sausage fingers like I do, it's a little tough to open, so make sure you have a scissors when you're brewing.
The yeast goes in.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Set that on top and put that right here in the bung on the topper and secure your lid.
Put this in a warm, dark corner and wait for fermentation to start.
All right. So through the magic of time and video amazingness, and the fact that we have a lot of these fermentors standing around, we actually have one that we started about 24 hours ago, so we can show you what this beer is going to look like 24 hours out.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right. Great. NICK STEPHAN>>: Sound good? NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah, let's pop it open. NICK STEPHAN>>: All right.
And what you can see is there's going to be a layer of foam on the top there, and that's actually the yeast that have begun their fermentation process and they're sitting on top of the beer and actually actively fermenting, converting sugar to alcohol and CO2.
NICK BUTLER>>: What -- what happens during the process?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Yeah, that's a great question actually.
So this beer after it's done fermenting will fall into the beer. It's actually a term we call flocculate.
NICK BUTLER>>: Flocculate.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Flocculate. Yeah, basically fall out of solution.
So if you see the foam still standing on the top here, your beer is still working, still fermenting, and it is not time to transfer yet.
So you're going to want to wait about seven to ten days before you do any transferring and taking this off.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay. We're all going to flocculate.
So it's bottling day. We're almost there.
NICK STEPHAN>>: But first we have to mix up what is known as the priming solution.
NICK BUTLER>>: Corn sugar?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Yeah, that's your corn sugar that you've been carrying around this whole time that you haven't quite been sure where it goes.
NICK BUTLER>>: Yeah, just been carrying it around.
NICK STEPHAN>>: You've been carrying it around.
You just mix this bag with 1 pint of boiling water.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: And allow that to boil for seven to ten minutes.
What that's going to do is that's going to pasteurize the sugar essentially.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Just so that we don't end up with any microbes that might have been present in the sugar from the refining process and just everything will be nice and clean as it goes into the bucket.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right.
NICK STEPHAN>>: In the meantime what we can do is we can get our equipment clean.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Generally speaking, I'll just kind of wash the walls of the fermentor and make sure this entire fermentor is good and clean.
The great thing about this siphon is it's pretty much self-cleaned.
You just give it a few pumps, let it run through the line a few times, and you're there.
And then we'll just need to clean up our bottles.
All right. So in order to get this nice and clean, we need to attach our bottling wand to this bottle tubing, then we will attach this end of the tubing to our bottling spigot, which will be neatly located on the bottling bucket.
In order to get this guy cleaned, we'll just open up this valve, allow that to run, place this in, depress the bottom, and we'll just run some solution through here to make everything nice and clean.
We'll cut the flow.
We're going to reserve some of this liquid because we're going to need it to clean our caps, but we need our bucket.
We have finished boiling for that.
Directly into our bottling bucket.
I should mention at this point it's had a little bit of time to cool, so it's not absolutely boiling liquid but it's just had a little bit of a chance to cool down.
The next step that we need to do is we need to actually transfer our beer into our bottling bucket.
NICK BUTLER>>: Rack Magic® Siphon.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Rack Magic® Siphon.
Run this tubing into the bottling bucket. Give that a couple of pumps and we're transferring.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right.
NICK STEPHAN>>: So one thing that's important to remember when you're doing this transfer as well is you don't want to stick the siphon directly into the bottom of the fermentor.
If you do, there is going to be a buildup of yeast and sediment down here, and if you stick it all the way down, it's just going to catch that sediment and goo and start dumping it right into the bottling.
NICK BUTLER>>: Don't want that.
NICK STEPHAN>>: No. It's really not going to provide any real benefit for your beer.
It's just going to be kind of some off-flavors and just contribute to cloudiness in your final product.
NICK BUTLER>>: It's been about ten minutes.
Is this thing nearly empty?
NICK STEPHAN>>: Best way to keep all of the beer that you can get is to actually just tip the bucket slightly.
That way you could pick up all the clear beer while leaving the sediment in the bottom of the bucket.
If you want to grab that one and bring it up on top of this --
NICK BUTLER>>: Yep.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Hold the bottling wand for me.
All right. I'm going to open up this valve. That will allow the beer start to flow.
Then as soon as you reach the top of that bottle, just lift up, the flow will stop, pull the wand out, and you'll be left with a perfect amount of headspace at the top of that bottle.
NICK BUTLER>>: All right.
NICK STEPHAN>>: All right. So now why don't you grab your capper.
Grab one of our pre-sanitized caps out of that reserved solution.
NICK BUTLER>>: Okay.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Toss that on to the bottom of the capper here.
NICK BUTLER>>: Magnetic.
NICK STEPHAN>>: And just crimp down. And there you go.
NICK BUTLER>>: Easy as that.
NICK STEPHAN>>: Easy as that. That is one perfectly filled bottle.
We'll store these somewhere warm and dark for one to two weeks.
After about a week, I usually recommend tossing one in the fridge, chilling it down, popping it open, seeing if it's carbonated.
If it's not, let them sit for another week.
NICK BUTLER>>: Well, Nick, I want to thank you for helping me along this process.
It's my first time brewing. I think it was a success, and I can't wait to try these beers.
NICK STEPHAN>>: All right. Cheers man. NICK BUTLER>>: Thanks. NICK STEPHAN>>: Yeah.
NICK BUTLER>>: So it's been two weeks and I finally have a chilled beer ready to open and enjoy.
So I'm going to pop this open; give it a drink.
Well, I had a really great time brewing my own beer with the Brew.Share.Enjoy®.
Honestly, the process is really simple from start to finish.
I hope you have as much fun as I did brewing my own beer.
Cheers, and happy brewing.