Making Beer: Kegging the Brew

OK, it is time to get my latest batch of brew out of the secondary and into the keg. At this point I am only about 3 or 4 days away from being able to taste this batch.

Again, I am sterilizing the keg, the siphon, and other tools so that I can transfer this batch to the keg but also brew a new batch before I call it a night. I've got lofty goals this evening.

What you see is this picture is the CO2 canister and my keg. This is a standard 5 gal. keg and not what you would see @ your standard kegger. Brew stores sell these kegs & they will also provide you with the CO2 canister. I believe that you can find the kegs other places like Ebay too.

Everything is clean and sterilized. Time to transfer the beer!
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Making Beer: The New Batch - German Doppelbock

Standing here listening to TWIT live (http://twit.tv/live) and brewing beer and I thought, why not make a quick video post as I brew? This is the all important step of adding the malts to the brew.

Crystal Malt
De-Husked Carafa I Malt
Victory Malt

Today I'm making my very first high gravity (i.e. more alcohol) brew. Very excited!
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Making Beer: Secondary Fermentation

Now that the beer is in the secondary fermenter it is ready to be stored . As you can see from the picture it goes right back into the same closet where it sat for about a week in the primary fermentation stage. Again it simply sits at room temperature out of direct sunlight.

Part of the beauty of the secondary fermentation stage is that the beer can sit for weeks without affecting the taste or quality of your brew. This helps if you are busy and don't have time to bottle it for a while.

My beer never lasts that long. :) Really, once it is in the secondary you could bottle (or keg) at any time. You just want to make sure that the fermentation process has died down. Generally that only take 8 to 10 days from the start of the primary fermentation stage. Now that I have spent a good part of my evening transferring the beer (and posting about it) I will leave it for a few days.

I don't bottle any more. I spent the money on a keg, CO2 canister, & regulator. It makes getting the beer ready to drink a much faster process than placing it in bottles. I'll probably get to that this weekend. If I have the time I will take some more pictures and you can follow me through that step as well.

Thanks for sticking with me. Happy brewing!
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