Homemade Beer by Chef Gordon Ramsey

Take a sneak peak into Gordon’s program of how he found some families that make homemade beer!

Really interesting!

Enjoy!

It’s all about the ingredients

The few items you need to brew your own homemade beer can be found at your nearest beermaking supply shop, or at most hardware stores.

– One 10-gallon «food grade» plastic pail with lid. Cost: about $12.00
– Siphon hose. You’ll need a 74″ length of 5/16″ «food grade» vinyl tubing. Cost: $2.00
– Hose clamp for siphon. Cost: $1.00
– Twelve 2- liter plastic pop bottles, with lids. – Hydrometer. Cost: $8.00. A thermometer is also useful.
– Large pot, or turkey roaster.

High Quality Ingredients

Malt types

Malt Extract. One 40oz. can of any flavor you like ( light, dark, stout), we prefer light.  The 1.5kg can contains more malt extract so you can make a larger batch or use the same method here to make a richer beer. You can also buy ‘pre-hopped’ extract which will impart more of a hop flavor to your beer.
– Yeast. 1 tsp brewers’ yeast. Note: some malt comes with little packets of yeast included.
– Sugar. 6 – 7 cups of regular white sugar, or 8 – 9 cups of corn sugar (preferred).

For even better results, consider using two cans of the malt extract and not using any SUGAR!!!!!!!!  This adds to the expense, but further enriches the taste of the beer.

How to brew?

Sanitize
It has been said that 75% of brewing is good sanitation. First, clean all equipment with warm, lightly soapy water. Rinse well to remove soap residue. Then sanitize using household bleach at a quantity of 1 tbsp/gallon of water. Or you can purchase a no-rinse acid sanitizer such as StarSan, which is effective and leaves no aftertaste.Brew
1. Pour 10 liters of fresh, cold water into the 10 gallon plastic pail (carboy). If the pail is new, wash it out first with a mixture of water and baking soda to remove the plastic smell.
2. In your largest pot, bring 7 liters of water to a boil.
3. Add one can of malt extract. Stir and cook uncovered for 20 minutes.
4. Add the sugar and stir to dissolve.
5. As soon as the sugar is dissolved, pour contents into the carboy. Pour, or ‘splash’, the contents quickly, which adds air to the mixture. The more air the yeast get initially, the better. It allows them to rapidly grow and get things going.
6. Top up with bottled drinking water or tapwater until temperature is neutral.  Test using a clean, sanitized thermometer. The carboy will now be a little more than half full.
7. Sprinkle in the yeast, and stir well. Cover with lid. (Set lid on loosely; if capped too tightly, a carboy can explode from the carbon dioxide gas that is produced.)

Keep covered and avoid unnecessary opening. The beer will be ready to bottle in 6- 10 days, depending on ambient temperature of the room and amount of sugar used in the brewing. Room temperature should be 20-24 Celsius at the highest; 16-20 Celsius is better but it will take the beer a day or two longer to ferment.

Test for readiness with a hydrometer. Set hydrometer into the beer and spin it once to release bubbles which cling to it and give a false reading. The «ready to bottle» reading should be about 1.008 for dark beers and 1.010-1.015 for light beers. If you don’t have a hydrometer, you can judge readiness by tasting a sample – it should not be sweet tasting. There should be little or no bubbling action in the beer.

 

Brewing Process

The final product

Homemade Beer

Which type of beer do you prefer?

Interesting Facts

First of all, what is brewing?
The production of beer through steeping stapled foods such as potatoes, wheats, corn and rice in water and then fermenting with yeast, that’s Brewing. The interesting fact about homemade beer is that you make small scales of beer as a hobby for personal or group consumption, in a cheaper and wider range of ingredients.

Did you know that… For beer, the brewing process is very similar to the commercial brewing but the difference is that the creators can choose high quality ingredients and also choose between high quality ingredients used in wide range of ingredients used in commercialization. The basic ingredients that are necessary in homemade brewing include water, malt, hops and yeast; in addition, they can add herbal ingredients to give them an extra scent.

Homemade beer

But beer is no the only thing that can bee homemade brewed. Cider, ginger, chicha, pulque and tepache can also be brewed but with another ingredients and containing high amount of yeast and sugar.

People in the northern part of Mexico, like to do their own beer because it’s cheaper and it’s different from the local brands. Adjusting the recipe to its palate is a pleasure that not everyone can taste. Home brewing can reduce environmental impact of fermented beverages by using less bottle packaging and less local transportation that can reduce pollution.