Beer No . 1 - tasting!

With it being Emma's third birthday, and there being a quorum of beer drinkers present, it seemed appropriate to crack open the first 2L bottle of the bitter - two months after bottling. My thoughts were as follows:

Head - surprisingly good, foamy. Head retention not bad.
Flavour - a little bitter but not too bad. Better than expected.
Strength - weak, as expected from the OG measurement.
Texture - poor. I think this is partly due to the low alcohol content. I also noticed that the bottles didn't feel over-pressurised (they still had some give when squeezed) so maybe next time I'll increase the priming sugar to increase the natural carbonation.
Colour - a bit pale for a bitter. To be expected, because I used pale malt instead of crystal. Also I didn't make any effort to avoid the sediment, so the pint was cloudy. Next time I'll use 500 ml bottles, which should be easier to pour without dislodging the solids.
Overall - 6/10. It would be a rather disappointing pint to be served in a pub, but still a not unpleasant bevvie.

Onwards and upwards!

There are some lessons here, plus I have proved I can make something drinkable from the the basic bitter recipe. So I can now use that as the starting point for experimenting. And I can confidently brew several different 1-gallon batches at the same time without waiting for the results of the previous effort.

But first up will be a couple of different efforts:

- Emma's birthday marks 4 months to Christmas. Time to get a seasonal ale started.
- Our pear tree is groaning with fruit, and our neighbour has more windfall apples than he can do anything with. Cider time! Fortunately, the Ian Ball book has cider recipes.

Wine Nos. 1 and 2: Racked

Wines No. 1 (damson) and No. 2 (elderflower) have been racked into clean demijohns and put into the cellar. A couple of weeks ago I added potassium sorbate and sodium metabisulphate to kill off the yeast. I didn't add any finings as I thought there were looking pretty clear, and Ian Ball suggests it's not necessary if you rack them for long enough.

During the transfer process I was able to have a little taste. The elderflower tastes pretty good; with 9 months maturing I hope it will be rather pleasant straight out of the fridge. The damson was less impressive; it doesn't have the body of a true red wine so, if it is drinkable, may end up as a rosé.

The picture below shows the homebrew-shop demijohn retailing at about £7, and the Iceland demijohn retailing at £1 and including a gallon of free mineral water.