Home Brewing Makes A Great Hobby

Home Brewing Makes A Great Hobby AG WORLD 28-4-23 Ted Enright has his own mini brewery neatly tucked away in the basement of his Crystal Lake, Ill. home. He carries on the tradition of home brewing that started with the Pilgrims and that he feels is closely tied to patriotism. But maybe the best reason for doing it himself, is the chance to come up with better tasting beer. Home brewing encourages experimentation, but the government sets a limit to how much beer you can make, "The ATF says I can brew 100 gal. per year for me and another 100 for my wife," he says. "Lots of our friends are brewers too." Enright uses a store-bought system to make his brew. It was purchased from Advanced Brewing Technology, Grayslake, Ill. Making beer is quite simple. A predetermined amount of water and grain go into the tank and gets heated between 146 to 160 degrees. Once the grain and sugar separate, you boil the remaining sugar liquid for another hour. The next step is to cool down the liquid to 80 degrees as quickly as possible using a chiller. Then you add a quart of yeast to aid the fermentation process, which can last from 3 to 10 days. The beer is stored in big 5-gal. bottles. By varying the type of grain, amount of water, temperature and yeast, you can make a wide variety of beers. "I've made everything from pale ale to porter, stout, pilsner, bock and lager," he says. "You can buy extracts from which to start your batches, but I prefer to make my own so I know what goes into them." Once Enright has a finished product he takes it to one of the 5 brew clubs in his area. "It's not just drinking the beer that's fun, but also the camaraderie and competition that goes along with it," he notes. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Ted Enright, 25 E. Franklin, Crystal Lake, Ill. 60014 (ph 815 455-1371).

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