Home Brew

    NEWSFLASH: Australians love their beer.   Yeah, OK, that is yesterday's news, or the last millennium's to be more exact.  But Kev isn't a one-brand kind of guy.  He likes variety.  He likes it to be cheap.   A "big ask" to combine the both requirements at the same time.  
    Fortuitously, a workmate said he had a beer making kit he wanted to get rid of.  Woo hoo!  Kev likes to try his hand in the kitchen and  experimental beer making would not only pair cheap and variety but add a pinch of mad scientist also!  Beer making mix (of which there are many, many varieties) costs about $12 and a couple more bucks for a bag of sugar.

It's all hopping in the utility sink

    Our bathroom has proven to be the best laboratory for the operation.  Like a cave, it seems to maintain the ideal temperature for the brewing process.  If you think I'm fussy about canning, you should see Kev with his brewing.  All water used gets boiled for several minutes before being poured into his never before used brew tub. The temperature gauge, the dark strip on the side, tells him when to start adding powders and potions. Handily, it notifies him that a constant, optimal brewing temperature is being maintained during the process.  Perhaps a little hard to see is a curved plastic vent pipe type of thing on top of the blue lid. As things are fermenting, water collects and bubbles like mad for a few days.  Music to Kev's ears, odd lullabying to mine as the gurgle goes on day and night.

    After about a week, it's bottling time.  Another delicate operation that requires much of the bathroom floor (so go now or go in the bushes!)  as empty glass pop bottles are sterilized  and then filled up with the beer mixture.  This tub yields about 24 liters (essentially, quarts) of beer or 20 liters of way too frothy ginger beer. We drank an awful lot of Schweppes tonic to supply the bottles for his beer.  And we are constantly scrounging around for plastic Coca Cola caps as they are the only size that works on the bottles.  After bottling, the three or so cases are stacked in the bathroom for several days.  If they are going to burst, this will be the time. Although I would much rather the bottles blow their tops outside plus this is the only time that this process really gets in the way of laundry and other cleaning, I hold my tongue. The cases of beer are stored under our table on the back patio for their three week maturing stage and permanent storage.  Every few days a few bottles are put into the fridge.  Kev still has the occasional Guinness or Trappist ale or whatever swamp juice is on clearance at the bottle shop, but the home brew is a source of pride and saved money.
    Pride is a good word. Kevin honors all visitors with a chance to try his homemade beer. Brewing is worked around announced visits by parents, friends and other family so they will be able to try a fresh beer themselves.  My sister Anne is coming to Perth in December and Kev is planning his next batch now.  But no reservations are really needed, a Callaghan Creation is always available.