I was at Walmart today picking up some light bulbs and came accross a 5 gallon water jug (empty).  This could easly be used as a five gallon carboy.  Save the cash and pick one up.

Seems to me that if you drilled a hole in the cap for an airlock you would have your self a cheap carboy.

Beer Style: pale ale, bitter, E.S.B., Fuller’s

Recipe Type: all-grain

Description:

Fuller’s ESB is by far and away my favorite (commercial) beer, and it has always been a high priority with me to find a way to clone it. Several attempts have brought forth some very pleasing beers, but they never quite matched up to the taste of the commercial variety.

Until the most recent attempt, that is! I think I have a very close clone on tap right now. I keg rather than bottle, and I am comparing this brew to the draught Fuller’s that is available in the Houston area; I would suspect (hope, anyway) that the same recipe, if bottled, would be comparable to the bottled Fuller’s ESB species.

Incidentally, I am just about 125% sure that Fuller’s does *NOT* use centennials in their ESB. This recipe is not an attempt to duplicate their processing or ingredients, just the flavor of the finished product. So no flames about how this could not possibly be an authentic recipe, please! A reasonable substitute (and probably closer to reality) would be to use all fuggles (about 2.75 oz for equivalent bittering).

Ingredients:

• 12# British pale ale malt
• 1.5# British light carapils
• 1# British medium crystal
• 1oz Centennial hops (11.2% AA)
• 1oz British fuggles (4.0% AA)
• 0.25oz Kent Goldings (5.2% AA)
• 1/3 oz Burton water salts (treatment for very soft water)
• Wyeast #1968 (London ESB)

OG: 1.060 FG: 1.016

Procedure:

Mash at 154F (high temp to promote dextrins) for 60 mins or until starch test negative. Sparge to collect 6 gallons. Boil for 20 minutes before hop addition. Boil centennials for 60 mins; add fuggles when 15 mins remain; goldings for dry hopping in secondary. I calculate the hop rate at 12.2 HBU.

Kegged and force carbonated at 8psi/40F, tapping after 18 days. At first, I was concerned that the dry hops had given it too much of a hop character, certainly more than present on the target. But after a few more days, the hops had blended and softened quite a bit and seems to . be about right. If anything is wrong with the recipe, I think it gives a bit more body than Fuller’s, so I will probably cut back slightly (maybe reduce the carapils from 1.5# to only 1#) next time.

Submitted by: Larry Bristol   To: BeerRecipes.Org

Ingredients:

• 24 lb. windfall apples, mixed varieties*
• 3-6 lb. granulated sugar
• 1 gallon water
• 1 tsp. pectic enzyme
• Sauterne wine yeast and nutrient

Instructions:

1. Chop the apples into small pieces, put into primary fermentation vessel, add the pectic enzyme and water and cover the mixture. The water will not cover the apples, so stir several times a day to bring bottom apples to the top.
2. After 24 hours, add the yeast and nutrient. Keep covered (a bath towel held fast with a large rubber band works well if the primary fermentation vessel doesn’t have a lid) and in a warm place for 7-10 days.
3. When the vigorous fermentation of the pulp subsides, strain the juice from the pulp and set aside, then press the juice from the pulp and add to the set-aside liquor. Measure and add 3 lb. sugar per gallon of liquor. Put into carboy or gallon secondary fermentation vessel and fit with airlock.
4. Rack when clear, allow another 60 days, then rack again and bottle.
5. Allow six months before tasting, one year for best results.

[Adapted from C.J.J. Berry's First Steps in Winemaking]

*For this and all apple wine recipes, unless varieties are specified, the more acid and sour varieties are preferred and the sweeter eating varieties are to be avoided. Winesap, McIntosh, Jonathans, and crab apples are best. Delicious apples should be avoided.

How to Brew Cheap Wine

Ingredients:

1. 2 cans of juice concentrate (room temp). You can use any type of concentrate like Welch’s concord grape, strawberry, kiwi-whatever, etc., as long as it doesn’t contain any preservatives, artificial flavors or coloring.
2. 2 cups of sugar.
3. 1 packet of active dry wine yeast (more will not increase alcohol content but will impart a bad “yeasty” flavor).
4. Water, dump between half and a third of the water out of the jug. At the end, top up the bottle using tap water (boil it if it contains a lot of chlorine).

Equipment:

1. 1 gallon jug  of water.
2. 1 Funnel.
3. Plastic hose for siphoning.
4. Air lock.
5. Large sauce pan. For boiling water (gallon).
6. Bleach.

Steps:

1. Never underestimate the importance of sanitizing! Sanitize everything you’re going to use to hold the fermenting wine, to keep bacteria from growing. The easy way to sanitize everything at once is to use your dishwasher at the high heat setting, with appropriate detergent. Some dishwashers are designed especially to sanitize your dishes (183 degrees F water temperature), this will at least reasonably clean the equipment, and it makes the task really easy. After the machine finishes the dry cycle you will be ready to start making the wine. If you do not have an automatic dishwasher, wash with detergent, then bleach the funnel and anything else you may use. You do not need to clean the jug, as it has only had pure water in it. Air dry.
2. Bring the water to a boil and turn down the heat setting to a slow boil. Allow to boil for a few minutes in order to kill any bacteria in the water. Remove from heat and let cool.
3. Add the room temperature juice concentrate to the clean, dry jug. Use the funnel if needed.
4. While the hot water cools, dissolve 2 cups of sugar into the water. Stir while pouring.
5. Activate the yeast following the directions on the packet. Another method of activating the yeast is to place 1 teaspoon of sugar into a separate bowl. Add 1/4 cup of hot water (100-110 degrees Fahrenheit). Add the yeast and stir briefly. Let sit for 10 minutes. The yeast should become very frothy. However, simply sprinkling the yeast on top of the juice and sugar mixture will give you a higher live cell count than re-hydrating in most cases, and will be far less trouble.
6. Pour the dissolved sugar-water into the jug filled with the juice concentrate. If it is too warm, cool it by placing the jug into a sink filled with cool water; add ice cubes to rapidly cool the mixture and limit the time the open container is exposed to bacterial contamination.
7. Touch to make sure the mix is cool, then add the yeast. Cap the jug and shake thoroughly to completely mix all the ingredients .
8. Remove the cap of the bottle.  Drill hole in cap large enough for the air lock to fit securely in.
9. Fit air lock into cap and replace on jug.
10. Keep the jug at room temperature and do not expose it to direct sunlight. After a few days, if it does not start to bubble, throw it away and try again being more careful to use sanitary equipment. Otherwise, wait 10-14 days, when the mixture will stop bubbling. Then transfer into another bottle or smaller bottles using the plastic hose to siphon the liquid off, leaving the sediment on the bottom of the first bottle, and then enjoy!

Tips:

• If you do not have a large enough pot, it is perfectly acceptable to use two pots instead.
• Not all of the water fits back into the gallon jug. Before boiling, dump out enough water to fit in jug.
• When done fermenting, strain as you pour into a wine bottle or glass, leaving the clumpy yeast in the jug. Make sure to wash and sterilize again.
• When adding the yeast, the juice should not be too hot or it will kill the yeast and ruin your wine. The jug should feel just warm to the touch.
• The quality of the wine produced depends on the quality of the ingredients. Try experimenting with higher quality juices and different types of yeast (See Warnings).
• When purchasing your juice, pay attention to the ingredients list on the label for “Preservatives” because these are intended to inhibit fermentation and spoilage.
• As an alternate buy a gallon jug of apple juice (no preservatives), pour yourself a glass (for head space) pour in 1 cup of regular cane sugar, and 1 pack of wine or ale yeast, replace the cap just loose enough to allow the CO2 to escape. In 3-5 days you have hard cider. Let it settle, pour off into an empty leaving the trub. Foolproof.
• Tips for adding the sugar – put the kettle on! 2 cups full from the 2ltr water bottle. Dissolve the sugar into the two cups of hot water. Then when its cool enough add it to your mixture.

Warnings:

• Yeast consumes and consumes until there is no food left (in this case sugar), then it becomes dormant (or until the alcohol content is so high that the yeast cannot survive). By adding more sugar, you increase the brewing time and also raise the alcohol content. Theoretically, if you add a lot of sugar you could ensure it would be very sweet when finished, but it would also be very potent, and take a long time to finish; however, likely, the yeast would die from the high alcohol content before it can produce more alcohol.
• Use dry wine yeast. When wine yeast is unavailable never use “rapid-raise” types.
• Don’t assume the alcohol content is as low as your average glass of wine. Plan not to drive for a while after consuming!
• Do NOT use “Brewer’s yeast” as sold in health food stores – this is dead yeast, and won’t do anything!

Carboy

In brewing, a carboy is also known as a demijohn. It is a glass or plastic vessel that is often used in fermenting beverages such as wine, mead, and beer. Usually it is fitted with a rubber stopper and a fermentation lock to prevent bacteria from entering during the fermentation process.

During the homebrewing process, a primary carboy is used for fermentation. Once primary fermentation is complete, the beer is either transferred to a secondary carboy for conditioning or it can be transferred directly to bottles for conditioning. (This process of transferring is usually called racking.)

Polypropylene carboys are also commonly used in laboratories to transfer purified water. They are typically filled at the top and have a spigot at the bottom for dispensing.

The word carboy is from the Persian qarabah (?????), from Arabic qarraba, “big jug”.

Carboys come in various volumes ranging from 1 gallon to 6.5 gallons (4 to 25 litres). The term carboy used on its own will generally refer to a 5 gallon (22.5 litre) carboy, unless otherwise noted. A one gallon carboy is usually called a jug. A 15 gallon carboy is often called a demijohn (in the Philippines, “dama juana”). “Demijohn” is an old word that formerly referred to any glass vessel with a large body and small neck, enclosed in wickerwork. The word is said to derive from the name of a Persian town, Damaghan, but this is not supported by any historical evidence. According to The Oxford English Dictionary the word comes from the French dame-jeanne, literally “Lady Jane”, as a popular appellation. This is in accordance with the historical evidence at present known, since the word occurred initially in France in the 17th century, and no earlier trace of it has been found elsewhere.

In Britain, demijohn refers to a one-gallon glass brewing vessel.

In Southeast U.S. slang, a demijohn jug, of any size, is referred to as a jimmyjohn.

The name is sometimes misspelled as “carboil,” “carbuoy,” or “carble.”

A carboy is often humorously referred to as a Conrack after the Jon Voight movie of the same name. In the movie, the children are unable to pronounce the name Conroy and therefore refer to Pat Conroy as Conrack.