It's bottling time!

Hermano has left the confines of my brewing tub and is now safely contained within forty-two 500ml bottles. I'd been checking the Specific Gravity (SG) every day and we had been at 1.009 since Thursday night. I could have bottled the beer last night but I wanted to double check the SG again today and it also gave me the time to finalise my beer label. I'll spare you the maths, but Hermano should come in at around 3.9% ABV. I had originally planned a picture label but decided against it for several reasons. I then thought I'd mimic the Corona label however this led to a interesting issue. The Corona-style label is oval, and as I would be printing and cutting around forty-five labels I realised that creating anything but rectangular labels would be simply stupid. The label above is the final printed version. The bottling itself was simply enough. The supplied plastic bottles are already sterilised so I simply needed to to fill, prime, cap and label.

Filling

The kit comes with a handy valve for bottling. It connects to the tap which you turn on about ¼. The beer fills it however it has a pressure valve at the bottom, a bit like a stop valve on a garden hose. With nothing pressing against it, the valve is sealed shut by the gravity pressure of the beer. When the valve comes into contact with the bottom of the bottle, it is pushed up and allows beer to flow. This means the bottles fill steadily with minimal foaming. Filling itself was easy however my first 4-5 were a little under filled as I had failed to account for the volume of the bottling valve itself and I was stopping too far from the top of the bottle.

Priming & Capping
Priming can be a tricky process however the kit comes to the rescue again, supplying Carbonation Drops that look a little like boiled sweets. They contain a pre-measured sugar dose that gives my Cerveza its fizz and ferments it for the second time. The capping process is simply a case of screwing the self-sealing plastic bottle cap on tightly. My wife Jenny was volunteered to prime and cap the beer and she did an admirable job, however she is complaining of a sore hand...

Labelling
In my first post I mentioned that using milk was the best way to attach paper labels. I set up my labelling workstation on the dining room table and found a small paintbrush. Whilst I wouldn't say I was skeptical I certainly wasn't filled with confidence that milk would provide the clean, simple and aesthetic adhesive solution I desired. Imagine my surprise when I discover that labelling the beer bottles was a piece of piss. Really. It was easy, and I had 40 bottles labelled in about 10 minutes.

The finished product looks pretty good, I think. The next part of the process is probably the hardest, as I need to allow the Cerveza to bottle condition for at least two weeks. The beer will taste at its best about 3-6 months from now, as it matures with age. Like all bottle conditioned beers there will be a small sediment that shouldn't be drunk either.

I'm quite proud of my first homebrew experience so far, but the desire to try it along with my usual impatience needs to be controlled. I know if I try it too early I will not be happy with the taste with good reason.

I've also decided that I will keep brewing beer at home, and I have ordered 3 further ingredient packs from Coopers, which should arrive next week. I have an Australian Pale Ale, a Canadian Blonde Ale and a Wheat Beer coming to me. I've come up with the following labels for these :)