Episode: 1998
Title: HPR1998: Homebrewing
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr1998/hpr1998.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-18 13:03:19

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This is HPR Episode 1998 entitled Thumbring.
It is hosted by M1RR Nero R5H4D35 and is about 24 minutes long, the summary is a bit
about making your own beer.
This episode of HPR is brought to you by an Honesthost.com.
Get 15% discount on all shared hosting with the offer code HPR15, that's HPR15.
Get your web hosting that's Honest and Fair at An Honesthost.com.
Hello World, Mirror Shades here again, before I get into the episode, I just wanted
to talk a little bit about some of the feedback from my first show.
So first of all, my handle, the one that gives the speech synthesis fits, I actually got
that from the title of a book, it's an old book, I think it came out in 1986, it's called
Mirror Shades, a cyberpunk anthology and it's edited by Bruce Sterling, I think you can
still buy it on Amazon, it's, I was just feeling nostalgic and of course if you're going
to do a cyberpunk handle, you have to do it and leave, that's just how it is.
Also the tape recorder, the reason why I used that is I just found it, I forgot to even
own this thing, I was cleaning out a closet, I had a bunch of hardware in there and I found
it and there was a blank tape, actually a sealed, unused blank tape and so that's why I used
it to record the first episode and a funny story after I recorded that show, the recorder
quit working, it just died an unspectacular death and doesn't work anymore, oh well.
So let's see, the last thing is my accent, I seem to have, when I apologize for my accent
it's not because I'm ashamed of my accent or anything like that, I just never sure how
much other people would be able to understand the words that I'm using, my accent's actually
not terribly thick, when I'm going to tell you it's a little bit anecdotal, so in
Kentucky it seems to be the further west you go, the milder the accent is and I grew
up in Central Kentucky but most of my family is from Eastern Kentucky and Eastern Kentucky
is more of the Appalachian region, it's the mountain area, so accents there are much
much thicker and sometimes it can really be hard to understand if you're not familiar
with them, so my speech is a little weird, it's a little bit of a mix which I guess is
normal if you're from Central Kentucky, it's not as thick as an Eastern Kentucky accent
but I usually understand what those people are saying, pretty well but I've heard accents
Kentucky accents or I guess Appalachian accents that are so thick that you know many people
have trouble understanding what they're saying, and you know that's okay, it's just, it's
regional, some people mistake my accent for a Southern drawl and it's not, a Southern
drawl is what you'll hear if you listen to someone who's from like Georgia or someplace,
most of the people who settled in the Appalachian region are Irish, Scottish, German and some
Scandinavian descent, so the accent here is pretty much unique to Appalachia and also
before I get into the episode, I just wanted to share, I got something really cool here,
my grandfather's father was born, raised, lived and died in Eastern Kentucky, I have a
recording of him and I'm going to play just a snippet of it for you and so you can hear
and a little bit more of an authentic Eastern Kentucky accent, it's kind of cool, I'll
go ahead and play that now and then it's not very long, the whole recording I have is about an hour
and a half, I'm just going to play a little just a couple of minutes, the audio quality on this
is extremely rough, it was recorded in the early 90s and he was, I think he was in his 70s,
so I'm just going to play that just as an aside, so you can hear that and then we'll get
him to the episode itself.
Sure did have a hard time, little brother, time to make a living, he had to raise him, he
back in, he bought us out of the store, he'd get home and wanted to buy a bed, he'd
get home and make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home, he'd get home and
make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and
make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and
make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and
make a bed, he'd get home, get a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home your
house, and he'd get home, and he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed
and he'd get home, he'd get home or make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'll give
him a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and make a bed, he'd get home and
And we learned how to fly there later, so was that the day when we played the roles of them here.
That's all we need to say to you about is just open up the most out of the roles.
Oh, she's echoed.
And later, so that's what she's saying.
That you know my day to day.
It wouldn't make me get up.
It wouldn't, it wouldn't move far away till it was one or two times.
It meant I saw it as all this water.
One day about it though, you didn't have to worry about it, if you wouldn't have.
So far on the edge of that, you can just get your role on that land.
That worked out pretty good, that way.
I went to two families there, and I don't know how it was.
That's no plan if he's wildly out there and I follow it.
And I smiled.
I started at an hour one day.
I don't mean to stand on the road.
You think only him.
He gets to stop him in the castle right now, gotten to say it.
I said, what world is that of you?
Shit, I said, this makes the third time.
I'll feel that it comes down the tone for you.
Well, let's do that.
It's a type of man's whole life.
There's trouble, let's do care of that.
I mean, it's back up in the tone for you.
Well, you need to do something about that.
You know what you'll do?
That's right, he takes your big little role.
Down you eight.
Now then, why not turn the trailer by?
Yeah.
Well, W peque lzo, you know what I'm going to say.
I'm going to turn it.
You know what I'm doing, that's for you.
Okay, so that was that was my grandfather the the the sound quality on that's pretty rough. I'm sorry
He he recorded that on an old tape recorder with no mic
On a very cheap cassette outside so
It's so it is what it is it's pretty it's pretty cool
So what I'm gonna do this episode I'm gonna talk about home brew
But I'm not talking about applications. I'm talking about beer and I know a lot of people
Think about doing home brew from time to time, especially if you're you know beer lover
It's gonna cross your mind at some point
And there's a lot of information out there on on home brewing and there's a lot of
A lot of equipment out there for it and I think the biggest hurdle most people have when they they think about
Home brewing their own beer is
You see all this equipment. It's a very expensive and
A lot of people if they decide to test the waters they wind up buying a
One of these inexpensive little like mr. Beer type kits or they get one for Christmas and
So if you look online some of the opinions of the of the
Mr. Beer kids aren't you know, they're all over the place some people say they're fine some people say they're horrible
What I wanted to do is just to share some tips
To get the most out of one of these inexpensive entry-level kits
Because it is a good way to find out if it's something you want to do or not if it's something you want to invest in
You know better equipment or
You know better ingredients and stuff and actually get into or you know if you just want to
Continue using the mr. Beer kids extremely easy to use
But you know, you're not gonna get the full home brew experience with it
But it will it's good for us for beginner. It's a good way to kind of learn how to go through the motions
But there's a few things that
I've noticed that when people get bad results out of it. It's usually
Usually it's one of three things that they have
They're actually I guess four things that they have
They've overlooked
And the
So I want I want to go over those real quick
So you if you're in that boat and you decided to
To try it out. Maybe you'll get a little bit better results
Save you the trouble and frustration of having to do all this research on your own like I did
so
the first thing is
If you with the kit or even the the refills
They will come with a little pack of I think it's called no rent sanitizer
And you will want to use that you will want to use that on anything that's going to touch your beer
the
The pot that you're gonna
Cook the ward in
any spoons spatulas
Inside the fermenter the bottles anything that's going to come in contact with your beer
You're gonna want to make sure you use that no rent sanitizer on
That's very important because
uh
If if foreign particles get in there
It's not going to
It's not going to poison your beer, but it's going to most likely make it skunky if you've never had skunky beer
Count your blessings
It's there's a reason why they say it's it's skunky beer. It really it's not a pleasant aroma
um
So use the sanitizer
You know
Be meticulous
Sanitize everything
The second thing is
water
I forget what is something like 85% of of beer's water
The better water the the better quality water that you use is going to render a higher quality product in the end
so
Don't just
Fill it up with that nasty stuff that comes out of your tap
If you guys overseas probably you may not have this problem here in the US our tap water is nasty and
Just don't use tap water if you have access to a natural spring that has
You know good water or a natural source of good fresh water
That that works really well if not and you have to go out and buy water by spring water don't buy distilled water
um spring water is probably your best bit
If you have a favorite brand of spring water or something or if you have one of those um
Those pictures with the filter in it
um, you know
You can filter your tap water and it'll work okay. I've seen some people do that
um
Just make sure you use you know good quality water
I think a lot of people who wind up with really nasty beer wind up using just water out of the tap
They think that's good enough. It'll be fine and it's not
um
The third thing is
Temperature
um
So the the beer will ferment at uh, you know, it's as bad
I don't remember what the optimal temperature is there's a range it's fine
Whatever they say in the instructions is fine, but just you want to make sure that you know you don't
Store the fermenter when you're letting the water ferment
In some place it's really hot or really cold or the temperature goes up and down a lot
um
Excuse me
It needs to be uh fairly stable temperature and um
And you should be fine
Uh, and the last thing is is patience um
One of the things that the instructions in in these cheap kids the particularly the mr. Beer kid. I know says this
uh
They they say you can ferment in the fermenter for a week and then condition in the bottle for a week
And then you can drink your beer and i'm here to tell you that that is complete fiction
Um don't do it. It's
You're not going to be pleased with what you wind up with um
Let it set in the fermenter for two weeks
Uh, if it sits in there for three, it's not going to hurt it
um
I've let some go over i've let a couple batches go over to three weeks um and then when you bottle it
You're going to want to let the let it set in the bottles
This this process is called conditioning you let it set in the the bottles for i would let it set for a couple of weeks
And uh then you can stick them in the fridge and get them cold and drink them
um
Because that that extra time is
Just trust me. Just do it. Don't don't do the two-week thing. That's going to you're going to wind up with something nasty
Some swill it you don't want
Uh, that's another place where that's very common for people to uh go wrong their first time trying to home brew
um
I don't even know why they put that in the instructions. That's just crazy
um
So uh
Those are really the four big ones
sanitize good water
stable temperature and and give it enough time to work. It's magic
uh, there's a few other little tips
um
Just on the tail end of this
I want to talk about one is uh yeast
So if you if you buy one of these inexpensive kits or you buy refill for it
It's going to come with a little pack of yeast
and that yeast uh
I've seen humbers on forums and stuff talk about how horrible it is and that you're better off
um
Investing a couple extra dollars in getting some premium yeast uh that it it enhances the flavor profile and all this stuff
I've never had bad luck with the yeast that comes with
the kits
so
I don't know
If you want to experiment with that you buy all means go ahead
I'm never really had an issue with the the yeast it comes with
Uh, I think the big thing is like I said giving it enough time to to work its magic and making sure the temperature is stable
um
They also sell
A little thing
It's called yeast nutrient and you can buy like a pound bag of it. It's pretty cheap
I forget how much it is you can get it either from home brew supplier or they sell it on amazon
um and you can add some of that
uh at the beginning of the fermentation process and it it helps to keep the yeast healthy and
Doing its thing
um
I did try some of it. It seemed that it worked okay. I don't know. I don't know what to tell you if it if it actually did anything
um
Amazing or not
um
But you can do that too if you want
um
I also want to talk about a few differences in
Beer that you buy in the store versus beer that you brew yourself at home
so
um
There's a few processes that beer
Undergoes when you buy it in the store that you actually will not be doing or you will be doing differently in a home brew situation
So when you buy beer in the store it's usually it has been filtered and has been pasturized
You're probably not going to do that in a home brew situation. It's okay. It's not going to hurt you
um
We've been making beer
Without filtering or pasturizing it for several thousand years now um
The uh
I actually to be honest like it better when it's not filtered or pasturized it it's it's it's definitely different um
You'll be able to taste the difference when you when you drink your own beer that you've made the first time
I can't I don't know it it is better than the stuff in the store. I think
Um, that's an opinion of mine
You know your your mileage may vary
um the other thing is is
carbonation
So when you buy beer in the store
it's
Force carbonated by injecting CO2 in it
um
The same way they do soda or any other carbonated beverage
Um, and then it's kept in pressurized containers until it's consumed
um
With home brew you can actually buy the equipment to do that
Um, there's really not much of a reason to most humbers what they do and what you'll be doing if you're just
You know getting started and just trying this out is when you go to bottle it
You're going to put some sugar in each of the bottles before you
drain the firm inner into the bottles
And that sugar is called priming sugar and what it does is it reactivates the yeast inside the beer and
It's not a lot just a little and it will create a little more alcohol
Not a significant amount, but what it also does is creates it releases CO2
And it does this naturally
So this is called natural carbonation and it it's a different
I guess body is the word I'm looking for it
It's going to be differently body than beer you buy in the store and
The carbonation natural carbonation is a little bit different. I've noticed
Uh, when you pour it if you pour it into a mug or something
um
It's going to get a really big foam head on it, but it'll dissipate quicker than what you get
In the you know in store bobbeer
um
And I think that's about it
If you're uh if you're on the fence, it's you know home brew is pretty fun
It's it's legal to do in the States. That's another thing of
I don't know why but people seem to think this is illegal
You can legally brew I think it's
200 gallons per calendar year for personal use now you can't sell it you have to have a liquor license to sell
You can give it to your family and friends. Uh, I usually just drink mine
um
But
There you go if you if you've ever thought about if you're wondering it's not
terribly hard
Uh, and I think the kids are pretty inexpensive now if you want to give it a shot
I would recommend going ahead doing it and if you have any uh questions
um
About it, you know, you can
Leave a comment or shoot me email or something
I will do my best to answer your questions on that front
And uh, that's about it for me today. Thanks for listening
and
I haven't enjoyed your beer
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