I’ve got my 7 dwarves brewing right now, I’ve got molasses and lime, molasses, lemon and plain sugar, lemon lime and plain sugar, lime and plain sugar, and three with combinations of different apples. All a litre and successfully started fermenting
Cinnamon, fun fact, is extremely antimicrobial and will almost definitely kill your fermentation chances. This is sad because I lost a bottle but happy because it gives me some great ideas for using cinnamon after a cold crash both for flavor and to help lock fermentation down.
Been into this hobby a few years now. Every time I run I end up with a legal pad covered in scribbled jar numbers and ABV readings I can't read later or can’t find on my next run. Tried spreadsheets, tried beer brewing apps — nothing really fit how I actually work.
So I built something for myself. It's called StillCraft Cuts Tracker. Free, no login, runs in your browser. You log each jar as you go — cut type, volume, ABV, temp, notes — and mark them Keep/Discard/Feints/Undecided. Exports to CSV when you're done. Mobile-friendly so you can use your phone without printing anything. And for privacy, nothing is stored “in the cloud”. It stays on your device.
It's still early — more of a working mockup than a finished product. I'm using it myself but haven't had a lot of outside eyes on it yet.
stillcraft.app/landing/cuts-tracker.html
And to be up front, I’m not an app developer. I needed help from AI to take my idea and make something practical. That is a bit of a hot button issue, so I wanted to be clear from the start. I hope that doesn’t turn some of you away.
Curious what experienced folks think. Is this useful? What's missing? What would you actually want to track that isn't there? I’m planning on adding features in the future. I created a quick web page explaining what’s to come. It’s at stillcraft.app
No strings attached. Just something I made for myself that might be useful to others. Enjoy!
I was just about to cold crash this one until I saw these black specs at the bottom with the yeast. It’s been sitting for about 3 weeks or so. I’ve done a few batches before but I’m still relatively new to hooching, is this safe to drink? Could this be mold?
I'm so annoyed at myself I bought a gallon of grape juice and I didn't check for preservatives.
It's got potassium metabisulfite and I've heard that I could still maybe use it for a brew if I used a yeast starter (I think the deal is the preservatives stop new growth but can't kill active yeast or something???)
I'm super impatient and I don't wanna wait another week to get the yeast going before I can start this gallon
I have a tiny tiny bottle of actively fermenting hooch (~ 2.5 L, day 5), could I use some of that as a yeast starter?? Or at least like an accelerant? 🤔
Also if I was gonna do that would I just pour off a little more than 2.5 L from the gallon of grape juice and just add in the other brew? Or do I just siphon off a little of the other bottle, mix it with more yeast and then add it the grape juice 🤔
ok guys help me out pls
Like how much do I need to look after it and if I used carrots beetroots and sugar would it taste like carrots and beetroots even a little bit
Fermenting 2 half gallons of apple juice with 100g of sugar each.
I also did one half gallon of apple and one of cranberry which I didn't add any sugar to.
All made with 71b, no yeast nutrient, and so far no issues. Loose cap method is working surprisingly well, airlocks should be here soon
Me and my room mates in the name of science and cheep piss started this beauty. It’s about two cups of sugar in two litres of water with lemon and orange juice. Pray for us
imma take a fresh wtermellon, cut a hole and insert distillers active and nutrient, tape a balloon over the hole, put it in a bucket, and put that in spare fridge. take it out in a month and dig in.
Mixed an eyeball amount of sugar into water and added some canned peaches and raisins and left for 10 days. Taste exactly like shock top. (Shock top tasting like watered down piss that you soaked a tangerine into) edit- I also squeezed half a lime into this before fermentation
So as the name suggests I like to call myself not an alcoholic, but an alchemist. The ricepie for my brew is rather simple, even a first timer could make it work. But keep in mind it's made in two parts.
Recipe (part one)
About 2/3 kg of red or green apples, diced in about 2x2x2cm.
1.2kg white sugar
About 20-30 grams of baker's yeast (mix it in a different cup and ad last)
Warm water, about 30-35° (my barrel is about 11.5 liters, but I advise you to leave at least three fingers from the lid.)
First pour about two liters of water in, and dissolve the sugar. Then drop the cut apples in and ad the rest of the water in, top it off with activated baker's yeast (mixed in a separate cup with warm water) and close the lid with the hydrolock.
Ricepe (step two)
After the previous part is done, let is stay for about eight days, then distillate your work. It would leave you with about a 1.5 liters of 60+% drink. You than add 35 berries of juniper berries, and let it stay for another week.
After that time the Alchemist's piss is ready and good for consumption. Just filter it through the cloth until a good looking glass or ceramic bottle and enjoy.
One of my very first bottles i used about 8 tea bags and 2 cups of sugar and EC-1118 with some yeast energizer. It took about may 4th - may 15th stabilized with Camden tablets and potassium sorbate then clarified with gelatin finings, now I'm enjoying.
To be honest in its clarity it's a lot more crisp if that makes sense.
So I know that pouring a hooch from one jug into another (after fermentation ) will likely cause oxidation. Had an idea to counter oxidation: don't transfer the full volume, just add a bit of sugarwater or juice to top things off and have a second fermentation to blow whatever oxygen was accidentally introduced back out.
Not a chemist or professional brewer (look where we are lol)
The context for this: I like making wine in a water bottle, skins in the hooch. After 1-2 weeks of the hooch sitting on the skins I like to take it off the skins but I can't be assed to set up proper siphons and filters etc etc to move the hooch from bottle A to bottle B. The way I see it, the amount of oxygen introduced can't be that much, and doing a second fermentation should remedy any potential damage done.... right?
Xbox controller added for scale
Bible added for the lord's blessings
2 bottles of apple juice
1 bottle of tropical
1 bottle of lemon ice tea
Roughly 300 grams of sugar
Small bit of water that I took from the bottle I'm using and Yeast
So I've finally narrowed down my previous batches stalling out and it seems like it's been the pH getting too acidic and I'm curious if this is something that.... usually happens? When I was looking up guides for Kilju nothing mentioned acidity being a problem even for high ABV batches, but so far I've had to add an entire teaspoon of baking soda just to get it up to 13%, I know yeast makes it environment more acidic but to the point of stalling out 3 times and needing incremental additions of a base to keep it going seems a bit much
Ingredients look ok in a ferment except the corn oil might be questionable
Mixed honey yeast brown sugar let it ferment for almost 4 weeks airlock balloon wasnt staying up so I assumed it was done so I cold crashed it for 2 days and here I am
Xbox controller added for scale
Bible added for the lord's blessings
2 bottles of apple juice
1 bottle of tropical
1 bottle of lemon ice tea
Roughly 300 grams of sugar
Small bit of water that I took from the bottle I'm using and Yeast