First Beer in the Fermenter

So my first batch of homebrew is bubbling merrily away in the carboy right now. I'm happy to have finally started my journey toward brewing. Brew Day went smoothly for the most part. My friend Josh and I polished off half of a mini-keg of flat Bell's Two-Hearted. Even flat, this beer is better than a vast number of other beers. Anyway, brew day went smoothly. No boil overs. The only thing I'm concerned about is whether I sanitized everything properly (I guess we'll find out soon enough). I also forgot to take an original gravity measurement, but I used beercalculus.com to figure out what it was approximately.

Speaking of beercalculus, I heartily recommend the site. This is the brew I just made: http://hopville.com/recipe/142099/american-amber-ale-recipes/attempted-hoppy-red

I was going for a very hoppy red in the mold of Green Flash's Hop Head Red. We'll see if I succeeded. I know that the ABV on this beer is going to be very low and subsequently the high IBUs will end up being very high. It may end up being an unbalanced beer, but given that I love hops, I don't think I mind all that much.

Here's my equipment as it stands right now:

- plain stainless steel 20 qt. brew kettle
- one 6g glass carboy
- two brew buckets (one with spigot for bottling)
- assorted airlocks, tubing, etc.

I'll keep this updated when I bottle and include tasting notes for the first beer.

Next up will be a brown ale with maple syrup from Sam Calagione's Extreme Brewing, and after that will be a black IPA kit from Northern Brewer.

Anyway, that's that. Happy brewing to all of you.