Brand new brew guy needs advice

Ok so I am so new at brewing i haven brewed my 1st batch yet

and ive been doing all the research i can and most of the kinda answers have been super complexed and confusing

1st off as a baker by trade I have raw red and white yeast berries where i mill my own flour- can i use these and if so how do i prep them(sorry my question mark doesnt work on my keyboard :slight_smile:

2ndly if i can use them what kind of hops and malt would you recommend to compliment those berries

I’m not familiar with yeast berries so I can’t offer an answer to your question. I can offer some advice though. If you have not brewed your first batch yet, I would recommend keeping it simple. Using standard basic ingredients. Save the unknown ingredients for down the road once you have your process mastered a bit.

Totally agree with the above. For your first batch you will want to keep it as simple as possible. I’d even recommend going to a good homebrew shop and getting a kit with instructions. Use a good dried brewers yeast such as US05. I have no idea what “yeast berries” are (did you mean wheat berries?) but if you are thinking on using a bread yeast for fermentation you are starting off down the wrong path. You want a brewers yeast, and the one I mentioned (Fermentis US05) is probably the best one to start with. Good luck, have fun and let us know what you decide and how it turns out.

I think by yeast berries you meant wheat berries. I’d say skip using raw wheat until you have more experience brewing. Raw wheat isn’t used all that much in brewing and often requires some additional processes to be useful in brewing.

I would also add that it is almost always a good thing to find a homebrewer in your area that has been brewing a while to watch him or her brew a batch.  It will help a lot of new complex ideas gel.

Raw red and/or white wheat berries have limited use, mainly in Belgian Styles. Germans use malted wheat. If you want to know what works for those look in the recipe section on the main AHA page.

Where ever you see flaked wheat in a recipe you can replace with raw wheat.

Here is one example, for a classic Wit.

So if we are talking wheat berries understand they will have to be mashed with some 2 row or pilsner malt. Not a difficult process but you wouldn’t want to add them without mashing them.

Here’s a great place to start - www.howtobrew.com