Homebrewing in NYC

[notahumanissue]

Does anyone have any experience homebrewing in NYC? I used to brew beer a few years ago while living on the left coast, in a small town, with plenty of room to let the delightful stench of the wort disperse before attracting too much attention. I'm very, very interested in getting back into it, but I live in the East Village and am concerned it'd be just plain rude to my neighbors.

Thanks,

-a

[cdh]

It's certainly been done there. eG member Iain brews in Williamsburg, or did a couple of years ago. It really depends on your space. Are you in a cheaply constructed new condo with paper thin walls? Are you in an old tenement with shared ventilation?

Cook something really aromatic like Indian food and see if your neighbors complain. If not, then brew on! Or you could rent a storage space to stow your fermenters... the Mini-Storage on 2nd and 2nd is convenient to most of the E. Vill.

Edited June 13, 2007 by cdh (log)

[notahumanissue]

No, I live in an early 20th century walkup with two units per floor and, well, pretty much NO internal ventilation to speak of -- a standard East Village building, I guess. The layout of my apartment distances me considerably from the surrounding tenants, but I really don't wanna be the kind of jerk who smells up the stairs every week.

I have a ton of windows, most of which open up to Thompkins. I'm guessing everything would be fine -- i just remember my early attempts at homebrewing in *cough* my college dorm complex in california *cough* as not the most subtle smell in the world.

[cdh]

It sounds like you should be fine, having all those windows will certainly keep the stairwell from getting overwhelmed. If you're really concerned about it, set up an exhaust fan so that you're sure to be pulling lots of air out of the window.

You might want to check out the big homebrew forums on the net and take note of how many NYC folks represent on them. brewboard.com, forum.northernbrewer.com, morebeer's forum, and tastybrew would be good places to start. You might also want to keep an eye on www.nycbeer.org, as it used to have info for homebrewers in the city, but is currently undergoing renovations.

[notahumanissue]

fantastic, thank you very much!

[jesskidden]

I would think temperature control is going to be a more difficult problem brewing in the apartment building you've described than aroma. I find that the actual "brewing" scents are quite nice- grain-y and sweet- and can think of a lot of normal food/cooking smells that are a lot more annoying (hey, I like cabbage and I like bacon, but I'll take smelling hops over having those aromas lingering in the stairway any day). And, with an airlock, fermenting wort gives off very little smell unless one is standing right over the fermenter.

I recall explaining homebrewing to a co-worker many years ago and he said, "Man, but your house must smell like a brewery!"

"YEAH!", I exclaimed.

(Altho', when most people say "smell like a brewery", they actually mean smell like a bar- old beer and (formerly) stale cigarette smoke. Breweries smell *GOOD*!)

Edited June 18, 2007 by jesskidden (log)

[AzianBrewer]

notahumanissue

Check out the NYC Hombrewers Guild...Here's the website.

http://hbd.org/nychg/

We meet every 3rd Tuesday of every month. Several of us are getting together for a group brew session in Brooklyn next weekend. I think we will brew couple of batches of saison.

Cheers

[notahumanissue]

Happy to report that after nearly three months and a much needed move out of the East Village, my first batch is three days into fermentation.