About this time in 1972 I had been making drinkable wines for a year or so. I decided that making beer shouldn't be all that hard. Got me some Blue Ribbon Malt down at the grocery store (Lord knows how long that had been on the shelf) and some Red Star bread yeast (just like the directions on the can of malt said). I had some dry, brown powdery stuff that the guy at the wine supply shop gave me several months before. Supposedly they were hops. Anyway, I boiled the malt, water and hops for a good five minutes or so and then let it cool overnight before pouring into the carboy. I washed the carboy really good so it wouldn't contaminate anything (sanitizer? what's that?). I added the yeast and fermentation went just fine. After a week I bottled it. Did I mention that I knew absolutely nothing about brewing beer at that point other than what I read on the side of the can of malt?
Anyway, after "conditioning" for a week or so, I chilled down a bottle or two so I could taste the fruits of my labor. I opened the first bottle and a brown geyser spewed forth all over the ceiling and down three walls!
I even had beer inside the ceiling light fixture! I opened the next bottle outside pointed in a safe direction. Same geyser, but nothing soaked. I did work up the nerve to give the little in the bottle a taste in the dim hope that it was just over-carbonated. No such luck. Tasted like it had been brewed in once of JP's dirty sneakers (you know, one of the Pacheco ones.).
That was it for me for beer brewing for the next 30 years. With the encouragement of Denny Conn, Dan Listerman, Pat Babcock and others over on Homebrewdigest.com, I finally got back into brewing again in 2002. Most of my beers have been pretty good ever since. None anywhere close to that first disaster.
