G'day,

I'm Ben from Sydney.

About a decade ago I used to brew loads of kits and extracts. Probably close to 100 batches all up, including quite a few alcoholic lemonades and one or two ginger beers.

I've been keen to get back into it for ages. And keen to graduate to all grain. BIAB looks like the way to go in the small kitchen in my apartment.

I've done loads of reading of various forums and whatever other info I could find online.

Anyway, I've attempted 2 batches on the past 2 weekends;

The first, an American Pale Ale brewed by myself in my kitchen on electric stove top with 19L Big W pot, seemed like a disaster at the time (a lot of wort lost, a few equipment failures and many stages were it could've been infected). But I've managed to get 10L to ferment (was aiming for 15L) and it tastes okay. I'm hoping to bottle this Sunday and trying to figure out how I'll be able to crash chill this (in primary, to bottle from primary) in a small apartment with no spare fridge space. Any ideas welcomed!!! (I'm thinking in the bath, with a bag of ice from a petrol station, covered with a blanket to keep the light out). The fermented wort looks a lot like miso soup right now.

The second was a group effort, an American Brown Ale brewed in a back yard with 2 pots and esky mash tun. This went fairly smoothly (thanks to learning from that first brew in my kitchen), but one thing I/we didn't do for both was whirlpool them. Will be doing that from now on.

I'm hoping to make a schwarzbier asap. But need to work out how I'll hit certain lower lager temps without fridge space. The fermenting temperature in my apartment sits constant at about 18-19 degrees C. If this crash chill on ice in the bath works, it might be an option for working with lager yeasts. (I'm hoping I could replenish the ice every 24 hours to keep it constant over many days).

Any tips/ideas for crash chilling in an apartment?