A few days ago, I spent over an hour with my least favorite home brewing task… cleaning and preparing bottles. You could spend some bucks, and buy some fresh bottles. Over time though, those bottles disappear. You take some brew to a party, the bottles ultimately get left behind. You go to a buddy’s house for football….you leave some behind…you get the picture.
Anyways, I hate buying bottles without beer in them…..they seem to be a better deal with commercial stuff in them….or craft stuff for that matter. So I have cases of beer bottles to scrape and sanitize.
A few tips I have gotten along the way. One, start the process soaking in some warm water. Add some OXICLEAN to the water. It helps break down the glue a bit, makes it easier to scrape. I used to use a pampered chef scraper, but now I use a straight blade widget. If it leave stuff behind, or is a bit stubborn, back in the water for a little while.
After the scraping is done, into the dishwasher for the sanitizing cycle. I talked with another buddy who sometimes wraps the clean bottles in foil, piles them in the oven and sanitizes them by heat in there. Other times, people fill their bottling bucket with one step cleaner and let them soak a bit.
Are there shortcuts? Yep, get the rounded scraper like this one HERE . OR just buy the bottles like here. Ideas? What do you do? Leave a comment below.
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