2 Tins Of Coopers Ingredients, Nothing More.

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I just kegged a 2 can

1can coopers pale
1can coopers draught
fermented 1 week
ccd 4 months
kegged last night


had a taste. not bad at all. very clear orange -red in colour. tolerable bitterness. good flavour. a bit stickier than your usual brew. I'll see how it goes when its ready to drink Tomorrow.

Woohoo i love my new keg setup. :D
 
I tried it once as an experiment while my AG set up was in bits/redesigning made. Used 2 cans of coppers real ale and then dry hopped. Turned out shit.

Happy to have my AG set up in full swing again.
 
Kick start an old topic.

I've just started all malt brewing, i.e., tin of Coopers + 1kg LDME, speciality grains etc.

Was thinking of doing a two can brew ( basically the same just liquid instead of dry malt) so searched the forum and found this thread.

After reading through all the posts, most people are saying to be careful with bitterness.

My question, if I boil the second can, say home brand lager or similar, will this neutralise the bitterness in the malt, or will it just neutralise the flavour and aromas from the hops?

Cheers
 
From memory of a similar thread on Grumpy's a few years ago(toucan brews?), it's the flavour and aroma that get driven out and the bitterness stays behind.
Maybe someone has found a solution since then?
 
Probably to use two cans of something with low bittering like a lager/draught kits, add your own flavour & aroma hops.

Done a toucan of farmland lager with hop additions - not a bad drop, full coloured, could have done with some more bittering, decent budget swill beer.

Also done a toucan of coopers real ale - not likely to repeat that one
 
Thanks for the speedy replies.

So so long as I stick to low bitter cans (no frills lager) and provide my own aroma and flavour hops, all should be good.
 
Yep, Simon W is correct, boiling will do the opposite of what you want.

I have to confess the toucan is what I'm mostly doing these days, as a cheap way to turn out large quantities of reasonable beer for the holiday season using only Safeway ingredients.

I disagree that you get a 'double bitterness' brew. Malt extract has a fair amount of 'malty sweetness', so most of a kit's hops are really there to balance out its own malt, if you get what I mean.

You also probably want to go up to a slightly larger batch to keep the gravity in line, say 26L as opposed to 22L - so I reckon you actually only end up with about 50% 'more' hops, which probably isn't a bad ratio given the blandness of a lot of the cheaper kits.

If you stick with the more tame kits you can turn out some tasty, general-consumption beers with very little effort.
 
I've also taken the step back from AG for now... and two can brews have served me very well, I just make sure I add something flavoursome to the boil. I usually use 1 wheat kit and 1 bitter kit, then add either american hops and a SAF-USale yeast for an american amber ale, or add loads of roasted barley, chocolate malt, brown sugar, cocoa, molassis or whatever for a sticky imp stout.
 
I have been doing two kits almost since I started home brewing, as I never like the results I got when I used sugar or dextrose with one can of hopped extract. The next day I always felt I had been drinking nasty cask wine (=a headache).

As plain liquid malt extracts are more expensive than hopped extracts (over $11 Aus as opposed to around $9 Aus hopped) and I really enjoy very bitter beers like authentic Pilsners and Bavarian Lagers etc, it just seemed to make good economic sense. I nearly always boil the cans of extract with 2-4 litres of water though, which I guess, reduces the bitterness a little because it changes any aroma hop flavours.

I just do a bit of math to bring the brew up to 23 litres. Usually 2-4litres of hot + the two cans contents (3.4kg which approximately equals 3.4litres) plus whatever cold tap water is required to make up to 23 litres of brew. I find I usually have to try and reduce the temperature of the wort before pitching the yeast and I have only ever pitched one yeast packet, as the other is kept for backup. Admittedly though, I sometimes keep a cup or so of extract back to boil up later with a little water to add to the bottles for priming although dextrose is almost okay for this too. Generally, I like all malt brews so I formulate that cup (or 0.25 litres) into the equation.

If you’re really hard up though, you can get the same result with just one can by taking the 23 litre formula above and halving it all. So you get one can at 1.7kg + 1-2 litres of hot and whatever you need to bring the brew up to around 11.5 litres. If you don't like the strong bitterness you can also add an additional 1-2 litres of water which mellows the flavour a little. In the 23 litre version you could add a little more water, but fermenter space is sometime limited. Even if you’re not hard up, sometimes a small batch of beer is good because it doesn't use up too many bottles and you can brew more variety more frequently.

Over the years I have done lots of two can mixes. Some that come to mind are a Wander's Pilsner (I think) + a Munich lager which tasted great, aged well and satisfied lots of discerning continental beer drinkers I know. I have also done a few "Half and Halfs" by using Cooper's light (real ale) and dark ale together which results in a strongly hopped, fruity tasting ale that also seems to keep very well. Wander's Munich Lager makes a pretty impressive 11.5 litre batch too: my girlfriend and I are currently finding it to be very drinkable.

I really recommend the two can method, as it makes for a very pure product which is not as cheap as the can and sugar (or dextrose) method but is cheaper than a hopped can of extract plus an unhopped 1 kg can of plain malt extract. Perhaps another way to reduce the bitterness in a two can brew may be to boil the hell out of one of the cans of extract with water and add the other one after the wort has cooled to around 70C. This would theoretically give you one can with more aroma hops flavour and one that is not as stronly flavoured which may result in a more balanced brew for those who don't like the extra bitterness.

Anyway...sorry about the rant and thanks for the interesting thread..Prost!!!
 
I have used t2 cans of coopers stout and it was excellent. Big and flavoursome

I would use another yeast. The one provided with the kit gets far too excited. We had big black sticky mess in the garage after an overflow

Alternatively just use one yeats sachet
 
As plain liquid malt extracts are more expensive than hopped extracts (over $11 Aus as opposed to around $9 Aus hopped)

I pay $10 for an unhopped extract and use a tin of hopped extract and then use hops to adjust bitterness etc. I also like using 2 tins of unhopped liquid malt to do the extract method. Unless you are comparing homebrand kits to the malt tins, its not that bad. Hells bells, you can pay upwards of $15 for a hopped kit.

I dont use dex etc anymore, only malt (and the occasional honey or golden syrup).

Cheers
DrSmurto
 
Coopers Toucan Stout - In the fermenter now. Just needs 1 additive - 300gms Corn Syrup. Hopefully I'll be able to serve it as a dessert. :lol:

Really good beer can be produced from the cheapies if a little effort is applied.

I boil a kit to 7 litres for 45 - 60 mins cool and into the fermenter.
Then do the second kit adding hops to this brew, cool and into the fermenter.

Cool to 24, and pitch.

I'd like a bigger boiler, but also an ocean going ketch and a Mercedes..... But we get by....

All the ales/Lagers mentioned in my signature are all toucan brews...
 
Yes DrSmurto you're quite right; some of the kits in home brew shops can even be up to $20, especially ones from the UK like Muntons. Sometimes though I can't get to my homebrew shop as its fair distance from me and I have to use whats at the supermarket, so the two hopped can brew is kind of convenient.

I guess there is only a couple of bucks difference between adding a 1 kg tin of unhopped to a 1.7kg of hopped. But perhaps thats just it: for less money you get 1.7kg of malt as opposed to the 1kg you get in the plain unhopped tin. I think this extra malt adds a little more body to the beer which I appreciate. Its all subjective though, and I can't claim I'm some sort of authority on the subject although I'm sure you'll admit that using all malt produces a far better end product.

Thanks too Saturn, I'll give your recipe a try sometime and I know what you mean about the yeast: most kits have pretty poor yeast strains that seem to ferment way too fast. I've read that most them are actually just ale yeasts or in some cases baker's yeast.

Prost!!!
 
Yes DrSmurto you're quite right; some of the kits in home brew shops can even be up to $20, especially ones from the UK like Muntons. Sometimes though I can't get to my homebrew shop as its fair distance from me and I have to use whats at the supermarket, so the two hopped can brew is kind of convenient.

I guess there is only a couple of bucks difference between adding a 1 kg tin of unhopped to a 1.7kg of hopped. But perhaps thats just it: for less money you get 1.7kg of malt as opposed to the 1kg you get in the plain unhopped tin. I think this extra malt adds a little more body to the beer which I appreciate. Its all subjective though, and I can't claim I'm some sort of authority on the subject although I'm sure you'll admit that using all malt produces a far better end product.

Thanks too Saturn, I'll give your recipe a try sometime and I know what you mean about the yeast: most kits have pretty poor yeast strains that seem to ferment way too fast. I've read that most them are actually just ale yeasts or in some cases baker's yeast.

Prost!!!

The tins of coopers liquid malt extract are 1.5kg not 1kg so not a huge differenc ein price but i hear what youre saying. I havent done a 2can yet but sounds like those making dark ales and stouts swear by it! Especially when you can get the coopers original kits on special form the supermarkets for $9.

As for all malt - i agree except when i add honey or golden syrup......

Cheers
DrSmurto
 
Yes Drsmurto I saw your post on the other site about Cooper's malt extract being 1.5kg just a while ago. Apologies for that. I would definately buy Cooper's plain malts if I saw them for sale. I was at my brew shop the other day and they only had 1kg tins of Morgan's and some other UK brand and they were both $11. 1kg bags of dry malt were the same price. Thanks for the info though as I will look out for Cooper's stuff.

Prost!!!
 
You can buy the coopers stuff online from their website - not sure of delivery charges. Price seems to be the same as most HBS
 
For the price, I'd go an ESB Fresh Wort kit instead.

I hate it when I have to ask a question I probably know the answer to.

What is ESB?
 
ESB can have two meanings in the brewing world.

Eastern Suburbs Brewshop, in the eastern suburbs of Sydney. Run by Mel. Good website, good range of goods.

Unfortunately, there is some confusion for newer members as there is a style that uses the same acronym, Extra Special Bitter which is an English style of beer.
 
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