All Taste The Same.

[eamonnfoley]

Exactly ! WTF is that sort of information for a new brewer doing kits ? There's a dozen aspects he should focus on, and water profile isn't one of them.

Not water profile - simply chlorine in water. It is important. Maybe you have beautiful spring water out of your tap and have never come across it. But it a common problem with a lot of extract brewers. Take your blinkers off, beer is ninety something % water. It needs to be fit for brewing. And yes, the OP may have great clean water and not need this advice. But somebody elsewhere may benefit from it when he reads the thread.

And the advice to throw away can the can opener isn't great. Fresh wort kits make the beer almost as expensive as buying from the shop. Good beer can be made from extract if the extract is fresh, you have a good fermentation, sanitation, and dare I say it - non chlorinated water

 

[loikar]

All of my beers have been brewed from kits

Brew an All grain....

To my palate the beer has tasted fine, and to me is better than most reasonably priced commercial beers which I can buy. You might not like the taste of kit beers, but I don't care, I'm not brewing for you. Many people brew with kits and love the results,

And all the people who say this are Extract brewers.
I don't know of ONE person, not ONE, that has made an all grain beer and said to themselves; "taste's like shit, im going back to cans".
So dont kid yourself, your Extract beer tastes like AG beer that's been strained through an Incontinent 80 year old womans panty-hose and then dry hopped in an unwashed footy sock and fermented with yeast from a 'badly packed kebab'.
Brew an AG and you'll understand, AND agree.
The End.

so to make such generalisations is ridiculous.

Says someone who has never brewed an all grain beer but seems to be convinced his extract beer is "fine".

Sorry, but I came from K&K and took all the steps to All Grain and I would rather drink a Super Dry than your instant beer.

Cheers,

BF

 

[manticle]

While if all other things are equal, I reckon grain will always win over syrup, if you can't get basic fermentation practices worked out, then it doesn't matter what you use.

I've tasted some pretty bad AG beers (some of them being my own failed ones) and some pretty decent kit/extract.

 

[loikar]

But somebody elsewhere may benefit from it when he reads the thread.

Why not post in reply to him on how to correctly and vigorously strangle your one eyed, purple headed, womb ferret?
Somebody elsewhere may benefit from it when he reads the thread.

From My Previous Post to you:

The bunch of guys are happy because they get to spew their 'knowledge of brewing' (AKA reciting someone else's post) to not just the OP but anyone else that reads the thread and believe they have contributed to the brewing community.
But they have bewildered someone who was keen to brew and originally started the thread, but due to the bullshit, has now put it in the too hard basket.

And the advice to throw away can the can opener isn't great. Fresh wort kits make the beer almost as expensive as buying from the shop. Good beer can be made from extract if the extract is fresh, you have a good fermentation, sanitation, and dare I say it - non chlorinated water

LOL - Fresh Extract...
Processed food, drinks, powders, syrups, etc
Vs
The Actual product they're trying to emulate...

...No, You're right!, there is nothing that comes in a can that isn't just as good or better than if it was made fresh. :blink:

Cheers.....LMAO

BeerFingers

 

[eamonnfoley]

You are a loser mate. Twisting words in order to be a troll. Fresh extract can make good beer - thats it. Maybe not as good as as fresh wort, not better than all grain. My point was fresh wort is expensive, and cans of goo can make decent beer if done properly.

 

[bradsbrew]

Welcome to AHB Banjo :blink: . The first 5 posts are on the money. Yes full mash and Fresh Wort Kits are great. But you can make a decent beer with a kit and some attention to detail. You will be suprised how consistent temperature control and using a better yeast will improve your brews. IMO I would concentrate on that before spending a heap of cash setting up a Full mash system.

Cheers

 

[goomboogo]

Aren't most malt extracts made from 100% malted barley? If so, a beer made solely with such an extract would be all-grain beer.

 

[loikar]

You are a loser mate.Twisting words in order to be a troll.

You're lack of understanding words, and having them twist up in your skull has nothing to do with me.
Im currently drinking an ordinary and plain "bottle filler" APA that I made from grain, hops, water and yeast and it stands, head and shoulders over any extract beer you could possibly imagine to make.
So to keep it in the theme of what we're discussing here, I believe, I am the winner :icon_cheers:

Fresh extract can make good beer - thats it. Maybe not as good as as fresh wort, not better than all grain. My point was fresh wort is expensive, and cans of goo can make decent beer if done properly.

Extract is not fresh. Maybe 'Freshly extracted' and 'Freshly' placed into a can and then 'Freshly' exposed to a range of fluctuating temperatures from the manufacturer to be 'Freshly' placed on your supermarket shelf, i'll give you that.
It's nowhere near as good as a fresh wort Kit and it's not even in the same game as AG.
Yes, fresh wort is up there in price compared to the tins of goop you make. But then again, you get what you pay for.
Can's of goo can make a beer, but so can Lion Nathan and the Fosters group.
And I would rather have one of theirs than the reconstituted ball sweat that you make.

 

[loikar]

Aren't most malt extracts made from 100% malted barley? If so, a beer made solely with such an extract would be all-grain beer.

That's like saying: Soaking a chunk off beef Jerky in water overnight makes a Steak.

 

[keifer33]

 

[Braumoasta]

That's like saying: Soaking a chunk off beef Jerky in water overnight makes a Steak.

No I would say it's more like if you had a salt water solution, you evaporated some of the water off to leave a saltier solution, you then add water and your back to the original solution.

 

[Braumoasta]

Brew an All grain....

I've tasted all grain beers, and no doubt in my mind they tasted great. The beers I brew from kits, also taste great to me. I've also seen many home brew competition results with plenty of kit beers scoring in the upper regions of the scoring range. But I guess you choose to think that these results don't exist, as all grain must always be better than a kit, and the judges must have been bribed or mentally retarded for such results to occur.

 

[goomboogo]

That's like saying: Soaking a chunk off beef Jerky in water overnight makes a Steak.

I see now. You don't mean AG, you mean MYO (mash your own).
Back to the topic; try the things mentioned in the first half a dozen posts and there should be some improvement in your beers.

 

[loikar]

No I would say it's more like if you had a salt water solution, you evaporated some of the water off to leave a saltier solution, you then add water and your back to the original solution.

But, imagine if you could make your own salt water solution in the first place and then used it straight away...

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

@OP - first few threads are on the ball.

The cidery, nasty tastes and the "homebrew" taste and the fact that it all tastes the same are all products of poor yeast control.

Poor yeast control, in your instance, arises from 2 things:

1. The packet the tin has is generally poorly handled, and not enough. a 12g packet of US05 or Nottingham or whatever other dried yeast, is usually better handled (owing to the fact that most brew shops know to do at least this, whereas big w doesn't) and adequate in size (12g is great, 6-7 is not enough - asking 6-7g of yeast to ferment over 20L of beer is slave labour and yeast becomes stressed.

2. Temp control - despite the instructions on the packet (something conspiracy theorists think are designed to initiate failure, therefore get brewers back to commercial beer), 25-30 deg is waaaaaaay too high. US05 for instance has a recommended range of 18-21 deg, Nottingham 14-20. I like brewing at the lower end of the scale, as it throws less homebrew cider. This is another reason to buy proper yeast - the packet will tell you the recommended range.

What you need to remember is yeast eats wort (that sugary malt water) and farts co2 and craps alcohol. It is therefore the most important thing in your brew. It needs to be treated with respect and allowed to do its thing under ideal circumstances. After all, why get sanitation perfect (one ideal aspect of yeast happiness), if you don't get the rest sorted.

As for the :icon_offtopic: stuff - I don't normally like or agree with expletive laden, attacking posts - but Beerfingers is right. Don't talk about water chlorine, when it appears that "cidery taste" points perfectly to the symptoms every new brewer suffers, all of which are caused by obeying the instructions of a kit. Chlorine issues will come later in his brewing career.

And kit/extract beer is never (all other things being equal) as good as AG beer. All AGers have brewed extract/kit (myself for 11 years, been AG for 2 years = 13yr total brewing), but no extract/kit brewers have ever seriously done an AG beer, otherwise they wouldn't be extract/kit brewers anymore. It's not being pompous, just fact - all of us have done the kit/extract thing, tried AG, seem the massive gulf in quality and stuck with AG. We hope you will join us, but still respect your right not to.

Goomba

 

[Braumoasta]

But, imagine if you could make your own salt water solution in the first place and then used it straight away...

But why would I bother if I'm well happy with the results I'm having, and it's also cheaper and faster??

 

[loikar]

I've tasted all grain beers, and no doubt in my mind they tasted great. The beers I brew from kits, also taste great to me. I've also seen many home brew competition results with plenty of kit beers scoring in the upper regions of the scoring range. But I guess you choose to think that these results don't exist, as all grain must always be better than a kit, and the judges must have been bribed or mentally retarded for such results to occur.

I didn't say taste one, I said "brew an All Grain"

No, there are some brewers that have entered comps with Extract beers, blended with a specialty grain mash, 4 hop additions done over a 60min boil that have scored well.

But lets see how you go with a coopers kit, BE2 and a 15g pouch of POR.

2 completely different animals.

 

[loikar]

I see now. You don't mean AG, you mean MYO (mash your own).
Back to the topic; try the things mentioned in the first half a dozen posts and there should be some improvement in your beers.

As opposed to mashing someone elses?

Have a look in the Forum, do you see a MYO section or a AG section?

:huh:

 

[big78sam]

Nope, woke up feeling great.
You can stand by whatever fact you like, im not disputing the benefits of a campden tablet, im disputing the relevance of your post's in this thread.
but to somewhat take you out of the equation since you're feeling a little bit sensitive

let's make it a hypothetical then.....kinda

So a new brewer comes along and is keen to make beer but is using extract.
He post's on a brewing forum stating that he's a new brewer and is having flavour issues.

Along come a bunch of guys keen to help out but want to spew a whole pile of data about water chemistry an array of additives, telling him to start steeping grains and spouting a barrage of shit that the new brewer knows nothing about.
New brewer is overwhelmed with irrelevant shit that confuses him and thinks to himself 'too hard' and stops brewing.

The bunch of guys are happy because they get to spew their 'knowledge of brewing' (AKA reciting someone else's post) to not just the OP but anyone else that reads the thread and believe they have contributed to the brewing community.
But they have bewildered someone who was keen to brew and originally started the thread, but due to the bullshit, has now put it in the too hard basket.

So, To the OP who started this thread to source information:

Tins of goop will taste like shit.
You can add hops and steep grains to hide the shitty goop twang but it will never be as you imagine.

Throw away your can opener and buy a Fresh Wort Kit. This is essentially an All Grain beer that has not been fermented.
All you need to do is top it up with water and throw in some yeast.
very similar to cans, only it tastes a shitload better.

Once you get the fermenting process down, then you can look at dry hopping and adding differen't flavours through malts and yeast.
Once you get steeping grains down, it's only a small step to All Grain where you can make the beer you imagine.

Cheers,

BF

To use your own logic...

"New kit brewer just wants advice how to improve his kit/extract brews.

He gets told all kit beers are terrible and no matter what you do it will always be sub-standard. The only way to make good beer at home is to move into all grain or buy fresh wort kits. New brewer perhaps doesn't have the money to spend $50 plus extra for yeast for each brew or likes the convenience of kits.

New brewer gets discouraged and thinks to himself 'too hard' and stops brewing."

You can make good beer with kits. The first few brewers give you the good advice on temperature and yeast. You can make good beer with kits and if one day you move to all grain or can afford Fresh Wort Kits you'll probably make better beer.

EDIT - I am an AG brewer and agree once you are ready to go AG you will find it better. It was just the comment that all kit/extract beer is terrible that I have a problem with. This is not true and has the ability to turn off someone who's just not ready for AG.

 

[Filby]

Beerfingers is my new hero! Seriously mate, you are spot on, but other people just don't want to admit that cans of goo are, at best, a bang for buck homebrew option. Most people, including myself, get into homebrewing to make cheap beer but for a lot of people this quickly changes to making excellent quality beer.

The best analogy I can come up with for extract beers versus all grain is 'orange cordial versus fresh orange juice'. Sure the cordial is drinkable and cheap but the fresh juice is a hell of a lot nicer and worth the extra effort to squeeze yourself.

My first homebrews were kit beers all done with correct temp control, good yeast, fresh can, correct sugars and steeped grains...still had that twang so I moved straight to allgrain BIAB and for the 40% increase in cost and time per brew the beer was 1000% better. mmmmm Little Fella's Pale Ale. Yum!


Fil

PS on average, it costs me $28 to do 23lt of AG beer. Still very cheap compared to buying 3 slabs of beer.