Brewers Please Give Your Honest A Opinion

[petesbrew]

I've got a few AG's under my belt but I still consider myself a noob with regards to recipe building.

What beer styles were you trying to make with the previous ones? (even a loose ballpark guess?)
What is SPOR? something Pride of ringwood?
Probably try copying some in the recipe database, Like Ross' Summer Ale, Dr Smurto's Golden, etc.

Get a hold of the Brewing Classic Styles. Most of mine are based on these recipes.

Start buying your base grain by the sack (shop around for a better price too!) and as stated buy hops in bulk (store em in the freezer for future brews).
Buy a kilo of spec malt instead of half... save the rest for future brews.
Culture your yeast.... save for future brews.

Use Tapwater. there's $10 saved.

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

Looking at those grain bills - I can see anything that would contribute a particularly biscuity taste to it.

Can you describe it further?

Goomba

 

[Mayor of Mildura]

Whats the FG of the beers that you haven't liked? How are you mashing? Sounds to me maybe that they are a little out of balance.

 

[Bogan333]

Now Nev has posted you even have a link to his shop,

Don't worry about spring water with an ale, just the local tap water will be ok, another saving.


QldKev

obviously you have not tasted water in Ashfield W.A, even a water purifier can not get rid of taste, it's very bad.
So my wife and I buy bottle water for cooking, tea/coffee. During the winter I use rain water.

 

[Bogan333]

I would really like to know or see what set up you are using to AG and I agree with previous posters (although I am a newbie) the temp control fridge is a must have.

All the best
MarkT

I will upload the pic's shorty

 

[petesbrew]

obviously you have not tasted water in Ashfield W.A, even a water purifier can not get rid of taste, it's very bad.
So my wife and I buy bottle water for cooking, tea/coffee. During the winter I use rain water.

LOL Fair enough. :icon_cheers:
All the best dude.

 

[QldKev]

obviously you have not tasted water in Ashfield W.A, even a water purifier can not get rid of taste, it's very bad.
So my wife and I buy bottle water for cooking, tea/coffee. During the winter I use rain water.

No, not in the last 10 years since we moved from WA I have not. But I though there are other brewers in the area who use it. I'd be wanting to know whats in it if the water filter can't sort it out.

 

[MarkT]

Awesome
I am just up the road from you on Lord Street and I brew with the local water I will have to give you some of my water to try! maybe I can test your beer and you can test some of mine but I am a real ale lover tho wheat beer is a frav too and I haven't tried brewing any larger or pilsners yet.

All the best
MarkT

I will upload the pic's shorty

 

[hsb]

I would honestly, as others have said, stick to ales until you're getting good results. Lagers are far harder to perfect.
Get your temp control sorted, use a decent yeast and make an APA of some kind.
Pale Malt - 75%, Munich I - 10%, Crystal (or similar) - 5% then pile in the hops.

Yeast is where the magic happens, treat it well and leave the biscuit taste for elevenses.

 

[mckenry]

First All Grain
Grain Bill
Joe White Traditional Ale 4 kg
Joe White Wheat Malt .500 g
Maltodextrin .400 g
Dextrose .600 g
Rice Hulls .500 g

Hop Bill
SPOR 18.00g 60min's Boil
SPOR 15g 10 mins Boil
Galaxy 15g 10 min's Boil
SPOR 15 g Flame out
Galaxy 15 g Flame out
Whirlfloc 1g 15 min's boil
14 g Coopers Brewing Yeast

Fermentation 14 Days

Just a over powering biscuit taste went down the sink undrinkable


Second ALL Grain
Grain Bill
Joe White Traditional Ale 4.5 kg
Joe White Munich Light Malt .500 g
Joe White Crystal Light Malt .250 g
Joe White Chocolate Malt .100 g
Rice Hulls .500 g

Hop Bill
SPOR 15g 60min's Boil
SPOR 10g 10 mins Boil

Whirlfloc 1g 15 min's boil
15g English Ale Yeast

Fermentation 14 Days

It was drinkable No bitterness taste a little biscuit taste no where near like my best Extract brew

Third ALL Grain
This is a 25L batch size

Grain Bill
5.673kg JW EXPORT PILSNER MALT
630g JW MUNICH LIGHT MALT
315gm JW CRYSTAL LIGHT
126gm JW WHEAT MALT


Hop Bill
SPOR Flowers 35g 60min's Boil
SPOR Flowers 16g 40 min's Boil
SPOR Flowers 15g 15min's Boil
SPOR Flowers 15g 0 min's Aroma
Galaxy Pellet 15g 0 min;s Aroma

Whirlfloc 1 Talbet 15 min's boil
15g Brew Cellar Premium Lager Yeast

The Brew day was 30/04/2012 current in my Kegerator at 15c
A taste of the wort sweet with a very small amount of biscuit taste

when the Primary fermentation is done I will rack the beer and than see how long the Secondary fermentation takes
I will store it for about 4 weeks in the old fridge at very low temperature before I keg it

I believe those super POR should never be used late. I have a fair dislike of POR - plenty here love it - but you might be like me.
I reckon your lager just might work (temp control factors tho) and you'll think its the type of beer.
I reckon you should give one of those first couple another shot, without SPOR late in the boil. Its a bittering hop and for good reason IMO.
Bitter with your SPOR and only galaxy late. Should be nice.
mckenry

 

[manticle]

My honest opinion is that you need to spend more time learning about recipe development and what ingredients and processes bring to the finished product.

As others have suggested, keep it simple - either by brewing something simple or by using a tried and true recipe.

What commercial beers do you like?
What was your best kit, extract or partial (if you made them)?

Simple grain bill, single infusion, neutral ale yeast and single hop addition and see how you go.

Some WA water is quite hard and may need adjustment but spring water mineral profile might be all over the place too. Are there any AG brewers near you who can advise on how they treat their water while you get your head around the whys and wherefores?

 

[thylacine]

Re- "Boil time 60 minutes"

Many brewers advocate 90 minute boils when using pilsner malts. eg DMS

Cheers

 

[Bogan333]

I would really like to know or see what set up you are using to AG and I agree with previous posters (although I am a newbie) the temp control fridge is a must have.

All the best
MarkT

My pic's are up in my Gallery

 

[bowie in space]

My honest opinion is that you need to spend more time learning about recipe development and what ingredients and processes bring to the finished product.

As others have suggested, keep it simple - either by brewing something simple or by using a tried and true recipe.

Simple grain bill, single infusion, neutral ale yeast and single hop addition and see how you go.

This is good advice. I wanted to brew every type of beer in the world for my first brews, but quickly realised I needed to find out how each malt, hop and yeast contributed to the finished product.

So far I've done single hop additions for POR, cluster, galaxy, amarillo, nelson sauvin, EKG, cascade, hallertau mittelfruh, northern brewer, target, challenger, and tomorrow doing NZ willamette. That's a small range of hops when you think about it, but I now know a lot about those hops and can start playing around with different recipes. I have done the same with many varieties of dry and liquid yeasts, and also different malts.

Currently, I'm drinking a brew I put down with a galaxy, amarillo, and nelson sauvin mix. Tasting it now and I realise I'm missing a bit of late hoppiness from the nelson sauvin and could probably up the amarillo too. So next time, I'll tweak it a little to taste how I want it to taste.

Also, temperature control is a must. I returned home from my week away at work and found my temp probe had shat itself. I don't know what stage of the fermentation this occured, but there was a rancid smell when I opened the fridge. I bottled both brews. One turned out well, but the other is infected. It's heart breaking tipping out a whole batch because you can't control the temperature. I now have an stc-1000 on the way.

Good luck with the AG journey. Slow down, brew lots and enjoy :icon_cheers:

 

[Bogan333]

Before I run out and buy a temperature controller, which one do you recommend for a 300L fridge
BrewMate has the ED330 Temperature controller for $129.95 is this any good?

 

[Flewy]

Before I run out and buy a temperature controller, which one do you recommend for a 300L fridge
BrewMate has the ED330 Temperature controller for $129.95 is this any good?

BrewMate have taken enough of your money at those grain prices. Look on ebay for an aquarium temperature controller, or an STC-1000, and get a sparky mate to wire it up for you (I wouldn't dare suggest you wire it up yourself using instructions on this forum, that'd be irresponsible). All up should be less than $40

 

[JoeF]

Before I run out and buy a temperature controller, which one do you recommend for a 300L fridge
BrewMate has the ED330 Temperature controller for $129.95 is this any good?

Hi mate

I bought a STC-1000 for about $23 shipped to my door from ebay. Here's a link to one for $20 shipped - LINK

You can get the rest of the parts from Jaycar for probably about $20 also. There are heaps of threads on here that have all the info you need.

Hope it helps

 

[petesbrew]

BrewMate have taken enough of your money at those grain prices. Look on ebay for an aquarium temperature controller, or an STC-1000, and get a sparky mate to wire it up for you (I wouldn't dare suggest you wire it up yourself using instructions on this forum, that'd be irresponsible). All up should be less than $40

+1 on the STC.
I've got one of these running my fridge. $40-ish.

 

[MarkT]

Get one of these just to start with if your unsure.
You can upgrade to an expensive one later on!

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Digital-Thermos...=item256cc41ca3

All the best
Mark T

 

[mikec]

Or if you don't have any sparky mates or don't want to piss about with it, get an STC1000 already made up:
STC1000 complete