Commercial beers are very well made indeed. They are not crap beers, any more than a Toyota Camry is a crap car. Boring and bland, yes, but actually made to the highest standards. Breweries spend millions employing yeast scientists, engineers, graduate brewers and source the best ingredients on the market plus the best temperature controlled computer operated brewing gear to turn out identical batches time after time.
They do this because there is a demand for their product from people who do not particulary see craft beers as being for them. Much in the same way that Coon Cheese isn't going to close down soon just because there is Imported Danish Havarti or Dutch Maasdam or Goats milk Bulgarian Fetta out there.
Just like Tip Top bread, commercial mainstream pale lagers are going to be the sliced white loaf of beer drinkers for decades to come.
If you want to try and emulate them, it is one of the hardest home brewing exercises and, from experience, I'd say you won't do it with partials. Sorry.
You have nothing to hide behind if you don't get the process spot on. You can't chuck in some extra hops or some extra malt as you would with an APA or a stout, isn't going to work.
At the risk of sounding immodest, but on topic for this thread, I won a second place gong in the Pale Lagers at the Nats just gone with a Premium Australian Lager, and it's taken me 6 years to get there.
Use the same ingredients they do: domestic pilsener malt and cane sugar that's right cane sugar *
Use Pride of Ringwood Hops
Use a Danish style lager yeast similar to the Fosters B strain (Recommend Wyeast Danish Lager)
Mash to a certain and precise schedule: 62 degrees for two hours then raise quickly to a short mashout at 78
Ferment to their typical schedule with the above yeast .. start at 13 degrees for a few days then let rise to around 19 degrees to finish
Lager for 10 days at -1
Ideally filter it, but in any case take the most stringent steps to avoid yeast carry over and chill haze (recommend brewbright)
Serve blisteringly cold.
Personally I prefer to make UK style real ales and the visitors can bring their own VB if they prefer.
*Cane sugar is used in Aussie beers historically to adjust the results from the often dodgy barleys that were grown in the colony. Also, for much of the 20th century pubs closed at 6 pm, giving rise to the six o'clock swill when workers would crowd into bars that were tiled like urinals and would swill down as much piss as possible, sometimes standing with legs outspread and ten or twelve pots on the floor between them. The beer had to be light in body and easily sunk schooner after schooner after schooner, so sugar was essential in the brew and it's stayed there.
