Help To Brew 2 Kit Beers

[Gout]

Ok fellow beer lovers, i have 2 kits i need to rid of... be it brew or give away

now after all grain i just dont seem able to drink kit brews, the last one i did has lasted close to a year, its not "BAD" but its just plain...

So

I have the following i need to brew, drink and enjoy:
Beer Makers Premium Imported (ohhh) Duch Lager
Coopers - Nut Brown Ale
edit*** just found a coopers draught kit also****

along with tins of coopers extract in:
light (1)
Amber (1)
Dark (1)

now i dont need to brew all of these at once / together etc, i was thinking of doing a double brew day where i AG 30Lt of pils malt wort, 15Lt per kit and brew with that

eg: Dutch lager + pils wort
Coopers nut brown lager + pils wort

this i hope would keep it fresh tasting, add some life and character etc and i can hop to keep this alive and happening

the tins of extract well i dunno many a 3 tin brew for a HG "somthingorother"

idea's
advice

kit guys HELP

i just want to use these before there time is up and the given room would be nice - as well as buying me some time ti implement the AG temp control :chug:

(and some quick beer would be nice - if drinkable)

 

[Trough Lolly]

Ben, do you like amber ales? You can make a poor mans JS Amber Clone with the Coopers Kit - I was trying to make a Kilkenny but stuffed up the recipe - and ended up with a JS Amber clone!!

1 x Coopers Draught Kit
1Kg tub of amber LME
A Brewiser "Ultra Brew" pack which is: 500g Light DME, 250g Maltodextrin, and 250g Dextrose.
250g of Caramunich
200g of Dark Brown Sugar in 500ml of boiling water
25g Northern Brewer (10% A/A)for bittering
25g Goldings (5% A/A) for flavour/aroma
1028 London Ale Yeast Starter

Steep the crystal in 6L of cold water - bring up to 70C. Sparge with 1-2L to make around 7-8L boil volume. Toss in amber LME, brew pack and dark brown sugar and bring to boil - add Bittering hops and the kit yeast sachet (Yeast nutrient!) when boil starts and boil for 60mins. Add flavouring hops in last 15 mins of boil. Add the kit at flameout and mix well into the boiled wort. Chill wort to 20C and rack to fermenter - top up to make 1.058 of wort in primary - you should have 25L at that gravity.

As I said, I was scrounging bits to make a very rough Kilkenny clone and failed dismally - but ended up with a beer that tastes very much like the JS Amber - so my few hours of brewing weren't a waste of time after all! You should get a final gravity under 1.016 which makes for a fairly potent drop - especially if you reduce the primary volume / raise the SG.

Next time, I will push the malt envelope further and add some more Caramunich - or, I might do a partial mash and use some Munich and Amber grains.
Cheers,
TL
Edit: You might want to substitute the Goldings with Willamette hops in the flavouring stakes - at least that's what the JS website says they do - here

 

[deebee]

Ben

Sounds like you have come up with a good solution. I have done a couple of partial mashes using a kit. Purists will cringe but I call it a mash without maths. It gives your beer the freshness of the mashed grains and you don't have to calculate bitterness. No problem to chuck a few small handfuls of hops at the boil in the dying minutes. Therefore tasty and easy.

Don't listen to me, but i would be tempted to chuck one of those tins of extract in with the "Nut Brown Ale kit + pils wort" just to see what happens.

 

[Gout]

thanks for the reply guys, and i think i will try both your idea's

I dotn really love the amber ale as most do, however i would die for it if a kit turned out similar.

However i find kits always taste off old and remain sweet so i wonder if the steeping caramalt will make it even sweeter?

I will try the TL ale,

and part mash with the other 2

any opinions on the yeast for the part mash kits (coopers nut and beermakers dutch) or run with the Kit yeats yuck esp in the "Dutch lager" as i know it would not be a true lager

 

[Gout]

Ok update time

I brewed the 2 kits (beermakers dutch lager and coopers nut brown ale)

mashed 4Kg of pils and 500g of munich some hellertau and a plug of goldings FWH (why? because they were leftovers, basicly i wanted some bitterness and to see if FWH bought any flavours through...

Munich Lager Wyeast for the dutch lager and kit yeast for the nut brown ale.

I will use the Amber extract and the coopers draught kit to the spec TL gave above

and then a black and tan Dark extract and light extract in a all extract brew... i guess this will turn out like crap .... but cant figure another use for the dark extract

the light could be saved for starters