New Brewer Questions

[keifer33]

Apologies if any these have been asked time and time again.

Grabbed a Coopers Kit back in March and have been making a few of the 'Kit & Kilo' and have turned out ok but the more I read the more my thirst to move onwards great-ens.

So on the weekend I went to my local homebrew shop for some advice and supply of crystal malt grain,hops and better yeast to take the next step up by adding things to the kits.

Came away with the following which ive made as per the instructions that where available

Little Creatures Pale Ale Clone

Ingedients:
ESB Pale Ale 1.7kg
Light Dried Malt 1kg
150g Crystal Malted Grain
25g Chinook Hops
25g Cascade Hops
Safale US-05 Yeast

Basically filled a pot with boiled water with grain and chinook keeping it hot for 20mins and then turned off the heat and added the cascade for 10mins. Then chucked the malt and can in the fermenter got to around 22 degrees and added the yeast. Now one of my questions is I did three hydrometer reads and each came in around 1035-1036ish which I thought is quite low but I stirred and tested all three times before adding yeast. Does this sound about right or have I done something wrong? The mix is fermenting away and its foamy on the top so must be working.

My next question is as a beginner am I better off sticking with a few more brews similar to the above or am I better to get stuck into doing extract style kits like a witch and a big cold-rum? Just after what other people have done and how they got started cause to be honest Im quite overwhelmed with the options to brew beer

Also my Father really wanted a Newcastle Brown Ale Style beer done asap as its becoming harder to source. Are the ESB Kits (the 3kg) mash ones where you just add water and yeast any better than the Coopers ones. From memory they where the $40-50 kits.

 

[roverfj1200]

Keifer

After reading your post I have a few questions for you.

You seem to have steeped your grain and hops together is this right?

Did you remove the grain from the steepings and boil them?

I think you should read up on steeping grains.

When adding hops a small boil of wort is used and the hop additions added to that, this boil would include you steepings.

Stay with the Kits and bits till you get used to all the processes..

Cheers

Richard

 

[keifer33]

My process was as per the instructions I was given which after doing some further reading may not be the best way.

The hops and grain where steeped together. 2lt of boiling water in a pot with grain and chinook over low heatto
keep temp constant (will now get a thermometer for next time) then after that turned off the heat and added the cascade for a further 10 mins. Then strained into fermenter with additional boiling water then mixed the can and malt in the water. Topped up with cold.

Apologies for a confusing post.

Should the grain be stepped in one container and the hops with a portion of the can in another then added to fermenter with all the malt and rest of can?

 

[technoicon]

2 things i would suggest is:

1. read up on the BIAG articles on this forum really helping me at the moment to understand what's involved in going all grain.

2. get a beer program like beersmith, read up on partitals, it will tell you every step of what to do. If you dont understand what it's telling you google it and you'll find heaps of info out there on the process.

this is what i've done and made a beer very similar to what your doing.

as for my process.

mash the grain for 40mins, take grain out.
start a rolling boil of just the liquid. (just like you would an extract)
add 500g malt @ 60min
add hops at certain points. probably chinook @ 60min and cascade @ 30min and 5min
boil for 60mins
add rest of malt. (when i did it i think i used 1kg of malt and a 1.5kg coopers lme can)
cool to 22 deg
ferment.

 

[mkstalen]

You may have been given unclear directions from you HBS. Here's what I would now have done after having made some mistakes..

1. Try to use at least 4L of water for your hops & grain.
2. Bring the water up to 70 deg.
3. Add your grain and "steep" for the 20 odd minutes trying to keep the temp at about 70 degrees. (don't boil it with the grain in it)
4. Strain the liquid into another pot to remove the spent grain.
5. Add about 400g of LDME for 4L (roughly 100g LDME per litre of water) to bring the SG up to about 1.040.
6. Bring to a rolling boil.
7. Add your hops - When adding hops the times listed are the times from the _end_ of the boil. So if it says 12g Saaz 60min, 12g Cascade 10min, you'd put in the saaz then 50 minutes later add the cascade, then 10 minutes later stop the boil.
8. Add tin of goo + rest of the ldme into fermenter with a couple of litres of boiling water to disolve
9. Add in your steeped grain & hops liquid.
10. top up with cold water to 23 odd litres.
11. pitch yeast when it hits the right temperature. For US-05 I'd go 18-20 degrees, depending on what you can keep it steady at.

There's lots of good articles and threads here, read up lots and good luck with it.

 

[keifer33]

Thanks for all the info guys will definetly be doin more reading. As I've already got this fermenting and don't wanna waste the $50 odd I've put into it what will be the effects of my errors on the final product. Seems I may have jumped the gun a little.

 

[technoicon]

hahaha, Biag woops.. BIAB! lol

 

[mkstalen]

I don't think you'll have imparted any bad flavours, & it should definitely be drinkable. You'll have extracted a bit of flavour from the grain & hops, just not as much as you probably wanted.

 

[keifer33]

Just another question on this topic and brew.

Had it in fermenter and let it drop and stabalise before bottling. Tasted it when bottling and it was nice and hoppy but milder which was fine. Its been in bottles just over a week but I did the newb thing and jumped the gun and tasted it. It seems to have a very sweet almost caramel taste to it. If I boiled/steeped the grain for too long could this have added to it or should I just be patient and wait a few weeks and try again. Unfortunately with the cold weather at the moment its hard to store them somewhere warm but id say they would be about 10-15 degrees most of the time. Will this have any negative effects?

 

[kelbygreen]

I would say you are tasting unfermented sugar had this the other week from the cold weather. All my bottles now live in the house lol that goes down well with better half

 

[keifer33]

I would say you are tasting unfermented sugar had this the other week from the cold weather. All my bottles now live in the house lol that goes down well with better half

Is it possible if I move them back into the warm the yeast will go mental on the sugar and save the beer?

 

[Oatlands Brewer]

Just try and keep them at 18-20 deg for another 3 weeks mate, you need it at about the same temp that you fermented at to get the yeastys to bottle condition/carb your brew.