Question About Australia V. United States Protocol

[pokerpot]

So I've been reading up a ton on this home brewing thing and I can't wait to get started. Just getting all my ducks in a row.

I notice on some of the US boards the directions for brewing from extract involves big pots and boiling water adding all the LME and then boling the full strength wort for the full 60 minutes as you add ingredients to it.

I believe most of the recipes here insist that you shouldn't boil your malt extract. I feel that that here people say boil a small bit of water, add your fermentables, then pour into bucket, add cans of LME, top off with water.

Is this because the LME used in these recipes that are in cans comes pre sanitized so you don't have to boil it? The place I plan on buying my LME from has big drums of LME and they will pour whatever you need by weight into a plastic tub and sell it this way. Am I to assume that i need to boil the malt extract before adding it to the fermenter?

Would the proper procedure be for example, take 500gm of LME add to 5 liters of water, boil, add hops at proper interval... then add the rest of the LME and boil for a few minutes to sanitize?

Post seems a bit rambly but hopefully my question makes sense. Thanks.

 

[boobiedazzler]

after dozens of successful brews including liquid extract as an ingredient i for one have never boiled the cans contents and not once has there been any problem with infection

 

[JestersDarts]

Hi Pokerpot -

yeah this seems along the same lines as what i have been led to believe -

use about 500gm LME in your 5L boil to get approx 1040 gravity for better hop utilisation.

I cant comment on the sanitisation of the malt extract in the US vs Aust vs out of your mates drums, but usually sticking all your fermentables into your boil right at the end can aid in sanitisation of the ingredients, and get it all nicely dissolved ready to add to your fermenter.

Cheers.

 

[dgilks]

If you want to get the best utilisation out of your hops as well as the most flavour from those hops, you need to do a full boil which means big pots. When I did extract I added 1/3 of my extract at the beginning and the rest with 5 minutes to go in the boil.

 

[Bribie G]

The widespread use of hopped kits as here and in the UK is not common in the USA so I guess they have a different mindset. The couple of extract brews I have made, I briefly boiled the malt extract - particularly the LDME as an insurance policy, but I see no point in boiling for an hour - I mean it's had the crap boiled out of it at the factory prior to vacuum concentration. In the case of kit beers I have added the kit as is after warming the tin.

I had a kilo bag of LDME specifically for hop boiling and as mentioned above I would make up a wort, around 1045 and boil about a litre of that with the hops. However being mostly kit brews the hops were generally late additions with a 20 min boil only. Example 20g of Saaz for 20 mins.

 

[Dazza_devil]

If you want to get the best utilisation out of your hops as well as the most flavour from those hops, you need to do a full boil which means big pots. When I did extract I added 1/3 of my extract at the beginning and the rest with 5 minutes to go in the boil.

Doesn't adding malt during the boil stop your wort from boiling and get all gluggy in your hop sock?

 

[katzke]

Hope this does not turn out as bad as my posts in the preserving thread.

We do not use as many canned kits here as you do. As I understand it most of the kits are pre hopped. Boiling for extended periods of time will mess with the hop character of the kits.

The way I learned to brew was to use bulk liquid extract repackaged in a plastic tub. It is the wet version of dry malt extract and has no hops added at the factory.

With liquid malt it is hard to pour only part so most recipes are set to just pour the entire tub in at the start of the boil. We also are encouraged to add steeping grains to the recipe. We add bittering hops at the beginning of the boil and flavor hops later. To get proper hope utilization the gravity needs to be about 1.040.

Advanced instructions for extract brewing are starting to say add just enough to get the desired gravity for the hops and add the remainder in the last 10 to 15 minutes of the boil. This results in a lighter colored beer. Boiling is important as repackaged extract either liquid or dry can be (most likely is) contaminated. Canned kits are as clean as any other commercially canned food product so the contents are infection free.