Real Ale Bitterness Questions

[buddhabrewing]

Hi,

First time poster, currently have down my 7th brew. Please keep it simple, I'm experimenting and new.

I started with a can of Coopers Real Ale, 1.5 kg Pilsen LME, 1 Box Brew Enhancer 2, and an extra 177grams LDME (1/3 of the coopers box) also added 25 grams of Chinook pellets which i had on heat (initially boiled but then turned off) for about twenty mins in about two litres of water.

My brew was made up to 23 litres in total and fermented out over about a week at approx 20-22 degrees, 25 grams centennial was also added as a dry hop on day five. All hops were pellets and added without hop bag (commando style). I have read that this is ok to do?

My big questions are :

1, Brew has been cold crashed with gelatin for about three days now, still quite cloudy....should I wait longer and will more yeast and hops drop out?

2, Brew is also very bitter, is this suspended hop particles still or have I just gone way over in bitterness?

3, Brew is brown in colour, was expecting something a little more Amber not "day after dodgy vindaloo"...does this colour sound about right or is it darker due to the Hops/Hops in suspension.

Any advice from people that actually know would be nice, not to be rude but not really after conjecture or what someone "thinks", rather what someone "knows"

Was aiming for a malty amber ale with plenty of fruity hop character and packing a boozy wallop, have a "f'd" it? Should I have ditched the Chinook boil and just dry-hopped, didn;t realise the Real Ale Can had so much bitterness.

Almost forgot, OG was 1064 and FG was 1020 (no mistakes, this was it)

 

[oglennyboy]

Yeah I found the same thing when I used the Coopers Real Ale in a toucan & a kits & bits (hops, crystal), heaps of bitterness. But I also found that it really came off the bite after about 4-6 weeks, and they turned out pretty nice. The brown is about how I remember it too.
Can't help you with the cloudy tho'

cheers!


edit: something about boiling hops in wort at SG 1.040 to allow better hops utilisation or such, I'd be interested to see from others whether the water boil makes hops behave differently? Or was the hop boil done with the LDME?

 

[buddhabrewing]

Yeah, I'm realising I should add some DME with the hops boil instead to even out the bitterness.

I've been reading a lot about the toucan recipes which this may be similar to in IBU's and Gravity and the advice is that it can taste like c*t's piss from the fermenter, but after putting down for a few weeks it evens out....like you said.

Will probably just bottle it all up and forget about it and move on to the next brew, might just try the Unreal Ale, Brew2, and 500gms DME, then Dry Hop with some Centennial......I think the chinook may have just been a bad idea from the start. Also not sure about the pellets straight into the fermenter, seems also like a mistake.

Time will tell

 

[Burt de Ernie]

Are you using software or a spread sheet?

See thread with spread sheet link.

http://aussiehomebrewer.com/topic/29655-kit-and-extract-beer-spreadsheet/

 

[Pilchard]

The bittering is in the can already dry hop to get nose hops.

 

[peas_and_corn]

You shouldn't boil hops in water, you need to boil them in wort.

 

[burrster]

My one experience with the coopers real ale can is the same, quite bitter. It does mellow a bit with time though. The steeping of the hops would have added extra bitterness, and from what I'm told doing it in plain water vs a wort solution, can cause extra astringent flavours that are undesirable. If you get Ian's spread sheet and enter all your ingredients( ad the Chinook as 25g @ 20 minutes, in 3L of water, with the hops Concentration factor on - small boil) you get about 41 IBU's - quite bitter. The same recipe with the Coopers Pale Ale can gives 29 IBU's, just for a comparison.(lighter colour too)
The colour you have(darkish/brown) is also as I experienced. As for the cloudy bit, It's very likely the yeast/hops in suspension still, and if it is, it will settle out with time. maybe cold crash for another day or 2. What temperature are you cold crashing at? should be between 0-2.
Hope this helps

 

[simplefisherman]

How long did it spend at fg before chilling? 1020 seems a bit high even with the dme and be2. General practice is when gravity is stable over 3 or more days. Many people give it a week on top of a stable fg for yeast to finish up, as they will clean up some of the off flavours and compounds produced early in the fermentation ( diacetyl and acetaldehyde are common ones, ) and you also get more particles and yeast dropping out before adding gelatin. Meaning you can forgo using it or use less for a similar result.

 

[Josh SA]

I recently put down a real ale kit as a quick keg filler.

To the kit I added 250g BB caramalt & around 13 IBUs of Galaxy @ 10 min. This was way to bitter / harsh (galaxy hops). Also. Yes the real ale kit must be firmly bittered already.

The caramalt would not have added much colour , however the finished beer was a very dark amber. Almost brown when viewed in low light.

All my brews are cold conditioned & all have a haze, especially those with more hops.

OG 46 FG 11 BRY97.

I have made much nicer kit beers using a CPA can + Bits. Dont know what is in the RA can for its colour/flavour.

Josh.

 

[buddhabrewing]

Thanks for all the comments...waited another day and a half and it cleared in the fridge, have bottled and will wait 4-6 weeks as Oglennyboy has said he did with his.

Bitterness may be high, but hoping the high amount of malt may help with this.

Just put down a Toucan of Coopers Real ale and Coopers Lager....NO bittering this time, also added BE2 and will dry hop again with Centennial, I figure most of the parameters will be the same, except the harsh Chinook bittering......will report my results......forgot to record OG but will probably be similar......

Of note, I don;t think that some of the beer-builders handle the Maltodextrin the same way in Calc's, either OG or FG or both!?....Brewers Friend beer builder gave me 1059 OG for the Chinook bitter brew, and the actual was 1064...also FG was 1017 and the final was 1020.

 

[maaark]

If you want an Amber Ale with good malt character & citrus hops this recipe is a real winner:

Coopers Parity Amber Ale
1.7kg tin of TC Traditional Draught
1.5kg tin of Coopers Amber Malt Extract.
15g of American Ale Yeast
30g of Cascade hops (dry hop day 3)
21lt brew

Approx 5% ABV. I made a batch in April and it's all gone now, much better than any Aussie commercial Amber Ales I've tried. I can't recommend it enough.

 

[buddhabrewing]

So....I just tried one of the bottles after three days (yes three day, pretty bad hey?)

Nut brown colour, very, very nice lacing on the glass, malty is an understatement. Bitter, yes....but not bad in any way, I could eat this beer it's nice and thick mouth-feel-wise. Don;t really know what i'd call it and probably won;t until a few weeks time when i try it somewhat conditioned.

I am not disheartened any where near what I was when I tried it out of the fermenter, the malt cleans the taste quite nicely.

Am I stupid for saying that I imagine this is what an old traditional IPA would have been like? I really like this beer, although it's definitely NOT a session beer. It's cold in Perth at the moment and it tastes appropriate!

Of note, this is the "last" bottled bottle, so fermenter was tilted and came straight off the trub.....I'll have to try another now and let you know!

 

[barabool]

Sorry if I fall into the someone "thinks", rather what someone "knows" but...you don't know where I live so I can avoid you if you turn out to be a ****.

1. FG was 1020 - this may account to a lot of your 'cloudy' issues. At 1020 you have a lot of unfermentables still in your wort.
2. 25 grams of Chinook pellets - not sure if this was for bitter or aroma? You said boil then sit for 20 mins. Joining those 2 together may mean a real bitterness boost to the brew.
3. Brown - again - the more unfermentables - the browner you will be. Brown beer is okay if its what you want but it probably relates to 1.

If it tastes good - drink it. If it tastes bad - chuck it and start again.

Cheers

 

[buddhabrewing]

Hi Bara thanks for the input, yours and all the replies I got here are appropriate and welcome and do help a lot

Sorry about the "thinks" and "knows"....just trying to get informed opinion rather than what someones's brother's mate's auntie's best friend thinks kind of replies. I like to think i'm not a ****, but probably a **** thing to say on my behalf.....sorry. I have tried to look for answers to a lot of my questions and end up on forums with lots of uninformed opinions so was a little frustrated when posting my dilemma.

I even read some places where people were told on forums (in a similar situation to mine) that they had to tip it out, or they had an infection, or even their yeast had "died" which is all highly unlikely and conjecture....just wanted to avoid this.

I realised, that maybe I have used a Munich Extract instead of a Pilsen (the lightest of the Briess extracts) This could be explaining the heavier maltiness and colour (a bit pissed at myself as I meant to grab the Pilsen Light). I put down a Toucan with Coopers Real ale, Lager and BE2 and it is nowhere near as dark as my previous brew or anywhere near as malty.

I will try and remember to post back here in about 2-3 weeks when my original brew is less "green" ......

Cheers, Buddha

 

[Bribie G]

If you are a beginning brewer and judge bitterness against commercial beers you are accustomed to, then many of the kit beers are going to be unusually bitter to your palate.

 

[burrster]

Ahh yes the Munich has a bit of extra colour(I recently used it myself)