Reducing Bitterness...

[henderjo]

Hi all,

I'm using Ianh's spreadsheet V2.1 starting with a tin of Morgan's Blue Mountain Lager. Is there any way I can reduce the bitterness?

I'm at around my 20th + a few brews and still doing kits 'n' bits, filtered to kegs.

I have LDME, Dex, and brew mix of both (#15) + a few packs of different hops.

Any tips would be great.

John.

 

[bum]

More water and some LDME to build the OG back up? Dunno how that works with the spreadsheet though. Might wanna do a short hop boil too.

 

[manticle]

Not quite sure what you're asking. You can't reduce the bitterness of the kit while keeping everything else balanced. As bum said you can add more water but that will change other things in the beer profile.

Are you bittering with the hops? If so - add less. You can also balance bitterness with sweetness (and vice versa). Even though the IBU will be the same the palate perceives differently.

 

[henderjo]

That's what I was thinking Maticle.

Morgan's kit
Brew blend 15 (approx 200gms LDME 800gms Dex)

Then I was going to add 250gms Crystal (light)

Hops amarillo and cascade 12gms each for only 5 mins

Probably just use the kit yeast (though I have some S23 and US-05)

Any thoughts on if it will be too bitter?

 

[bum]

It won't be any more bitter than the straight kit. It will be sweeter (from the crystal) however so you may actually want more bitterness to balance. All up to personal preference, of course.

 

[boingk]

To be honest I'm not a big fan of 'brew boosters' and similar fare. They usually contain too much dextrose and too little malt for my liking. I generally prefer 500g LDME and 300g Dextrose, I buy them seperately and weigh them out by hand for each brew. This extra malt, in addition to any grains you steep, will help reduce perceived bitterness.

THat is, the bitterness will still be the same but it won't hit you as hard because there will be more malt to balance it out...as others have said.

Cheers - boingk

 

[casualties_army40]

You can also balance bitterness with sweetness (and vice versa).

my ginger beer is very sweet and i reckon if it had more of a bitterness flavour to it, it would taste awsome. is there anyhting that can be added to it after fermentaion has started to make it more bitter?

it was just a coopers can of ginger beer with some brown sugar and some syrup made form lemon zest, lemon juice, cloves, chili, and cinnamon.

 

[manticle]

A lot of that sweetness will be fermentable sugar and the brew will become less sweet as it ferments.

You could do something like boil up some bittering herbs or compounds (a touch of lemon pith maybe although usually I'd avoid the stuff) and rack onto it when ferment is done but I'd wait and see. You're probably just tasting brown sugar.

 

[ianh]

Any thoughts on if it will be too bitter?

Hi

Depends what style you are trying to make. For a standard / special bitter it would be OK.

If you want to reduce the bitterness you could replace some of the Brew Blend 15 with LDME (and make a better beer in the process).

Using the spreadsheet have a look at the graph to the right as you change the ingredients and watch the change in position of the red dot.

I presume the 12g of hops are bags, much cheaper and more flexible if you buy them in packets (90 grams)

 

[Pennywise]

I presume the 12g of hops are bags, much cheaper and more flexible if you buy them in packets (90 grams)

Not to mention prolly alot fresher

 

[henderjo]

I usually buy my hops in 50gm bags, pellets.

Put the brew down tonight - so cheers for the tips boys.

Ianh, if I'm aiming for a session lager... would that most likely have the red dot in the middle? kind of figures - I'm using your invention as a guide - plan to add notes as I go.