To Boil Or Not

[Bigfella]

I'm very confused I have just been reading John Palmers book "great book" and he talks about boiling all his worts befor formenting. I've just picked up a Morgans Pilsner and it states clearly not to boil the extract.
I'm confused is it realy worth boiling at all for kits. I do have some hopes to add also.


sooooo much to lern.

 

[Hoops]

Kit brews say to not boil as this will cause you to lose the aroma from the aroma hops. If you want to boil a kit you can always add some hops at the very end of your boil, or when cold conditioning to give you back the aroma.

 

[dicko]

G'Day Bigfella,
I used to use Morgans kits almost exclusevely before going partial and what i used to do was just boil my malt additions and add any aroma hops if required in about 4 litres of water for about 10 mins, tip this into the fermenter and then tip in the contents of the tin.
Most used to come out pretty good if i didnt overdo the hops.
Cheers B B B.

 

[wedge]

i would assume that the extract that come in the can is already sterile!!

Hence no need to boil

Only boil the water that you will be adding to reduce risk of contamination, but at the same time i only do that when doing an a.g. and have never had a problem

 

[Jovial_Monk]

yeah, I would never boil a kit, for several reasons: hop utilisation if you are adding hops, and the fact that some kits will give a nasty taste if boiled and others lose all the isohop oil they have in place of real hops

it seems smehow pretentious to me to boil a kit. if you want to do a full wort boil, use bulk extract, specialty grains and bittering + flavoring hops etc etc

But boil extract/sugars you want to add and boil the hops in that
To add substantial bitterness to a kit, boil with hops for an hour

Jovial Monk
PS is Bigfella in Bathurst?

 

[Bigfella]

So I should not boil the kit but I should boil the malt and hops for about an hour. Does this sound right.

 

[dicko]

Bigfella

If you are adding bittering hops you might boil for 60 mins.(personally I wouldn't)
My suggestion for what it may be worth would be not to add any bittering hops to a kit beer on your first boil attempt.
My experience has been that you may make it too bitter by adding too many hops at the 60 min boil.
(remember that the kit has allready the amount of bittering hops added to suite the style)
I would start off with small additions of finishing hops boiled for ten minutes or so and see if you like the extra hop additions with the malt extract.
If you consider after this that you would like to try bittering hops then work out what you want and try a 30 min boil.
It is very hard to evaluate changes in recipes if you do more than one thing at a time and it is very important that you keep records.
Remember this is only my opinion and others may have different ideas.
Hope this helps,

B B B.

 

[GMK]

I agree with Bigfella....

Just boil the malt and teh hops for 10-20mins only.

Then Rack after primary has finished - 7-10 days and dry hop for 2 weeks.

 

[Bigfella]

Thanks guys for your help I'll give it a try.

 

[Jovial_Monk]

Yes to add more hop flavor & aroma boil some hops for 15 mins, some for 5 and add some as soon as the heat is turned off.

This will impart a lot of hop character without making the beer too bitter.

Hehehehe, homebrewers gradually get to like beers hoppier than the commercial stuff

Jovial Monk

 

[wardy]

well, don't i feel like a prize idiot. i have been boiling my kits all this time!! with hops!! so they already have hop flavour in them hey!! and boiling kills this!! i could have saved myself a fortune in hops and cans!!

so now that i have my own hop preferences, i can just boil 2 cans of LME and do my usual hop additions??

 

[Jovial_Monk]

yes, add the lme to very hot water off the heat, stir really well to dissolve the extract before turning the heat back on, alse the heave extract sitting on the bottom of the pan will scorch

JM

 

[deebee]

Bigfella, an easy and good way to use kits:

Boil malt extract and any sugars in your biggest pot for up to 60 minutes. 20 is fine. Add finishing hops (eg 30g of cascade pellets) at the end of the boil or following hopping suggestions above.

Turn off temp, add kit. Stir very gently (no splashing or breaking surface) to dissolve the kit.

Chill the pot in a sink of cold water, replacing water when it gets hot. Repeat. Then repeat again with ice in the sink to get the wort down to mid or low 20s.

(Here you could whirlpool the wort so the trub gathers at the bottom of the pot, then pour the wort off the trub, wasting some wort.)

Or skip that step and just tip the lot into your fermenter (strain it if you like). Top up with tap water and pitch yeast.

This gets everything sterile, dissolved and cool before it gets poured into the fermenter.