[Review] Finlandia Premium Lager 1.5kg kit

[vonHolt]

Thx..

I've a 23L batch and also using dextrose. My calcs (based on the link I mentioned) worked out at 165g. I'll reduce that back to 160g as I think that my carb levels are a little high.

Cheers.

[LordEoin]

Your calculator said 165g? Fantastic! My guess of 7g/l at 23l works out at 161g, so we should be bang on the money

[vonHolt]

Excellent... It's reassuring to have a second set of data to compare against....
Well, all I got to do now is bottle and wait..

Want to swap a bottle or two to compare when they are ready?

Cheers.

[LordEoin]

I'll dive on any opportunity to try someone else's brew 

[vonHolt]

Cool, I'll drop you a PM in a few weeks, after I bottle this lot up over the weekend..

Cheers.

[vonHolt]

Just an update on my copy of this...

Bottled yesterday.. but the FG was 1.014 :-(

It tasted ok, but 'light'.
Same OG of 1.042,


so by my calculations...

(1042 - 1014) = 28
28 * 131 = 3668
3668 / 1000 = 3.668

or

1.042 - 1.014
----------------- * 100  = 3.73
  0.75


that works out at 3.7ish

have I just made budweiser clone?

[johnrm]

Did you prime your bottles?
Add .5%

[vonHolt]

Yep... 160g of dextrose into the bottling bucket

Ok... so that will bring it up to an approximate ABV of 4.2 ... now that's looking better 

Cheers...

[LordEoin]

a fine respectable level for a session beer! 

[vonHolt]

 

Is 4 weeks enough time for this to bottle condition or is a 3-4 month period more realistic?

[LordEoin]

4 weeks will have it carbonated and clear. it'll probably continue to improve to about 3 months but not as noticably.
A strongly hopped beer will fade with time, a very bitter/roasted beer will mellow with time, but this one does not need considerable conditioning.

I brought this over to a friend's house and it went down really well with everyone.
Personally, I found it a bit sweet, but they all loved it.
That was great for me as I got to keep all my hopped up IPA to myself while they boozed away into the Finlandia Lager

[Garry]

LordEoin gave me a couple of bottles of this during the weekend. Thanks 

The beer got a fair bit of shaking on the way home so I should have left it in the fridge to settle for a few days. I didn't and cracked one open Saturday night. I poured it into a Coors light glass, one of the ones with the shot blasted type bases. I was surprised at how clear it was after all the shaking. It poured a nice orange lucozade colour. Not much aroma but you'd expect that from a kit lager. Taste was sweet, malty and very refreshingly carbonated. Head retention was spot on, 2 finger head all the way down although I did drink it quite fast!

I tried the second one last night. I was using a plain pint glass this time and the head retention wasn't so good. It had disappeared completely before I'd finished. Still a good beer though. It did seem to taste sweeter without the head. Reminded me of lucozade but that could have been the colour tricking my palette.

If brewing this myself I would maybe add some carapils or some wheat malt to help the head retention. Or else shake the bejayus out of it before pouring into a Coors light glass.

It would also benefit from a bit of dryhopping.

Overall a good quality beer especially for the price. It would be worth doing a batch for my normal beer drinking buddies.

[DaveB]

Going into my 4th kit now  . First two brewed over the warmer than usual summer and they were shocks to my system as they turned out fecken brill. 3rd one on at the moment and fingers crossed it comes good as I get the feeling I am living off beginners luck. If anyone is interested, the kits I had success with and tasted monumental are Tom Caxtons Dark Real Ale and Four Finger Jack (although this one is more expensive it was money well spent). Looking for a cheaper one to brew and this looks and sounds a good one to try.

I have one question though to the wise - Temps are dropping now and I'm a stingy bastard when it comes to putting on the heating, therefore the brew room will drop quite easily to about 16 to 18 degrees (more when the mother-in-law stays in it) during the wee hours of the morning over the coming weeks (Oct/Nov). Would that kaput the process for this kit? and sure while I am at it - anyone recommend a kit for these expected lower temperatures or am I really showing my inexperience?

[LordEoin]

The most important thing is to keep the temperature fairly constant.
Will you be fermenting at 16 or at 18?
considered a brewbelt?

[DaveB]

I have not but I shall look into that one today when ordering a new kit...decisions decisions.