Coopers Real Ale Extract Brew w/ grains and hops...

[DrowningManatee]

This is my first time brewing with a boil or malt extract but here's the plan anyways, any advice would be greatly appreciated

Ingredients:
Danstar Nottingham Ale Yeast,
Cooper's Real Ale Kit,
1.5kg Light LME,
50g Cascade hops,
EKGoldings 12g tea-bag,
250g Cara-crystal 120EBC.

Im re-hyrating the yeast according to Danstar's site recommendations:
sprinkle yeast on 10x weight of yeast in water at 30-35 C
leave 15m, stir, leave 5m, add wort cooling by 10degrees
leave 5m, add wort to cool by 10degrees again, add to wort.

Im adding 250g carapils 120EBC (all they had in the shop, im assuming this will result in a dark beer, does this affect flavour negatively?) to cold water (12.5 L) and raising temp to 77C.
Remove grain bag, bring to boil, add 1/2 LME
Bring to boil again (30 minute boil starts now)
Add 25g cascade at 20 min
Add 25g cascade at 12min
Add other 1/2 LME at flame out
Dissolve, add coopers can, dissolve
Cover and leave for 15minutes to pasteurize (dont really understand this but..)
cool in ice bath

apparently danstar gives banana flavours above 21C so colder fermentation, can i go as low as 15C?

Im thinking of using a secondary fermenter and adding the hop tbag then?

Im also adding lemon, orange and spice flavours at bottling time using vodka to extract the flavours and just add to each bottle in a variety of combinations, labelling em all and checking out what works

cheers for yer advice dudes, totally new to this boiling craic

[DrowningManatee]

im waiting on delivery of a 15L stockpot in a week so will probably get goin then, i have all the rest o the stuff already...

[Will_D]

Im re-hyrating the yeast according to Danstar's site recommendations:
sprinkle yeast on 10x weight of yeast in water at 30-35 C
leave 15m, stir, leave 5m, add wort cooling by 10degrees
leave 5m, add wort to cool by 10degrees again, add to wort.

I think the above is a bit overcomplicated:

About 2 hours before you are ready to pitch:

Sprinkle yeast on 10x weight of yeast into boiled/cooled  water at 30-35 C. Loosley cover with foil.

Leave 15m,

Gently stir, leave 5m,

Gently stir.

Leave to adjust to brewery temp while the rest of the process is going on.

Pitch when ready

[DrowningManatee]

nice one, that leaves alot less room for errors, will go with that will, that be the Will of God

[LordEoin]

The more I look at this recipe, the nicer it sounds.
I love the real Ale Kit and I love Cascade.

Looks like you're set to go 

Your questions:
would 250g Cara-crystal 120EBC affect flavour negatively?if anything it will be a positive
leave for 15minutes to pasteurize? No need.
can i go as low as 15C with Danstar Nottingham? Yes, you can go as low as 12. Recommended range 14-21C.
add the hop tbag to secondary? - sounds like a good time to me, just do it when it's most convenient.

Regarding the vodka extracted flavors though, I'd only do this with a few bottles (half the batch max) just in case it doesn't work out as expected.

[DrowningManatee]

great advice lordeoin, was kinda turned onto this stuff reading your 5am clone recipe, wanna do that one after this, that 5am stuff is bloody gorgeous.

Yea, never too sure how this EBC stuff affects it, i know its for colour but can it ruin it? it seems to me itll just turn out dark (who cares...)
ive done that real ale kit before and its always turned out nice, got one for 5euro as the can was dented in the shop so i just wanna use it up.

nice one on the low ferment temp as its usually 15degrees in the kitchen.

ill follow yer advice on the vodka flavours as well, half a batch o sound beer (hopefully) and half a batch o wacky flavours then. I was reading about the green dragon there if you've checked that out.... a bit mad but id try it for a bottle or two and see what happens...

cheers for the help, bigtime!!

[DrowningManatee]

sorry 5am recipe wrong, just came across ya loads (dont get the wrong idea:)) reading some o the threads and got mixed up, cheers though.

was trying to use the beersmith calculator there but it doesnt seem to accomodate kits, or I haven't understood it well....

[Ciderhead]

or I haven't understood it well....

There is a new add-on for LME and he has most of the coopers tins also

[DrowningManatee]

Was tryin to get that addon but there wouldnt be torrents of them on the internet, cheers though, im sure ill find it some way.

Got me stockpot there and brewed last night. I crushed my grains in the homebrew shop and ther mill was far too tight at first and they came out pretty small. I then tinkered with the mill until they came out more like crushed grains (more or less still intact).
When i added the specialty grains to the brew, alot of small particles came out of the tea sack and into the brew - I think this was the biggest mistake I made but we'll see.

Also, for the boil, I kinda just let it a bit below boiling id say as i couldnt keep the boil on with the lid off.

I added the hops looseleaf at 20min, and then in a tsack at 12min as I thought id put in too many hops as a load on the 20min one and thought id see how the tsack works (even though i read it doesnt aerate the hops enough).

I hydrated the yeast according to WillD's specifications, by the time I pitched it, it was a big bubble, like one o them chocolate desserts you cook in the oven, is this ok?

A bit worried that I added too many hops as I tasted the brew whle syphoning into the fermenter and it was pretty bitter. Is ithis from the small grain particles maybe either?

Also the syphon tube kept getting blocked (i shoulda used Irish moss but didnt have any on hand) so ended up pouring the mixture through a seive.

No sign of bubbling after a night, but hoping to see some activity by the end of the day.

Cheers again for all the help guys, will keep posting as brew progresses...

[DrowningManatee]

oh yeah, OG: 1.04 (thought this would be higher)

[DrowningManatee]

transfered to carboy after 6 days, and dry hopped with 12g tbag of EKG, gravity is 1.014. smells good

[LordEoin]

you're on the home-straight now 

[DrowningManatee]

I tries the fermented beer after 4 days dry hoppin, smelled and tasted good.
Taste tested 6 different fruity tincture additions and decided on 10 bottles gettin additions:
1 - 2ml vanilla
1 - 1.5ml lime
3 - 4ml strawberry
1 - 1.5ml lemon
2 - 4ml grapefruit
2 - 5ml orange

So i batch primed (first time) with 180 g sugar which i thought was correct at the time, though i checked after and see i shoulda added 125g. Is this a complete loss or can i open and recap them after a few days to let off some of the gas? I know :total fool, my first extract

[DrowningManatee]

so, im thinkin im defo openin the bottles...
any idea as to when I should open them, im thinkin in 4 days (5 days total carbonation), then recap and they should be ok?

[LordEoin]

1 - how many liters brew? (if 23, it makes 7.8g/l, which will be fizzy but fine)
2 - what kind of bottles? (good quality beer, reused commercial, PET, etc)
3 - Did your FG stay at 1.014?