Well gang, I've well and truly got the bug, now onto my 3rd brew already,
1st brew is being consumed a Coopers IPA straight kit just used LME and its great really enjoying it,
a bulldog imperial red cat is conditioning away in bottles i predict its going to need a fair bit to be drinkable being high in alcohol
so wanting to keep momentum i stumbled across this recipe while browsing the web and decided I liked the sound of it
so ordered up all the ingredients and started it last night.
a Coopers Lighting Strike Summer Ale
http://store.coopers.com.au/recipes/index/view/id/82/
now after the two farily straight forward kits above I' know i made a few school boy errors last night :)
firstly i was under some time presssure mistake no.1. and I was also baking with my 8yr at the same time.
Now if you read the recipe I didnt have a big enough pot, but I dont think thats going to impact the boiling and adding of the first batch of hops, I think I managed that alright in a smaller pot and followed that instruction fairly well.
I will admit my daughter was not at all pleased with helping with the hops or there smell !!
Next problem and lesson learned was I had some clumping of the DME when adding to the fermentor, and while I managed to be fairly patient and remove a most of them a few did remain (see mistake no.1 time pressure) so any advice offered regards clumping appreciated (can I use LME next time)
mistake no. 3, while rushing to get all tasks completed I read the yeast instructions and not the coopers instructions and rehydrated the yeast as per the yeast instructions while coopers said just add the dry yeast. This schoolboy reading error I'm guessing is not going to be too much of a problem as long as I didnt make a bags of the rehydrating (no thermometer)
pitched a right temp etc so hoping for the best
mistake no.4 - forgot to take an OG, again time pressure and rushing, but no big deal.
also the vacum packed hops I've left over how can i store these and how long will they last for for another brew day
so some valuable lessons learned for an early beginner
ohh another mistake I made right at the start, I forgot to open a home-brew to drink at the very start of brewing - my biggest mistake I think !!!!!!!!!!
any advice appreciated
thanks
R
Good job RobShamrock. It can be tricky brewing with a kid under foot ;)
Stirring the DME in always clumps for me, but the clumps will dissolve and get eaten up by the yeast anyway, so all it affects is your OG reading.
To avoid clumping DME, put the DME into a dry FV and then add your hot water (about 2L). Pick it up and swirl it until the DME is dissolved.
Alternate direction occasionally. Then add your kit extract and swirl this in. Finally rinse out your can with any and add this in. Swirl or stir until it's all dissolved and then continue with the cold water.
You should be fine with your yeast regardless of whether you pitched dry or rehydrated. Don't worry about it so long as the temperature is good.
Guess the OG or if you stuck to the recipe, just take their OG.
Push out as much air as possible from the hop bag and stick it in a ziplock sandwich bag. Put it in the freezer until you'll use it.
Not having a homebrew while all this happened is unforgivable though. Get out and never come back! >:(
I promise to never let it happen again !!! in fact I'll drink two during the next brew day, the missus is flabergasted at all my efforts !!, shall freeze up the remaing hops this eveing and ta for the advice
That is the recipe I was going to do next, having done two of the craft range kits to date. Sounds like it is a simple enough process, and I have a 10 litre pot so should be good.
It will be two weeks before i can start on it though as i have to wait for the current kit to be evicted from the fermenter.
Keep us updated on your progress, interested to see how it goes.
cheers
DME always clumps, just dissolve in boiling water but watch for boilovers!
its tipping away nicely, felt it was slow to start compared to others I've done but receipe stated lower temp which thankfully with the month in it the room is helping me out with, with my time brew-belt on i've been pretty steady around 20c, will give it another week before I test gravity but will leave for min. two weeks probably bit longer as I started on a weekday and will most likely bottle on a saturday
ordered all the ingredients for this brew recently, so as soon as i have the current batch out of the fermenter I'll be giving this a whirl.
I'll read the mistakes above first again though!
Quick question on this one:
Did you use the yeast pack that came with the Coopers Blonde Can or did you get a seperate one?
I ordered all the bits (except the yeast) as I was planning to use the coopers kit yeast?
Any ideas if this will be up to the task?
thanks
Sorry mate been so busy havent been online, I ordered a seperate yeast as per the coopers instructions, I actually bottled it up on Easter Saturday, was a bit disappointed I was short on bottles and ended up chucking about 8/9 500ml bottles worth down the drain, did a batch prime for first time after siphoning off to a secondary so hoping it'll be good to go in about 3 weeks
Finally had a few of these in bottle since 4th April so still young but absolutely delicious best brew I've done yet
that looks great.
have to get mine brewed up......
That looks flipping tasty!
Just got my attempt at this recipe into the fermenter. Went well, but did get a lot of dme clumping too. Also, took my eye off the pot of dme at the start and had a lovely sticky boil over mess to clean up.
I used the yeast that came with the coopers can so hopefully it will be up to the job.
Have it sitting in the basement with an ebay brew belt hooked up to an stc1000 that I wired up last night, thanks to lordeoins instructions. Have it set at 18 degrees which should be achievable in the basement.
I'll check it for action in a day or two and then ignore it for two weeks. I'll aim to bottle it the weekend after two weeks in the fermenter.
Good on ya have to say it's the best kit I've done from the three I've done the last couple months had another few during the week and finding them as good as anything you can buy bursting to get going again but have communion coming soon and not a decent spot with temp. considerations to brew
I happened to come across the instructions that came with the Kit of Blonde ale and they say the yeast is happiest from 20 to 23 or something like that. So i have been upping the temp on the STC1000 by a half degree each day for the last few days to bring it up to 20. Hopefully it will work out well. there is a good ring of krausen around the top of the fermenter and lots of condensation inside the lid so something is happening anyway.
What temp was it at? dont think 18/19 would be a big deal just might be a bit slow, any lower I'm the wrong man to know :)
As usual LE has already got it figured http://www.nationalhomebrewclub.ie/forum/index.php/topic,660.0.html
Left this alone for almost 3 weeks. Was planning on bottling on Friday but got stuck into the remains of my Craft range IPA with a few friends and that went out the window.
Bottled last night and it's heading to the hotpress for conditioning this evening. FG was around 1.010 and the dregs in the bottling bucket tasted geat. Sweet, flat, but great.
Batch primed with 140 gr of dextrose.
Looking forward to trying this out.
And on to the next recipe........
well done report back after you cracking first one. Have communion this Sunday and planning on getting straight onto a double brew day soon after before it gets too warm
I want to get this on quickly the recipe calls for 3 x 500g Coopers Light Dry Malt. Would the muntons light spraymalt be the equivlant of this?
thanks
any spray malt will do they mention there own brand as it's there recipe I just used ordinary light spray malt that I had already. Mine is nearly all gone
I also used generic light spray malt from thehomebrewcomapny.
Might try one for this weekend, as it has been bottled for about two weeks.
Looking forward to it.
Well this turned out nice, really really nice (if I do say so myself).
I put half the batch into the hotpress to condition and left it there for two weeks, and the other half I left in the living room for comparison. Both pretty much the same at this stage in regards to carbonation.
I've drank a few of these now as my IPA is almost gone and they have all been delicious. A real easy drinker that will improve further with more time in the bottle.
I'll be making this again too.
Well done. I've drank all mine already which considering it was only bottled on 04/04 says a lot.
Still enjoying the last few bottles of this so thought I better get another batch underway.
Followed the recipe again, except this time added in 250gm of Carapils steeped for about 40 minutes in 2 litres of water at about 65 degrees. I also used a packet of GV12 yeast instead of the Coopers kit yeast. Can't wait to do a comparison between the two batches. To this end I have hidden away 2 bottles from the first batch for a side by side testing later in the summer.
This brewing thing is super.......... need more bottles though!
You've Been busy, here you on the bottles, have a shortage myself, used the GV12 on my batch, will be doing a similar kit hack later in the summer based on this but much braver now so will be doing my own recipe next time, wish I'd kept a few bottles of this too, is your Weiss beer ready to be sampled yet??
@Rob, Weiss not ready yet. Have 20 odd bottles of it in the hotpress for a little over a week now so might give one or two a whirl this weekend, probably a bit early but always worth a sample.
Bottled up my second batch of this last night. Changed from the kit yeast to GV12 and added 250gm of steeped carapils also. Left it in the fermenter for about 4 weeks as I was on my holliers. Can' wait to try it second time round with the changes. Have 2 bottles of the original batch set aside for comparison.
The second batch has turned out fantastic. I really like this beer, and even more importantly the boss likes it a lot too. The carapils addition seems to have done a lot for head formation and retention, which now lasts to end of a 330ml bottle.
I'll be making this again.
Nice one, I've six brews done to date and this has been my favourite so far. Still experimenting so wont be returning to it too soon but one to be repeated for sure, Next Up a Simcoe Hopped Pale Ale :)
Finally got around to getting this on as a repeat brew as it went down so well. Did some steeped grains with it this time some carapils 250g. Also looking to dry hop this batch but not 100% sure which hop to use from the recipe either EKG or the Northern Brewery and how much 25g or so I'm guessing . Any suggestions
Can't help on the dry hopping recommendations I'm afraid.
This is still near the top of our list for great kit hacks. We are running low on the second batch and Mrs Oinkely has requested a fresh one be produced.
It's simply a great beer.
I prefer dry hopping with EKG. 30-40 grams should be nice :)
Only seeing this post now. 2 hours after dry hop addition. Strangely I'd gone for the Ekg and did 30g as per your post I think my brew instincts are improving
Well its time to sample a few of these and I'm surprised that its not come out as well as lastime.
I did alter the recipe a bit, I did a grain steep to help with head retention etc, I'll have to check my brew book to see what grain I used, I also dry hopped as per above.
Its taken an age to clear, and its not really cleared up too well at all, I've a fair few stashed in cool garage which I'll leave till closer to christmas and check again. My experience isnt strong enough to put my finger on whats wrong, but in my original batch I just remember it as more enjoyable to drink.
I'm guessing the grain steep, also in the original I used fresh leaf hops and I used pellets this time ?
I've plenty stock anyhow to tide me thru christmas and they'll be all drunk no doubt eventually