Beer Lacked Flavour

[ADDLED]

Hi everyone. I was really impressed with my extract brew - it was a London Ale made with the Brupax Craftsman kit - my first brew for many years and it seemed really good. I casked it 2 weeks ago ito a HB beersphere and had wanted to leave it for 4 weeks, but curiosity got the better of me, plus nagging from mates for a 'tester', and so weve been dipping into it... a lot - nearly gone!

The thing is, it tasted lovely. Its malty with a real hoppy bitterness - not puckering, but its perhaps very slightly 'resinous', and it has some really nice character, almost a rich light maroon in colour. Darker than Pride, to do with a bit of tinkering and a bit fatter in alcohol, I was very happy with it, considering all of my kit efforts from years ago just tasted of boozy maltbread.

Until tonight when i bought a few tinnies of Fullers Pride to drink while watching England lose, and I tasted one side by side with my brew.
By comparison my beer has absolutely NO hop flavour or aroma and so it tastes flat (flavour, not condition). Its the flowery hoppiness on the nose, that lightly sweet malt aroma tempered with a slightly oily/iodene/seaside saltiness from the hops that is totally absent; theres bitterness but no aroma there.

I boiled a load of challenger (maybe 100gms) for 60mins and chucked in a handful of fuggles 5 mins and another at gas off. But theres no flavour...I was so full of foolish pride (no pun!) but now I am totally CRUSHED!
Im not arrogant enough to expect my beer to taste the same, just similar(ish), but its missing so much aroma that the real thing has.
Can anyone tell me what ive could have done to give it more ooompah!?

tks
Owen

[johnh]

The majority of the hop flavour and aroma comes from the late additions. Next time just bump up the quantity until it is to your taste. That's the beauty of homebrew, you can tailor your recipe until you get exactly what you like. Also this is where a log book comes in really handy because you can look back and see exactly what you did and adjust accordingly.

[ADDLED]

Thanks John. Would you suggest keeping my bitterness hop the same and also adding others after the boil and also dry hopping? I do need to start keeping a record - im ok at the practical, its the admin im crap at.

[johnh]

Absolutely, if the bitterness is just right that don't mess with it. Up the late additions and see what happens. They won't affect bitterness perceptibly. I've found that making simple changes like this really is the best way to find out what each bit of the recipe does to the final article.

It also proves that extract brewing is proper brewing dispite what people might say

[ADDLED]

Thanks again John, I might try the same brew again and up the late hops, perhaps a good handful in the FV after the initial ferment has died down a bit and leave until i barrel.
What amounts would you suggest to start making an impact? If i slam in 10gms would i be wasting my time, same with 100gms would that be overkill. I suppose im trying to work out the parameters between not making any difference at all and making a beer undrinkable.
cheers
Owen

[johnh]

I'm guessing that a handful is about 10 grams, maybe a bit less (depending on how big you're hands are I suppose!). I'd double it and see what happens.

[prolix]

some beers like Doom Bar have 85% of hops as late additions! Bloody good pint though!