Brewers Choice Best Bitter

[Ingieuk]

First off I'd like to say Hi, I've been reading in the background for quite some time now, great forum! It's answered loads of my questions!

My first brew was a Brupaks IPA which was kegged, tasted great and was quickly supped (your very own first homebrewed pint is a good moment!).

Yesterday I set another Brupaks kit away for christmas, this time a Best Bitter with spray malt.

I've just got a couple of questions if you guys don't mind:

1) I bought the kit from Hop & Grape (excellent service and shop, very local), the gentleman advised me to get two 500g kinds of spray malt, a 'Hopped Light' and a 'Light' instead of the instructed 1kg 'Pale'. He did explain it to me why but i couldn't quite grasp it there and then, something to do with allowing the Hoppieness to penetrate through?

2) The instructions differ slightly to the canned brupaks kit I did before, after the 5-7 day fermentation it tells you to siphon into another vessel with an airlock and stir gently, leave for two days then siphon it into the Keg (I'm using a TT king keg) with priming sugar etc... My problem is I don't have 'another vessel'(My current FV has an airlock), this step didn't come up when I was making the previous kit so I'm wondering how necesary it is? I'm guessing it rouses the yeast to make sure its fully fermented?

Other than that all seems to have gone well, OG of 1.042

I'm intrigued by the Hops used in this kit, they come in 4 teabags, 2 the same the other two different. The only mention to hops is to Challenger hops, which ones are these? Two bags stayed looking like hops and had a brown/reddish tinge to them, one was a mushy brown colour and one a mushy green colour (think i need to know names before I ask for some more mushy green hops at H&G!).

I'll let you guys know how it goes, I can't fiddle with this as I'm away at Uni in Newcastle most of the time - probably a good thing!

Many thanks for all the help!

Rich

[Ingieuk]

Thanks for quick reply.

Okay, I'm going to leave it in the FV for 10 days then siphon it into the keg with the sugar.

Ahh okay, might try normal spray malt next time then.

I came down this morning (I set the brew off last night) to find my FV at 17 degrees, luckily when I was given the equipment included was a 'Ferment - a - matic 100' so I sterilised it and put it in the brew. All this gear is many years old, the price sticker had a phone number with only 5 digits in it, before my time I think! It still works too, its sat at a nice 24 degrees.

Is it okay to leave the FV at 24 degrees for the duration of the ferment (till next sunday)? or should I leave it for a couple of days to get it going?

Thanks for the info chris.
Rich

[fractureman]

24 deg is fine mate no problems

[Ingieuk]

24 deg is fine mate no problems

Great, 24 degrees it is then!

In the tea bags you have grains and a special type of pellet hop. The grains will be brown/red particles and a little crunchier between thumb and finger than the hops which will be a bit like pelleted rabbit food, or a green powder if they have lost their form. They are provided because hop flavour is easily lost, particularly when turning unfermented beer into dried malt extract. The instructions give examples of how you use them to produce slightly different results in the finished product.

I think I have mistaken what I thought were bagged hops for grain! In which case I think the kit had two bags of grains and two bags of different Hops.

Starting to plan my next brew already, is this the way it goes? Number 2 is hardly started and now number 3 is on the cards!

Rich

[fractureman]

exactly get another FV & get another brew on the go

[Ingieuk]

Yup I reckon a new FV is in order, intrigued by Extract brewing as included in the kit I was given was an old baby burco so I can get boiling and don't have to use stockpots.

I left my brew slowly starting to ferment-theres about an inch of foam and a few bubbles-to head back to Newcastle. I'm going to be popping back next weekend to hopefully find a brew ready to siphon into my keg, in the meantime I need to do some research into doing an extract brew.

Cheers for the help guys!
Rich

[Ingieuk]

I'm having a bit of trouble with my brew, the inch of foam I previously had has all but disappeared, the airlock is still glugging but only about once a minute.

Do you think I've killed the yeast by letting it get too cold the first night? (It went down to 17 or 18 degrees) The morning after pitching the yeast when it was at 17 degrees i bunged the heater in which has kept it at a steady 23/24 degrees since. it was given a shake to rouse the yeast on Tuesday which helped a little. I have a spare pack of brupacks top fermenting ale yeast which I could add potentially.

I will find out later on what the current gravity is.

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Rich

[scottmoss]

I'm having a bit of trouble with my brew, the inch of foam I previously had has all but disappeared, the airlock is still glugging but only about once a minute.

Do you think I've killed the yeast by letting it get too cold the first night? (It went down to 17 or 18 degrees) The morning after pitching the yeast when it was at 17 degrees i bunged the heater in which has kept it at a steady 23/24 degrees since. it was given a shake to rouse the yeast on Tuesday which helped a little. I have a spare pack of brupacks top fermenting ale yeast which I could add potentially.

I will find out later on what the current gravity is.

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Rich

When did you start this ? Have you took a reading with a hydrometer?

[Ingieuk]

I'm having a bit of trouble with my brew, the inch of foam I previously had has all but disappeared, the airlock is still glugging but only about once a minute.

Do you think I've killed the yeast by letting it get too cold the first night? (It went down to 17 or 18 degrees) The morning after pitching the yeast when it was at 17 degrees i bunged the heater in which has kept it at a steady 23/24 degrees since. it was given a shake to rouse the yeast on Tuesday which helped a little. I have a spare pack of brupacks top fermenting ale yeast which I could add potentially.

I will find out later on what the current gravity is.

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Rich

When did you start this ? Have you took a reading with a hydrometer?

It was started about 11pm on Friday night.

The OG was 1.042

[scottmoss]

Have you took a hydrometer reading today?? If not then do and check what the current gravity reading is.

[Ingieuk]

The hydrometer is reading 1.011, the estimated final gravity is around 1.008.

I guess the fermentation is just winding down a little towards the end? Is there a way of finding out the alcohol content from the gravities?

[scottmoss]

Its not far from done. Leave it another day or 2 then when you get 2 of the same readings it's done!

[Ingieuk]

Its not far from done. Leave it another day or 2 then when you get 2 of the same readings it's done!

Wahey! Wasn't expecting such a quick fermentation, my last brew took about 9 or 10 days but then i suppose that wasn't heated. Looking forward to giving it a taste after its been conditioned for a while.
Thanks!

[Ingieuk]

Well I bottled the brew today, went well for the first time! Only problem I had was the two handed bottler I got won't grip Hobgoblin bottles, no real loss though as I only have one!

The quick sip I had was tasty and very much like beer, which is good!

Looking to have a go at a short extract brew next, If I only want to make a brew of half length, say 10l instead of 20, can I just halve the ingredients used? Do the boil times for the hops stay the same?