Type: Modified Kit Brew
Sugars: 1 Coopers Australian Pale Ale, 1 Kg Extra Light Dried Malt Extract, 500g Lidl Clear Honey, 100g Crystal Malt (steeped in DME)
Yeast: Coopers Kit Yeast
Hops: 25g Saaz for 10 min boil + 20 Min Steep, 50g Challenger, 5 min boil plus 20 mins steep
Additions: Water de-chlorinated with 1/2 Campden tablet.
Time in Primary: Erm... 2 weeks?
Secondary method: King Keg
Time in Secondary: 4 - 5 weeks
O.G. 1050
F.G. Erm......
OK, so this is a story of two things. The first, as you can see from the specifications above, is a lesson in decent record keeping. Not only did I forget to record the final gravity, but I forgot to record the date that it went into the King Keg, so I'll have a guess at both, around 1014 for the F.G., and 2 weeks in the FV. My bad.
The second lesson is that the honey was lobed in with the hops, as I was concerned that it may contain wild yeasts (that I wanted to kill). I have since read up and discovered two things ~ most commercial honey is pasteurised, thus no wild yeasts, and boiling destroys much pf the honey aroma and taste.
To be honest, this was no better that the modified Coopers Canadian Blonde below, and had hardly any noticeable honey notes to it. Not one I'll do again, I'm afraid, at least not without some modifications first.
Tuesday 21 February 2012
Monday 6 February 2012
Magnum Apple Cider
First post for a long while, and I've got a bit behind on writing about my brewing. What can I say ~ real life intervened! Women, work and the festive season ~ all things to drag you away from the blogging lark.
Anyway, back to the brewing. Todays report ~ Magnum Apple Cider.
As I've posted here, I've made a few batches of 'Turbo Cider' from budget apple juice, so I thought I'd give this a go.
Thinking along beer kit lines, in that it's the quality and type of your 'sugars' that often make a difference between an 'OK' and a 'Great' batch of homebrew, I was keen to see if I could get a really top class product by replacing some of the required 'household sugar' with something better.
With a beer kit, this would be liquid or dry malt, brewing sugar or a mix of them, such as with beer enhancer. With a cider kit, the obvious thing to do is use apple juice, as you can work out how much sugar is in each litre from the nutritional information on the side of the carton. Reviews of this (and most other cider kits, if I'm honest) tended towards the view that the resultant product could be a little 'thin', so I was hoping to minimise this by the use of apple juice as part of the fermentable sugars.
Making the kit up is pretty standard faire ~ Kit contents plus sugars in the fermenting bin, plus some hot and cold water to 20 odd degrees, and thrash the yeast in. My calculations for the given amount of sugar required (1.3kg of household sugar) came to a substitution of 10L of Lidl apple juice, plus 600g of sugar. Finally, you add the 'cider yeast / sweetener sachet' (which I assume is a non fermentable sugar plus yeast) and wait. I left it 2 weeks in the FV, which saw it drop from an OG of 1052 to 1004 (ABV 6.4%!). All good so far. Then, into the pressure barrel with 60g of priming sugar, and the 'Cider Flavouring Sachet', which smelt of pearl drops or nail varnish.
Two weeks later, I had a drinkable cider, but nothin special. In fact, compared to turbo cider, which I've just about perfected now (more anon), I was a little dissapointed ~ it was very 'thin' tasting, and not at all as 'apple' like as home made TC. Also, the TC would have been cheaper, and just as simple if not more so, and what on Gods green earth was in that flavour sachet?!? The finished product still had a 'nail varnish' twang, even after several weeks. And boy, did it take me several weeks to chug through this one!
Not one I'd try again. However, if you are tempted, I'd recommend bottling as, just as with lager, the King Keg can't maintain sufficient pressure to get the CO2 to dissolve in the beer and give you proper 'fiz'. Unless you like traditional, flat, cider, but then, this kit wouldn't be to your taste anyway ~ too commercial tasting. Also, unless you have some 'keg in a fridge' set up, you can't chill the cider, which I also like (purists, look away now!).
Anyway, back to the brewing. Todays report ~ Magnum Apple Cider.
As I've posted here, I've made a few batches of 'Turbo Cider' from budget apple juice, so I thought I'd give this a go.
Thinking along beer kit lines, in that it's the quality and type of your 'sugars' that often make a difference between an 'OK' and a 'Great' batch of homebrew, I was keen to see if I could get a really top class product by replacing some of the required 'household sugar' with something better.
With a beer kit, this would be liquid or dry malt, brewing sugar or a mix of them, such as with beer enhancer. With a cider kit, the obvious thing to do is use apple juice, as you can work out how much sugar is in each litre from the nutritional information on the side of the carton. Reviews of this (and most other cider kits, if I'm honest) tended towards the view that the resultant product could be a little 'thin', so I was hoping to minimise this by the use of apple juice as part of the fermentable sugars.
Making the kit up is pretty standard faire ~ Kit contents plus sugars in the fermenting bin, plus some hot and cold water to 20 odd degrees, and thrash the yeast in. My calculations for the given amount of sugar required (1.3kg of household sugar) came to a substitution of 10L of Lidl apple juice, plus 600g of sugar. Finally, you add the 'cider yeast / sweetener sachet' (which I assume is a non fermentable sugar plus yeast) and wait. I left it 2 weeks in the FV, which saw it drop from an OG of 1052 to 1004 (ABV 6.4%!). All good so far. Then, into the pressure barrel with 60g of priming sugar, and the 'Cider Flavouring Sachet', which smelt of pearl drops or nail varnish.
Two weeks later, I had a drinkable cider, but nothin special. In fact, compared to turbo cider, which I've just about perfected now (more anon), I was a little dissapointed ~ it was very 'thin' tasting, and not at all as 'apple' like as home made TC. Also, the TC would have been cheaper, and just as simple if not more so, and what on Gods green earth was in that flavour sachet?!? The finished product still had a 'nail varnish' twang, even after several weeks. And boy, did it take me several weeks to chug through this one!
Not one I'd try again. However, if you are tempted, I'd recommend bottling as, just as with lager, the King Keg can't maintain sufficient pressure to get the CO2 to dissolve in the beer and give you proper 'fiz'. Unless you like traditional, flat, cider, but then, this kit wouldn't be to your taste anyway ~ too commercial tasting. Also, unless you have some 'keg in a fridge' set up, you can't chill the cider, which I also like (purists, look away now!).
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