Jim's Beer Kit

I attempted something similar with a pale ale that went sour. I used a cherry concentrate from Holland and Barrett. Added at priming time. It didn't quite salvage the beer, but the cherry flavour comes through. Note that you have to use a lot , in my case 500ml in a 24l batch. It would be worth it t...

Use thicker tube or a longer drop

Also leave less headspace in the fv

Good to know about Minch being lower colour dingemans pale. I use that malt for everything, but a low colour equivalent would be nice to have.

Decide. Then purchase. Beer ingredients do decline with time. There are some staples that you should always have to hand, like pale malt, wheat malt, crystal and perhaps Munich or Vienna

What kind of mini kegs?

If your mash pH is off the sweet spot, enzyme action can work slower. Conversion may not be complete by the end of the 60 minutes.

That is one source of missing your numbers.

Do research into your cleaning products. Some, like paracetic acid can oxidise the beer if not rinsed correctly.

Jocky wrote:Pour the last of the hoppy crud out into a sieve lined with voile?

This works an absolute treat for me.

You need to use a lot of rye to get that character to come through. Think 40% pale rye minimum. Also consider the amount of crystal rye, as I think this is more significant in imparting the rye character to commercial rye beers. If I was to do a rye beer again, I would probably go 40% pale rye, 5-10...

I have to admit I don't think I aerate enough, I just cool to about 23C in the boiler then let the wort splash into the fermenter and that's it. I have been having issues with fermentation and off flavours which I think are down to poor fermentation. . If you are pitching at 23C you are in the prob...

I was always a bit hesitant to use pellets in the kettle, but my last 2 brewdays have gone great with them.

I just set up a small whirlpool with a 5 min stir of the mash paddle after the Irish moss.

15 min steep and everything has settled to the bottom.

With 2 bags + 1 pot you run into possible efficiency problems as you would have to fill the bags in advance and drop them in, so doughballs would be an issue.

Get a big bag and a pulley. The bags are strong and can take the weight of wet grain. But your back cant.

Done. you have put in a lot thought into the questions. Best of luck.

My favorite method (having tried many) is to simply have no filter in the boiler, chuck the pellets in, (stirring lots) then sieve the finished wort through a sterile muslim bag on its way to the fermenter. Very little gets through. Sometimes the low tech solutions work best! Rick I tried this rece...

I have the bulldog too, but how do you guys set these up? I would like to fix my mill to a hopper so that it is stable when I hand crank it.

I get enough resistance that it jerks around a lot.