Jim's Beer Kit

From Midwest Supplies website : How Do I Use Oak? A good proportion of oak chips for home use is 3 grams of chips per liter. To use oak chips, sanitize them in a 3-6 ounces of water and then add the chips and water to the wine. Add oak chips to your wine after it has been racked for bulk aging. Use...

So, I don't even know if they brew traditional Porter in Australia. If so, I'm not saying this is how they do it, BUT I did use Australian base malt (thanks Kent at MO Malt!), Australian hops (thanks Wally!), and Australian ale yeast (reused from my recent Australian Sparkling Ale.) I intentionally...

Galaxy used to be my go to hop, but it's easily overdone as a bittering hop. You need to be careful also if dry hopping with it as it can be quite "grassy". I've gotten quite tired of it. There is a variety here called Victoria; not to be confused with Victoria's Secret. It's not grown commercially ...

Chinook, Cascade, Centennial, Simcoe and Citra in small doses.

The US Cascade is far and away better than the Cascade we grow locally, however the Chinook I have grown is pretty good. It must like the conditions here.

Nail on head, Seymour. I have never had a Cooper's Sparkling that wasn't cloudy and turbid. Still a good beer, though. Funny you should say that. My experience is that Coopers Sparkling from a bottle pours perfectly clear if it has been allowed to settle for a couple of days in the fridge. That's h...

Hi Seymour, I always associate Australian Sparkling Ale with Coopers Sparkling Ale. Check out the style guidelines (6.5 Australian Pale Ale) here:- http://www.aabc.org.au/docs/AABC2014StyleGuidelines_OnePagePerStyle.pdf The grist that you have will make a nice beer. Just not sure what you're expecti...

Well, what can I say - i have some catching up to do.... So I have now bought the right kegs, and have been talking to a homebrew shop in oz about valves / fittings & regulators (http://www.cheekypeakbrewery.com.au/) It also appears the the CO2 bottles have different threads as well, so as I was pl...

That's cool. I had to look up what ANZAC Day is, interesting stuff. Are you personally involved in the military, or is this just for a big national Memorial Day party kinda thing? I've not been involved in the military, however my Grandfather and Parents were. I used to work at Repatriation General...

Seymour, this appears to be an interesting recipe. I'm considering something with rosemary myself to celebrate our upcoming ANZAC Day. How much of the rosemary comes through in the finished product? Is it subtle or more in your face? Do you leave the rosemary on the twigs and steep the woody part al...

The plot thickens. Information available here https://www.coopers.com.au/coopers-forum/topic/7290/?page=1 indicates that there are several dried strains in play, plus a blended variant. 6470zzy was correct in saying that Coopers use a dried strain that was developed "in-house", however it appears th...

The yeast supplied generally with the Coopers ale kits, is MauriBrew 514. I believe that if you do some investigation you will find out that it isn't :-k What investigation would you like me to do? I have a book in front of me published by the Coopers Brewery, Jolly Good Ale and Old, The History of...

That sounds great. How many batches do you usually get outta your own plants? I generally get between 250-300g in total when dry from the two plants. That gives me about five 40l batches. I only do enough to fill a couple of "Corny" kegs at a time. It's good to drink in summer, but I prefer bigger ...

So how do you use your homegrown Pride of Ringwood hops, recipe-wise? For the POR, I make an assumption as to their A/A%. I generally work to about 8% A/A as the commercial growers are able to get higher values generally. They are used in an all-grain "lawn-mower" style ale to emulate, but not that...

Seymour, there is a variety called Super Pride ( A/A ~ 14%) which was developed from Pride of Ringwood (POR). It has a higher alpha than (POR) and has a low cohumulone figure when compared to POR. Super Pride has largely superseded POR as a commercial cultivar as it is more attractive to growers as ...

Seymour, have you actually brewed and tasted this beer? IMO a recipe that obtains 65 - 70 IBUs from Pride of Ringwood(POR) would be very harsh. Coopers are using isohop these days in their brews and kits and the beer has lost it's earthy taste from the POR. Edit. You also need a little wheat malt in...