Hello Ale!

[beezer]

Hi all,

First post and first brew, just wanted to share my progress and maybe get some tips. All I've ever fermented before is sugar and Norwegian turbo yeast so this has been a lot more fun.

Recipe

500g Carapils, steeped for 45 minutes and included in boil.
1500g Muntons Light Spray Malt, boiled for full 60 mins
1500g Brupaks Liquid Pale Malt Extract, boiled for 40 mins.

15g Centennial 12.40%, 60 mins.
30g Cascade 8.20%, 20 mins.
15g Goldings 5.49%, 10 mins.
10g Goldings 5.49%, 5 mins.

20g Cascade 8.20%, dry-hopping planned for 12 days.

22g Gervin English Ale Yeast

I realise the amount of Carapils might be a bit excessive but I tasted it before adding and wasn't overly sweet so hope it will be fine, just warmed up around 4 litres of water to 70C and then let it sit while topping up with a bit of boiling water a couple of times. Boil went well and you can taste quite a lot of the Cascade already but we'll see how it goes, any tips on amounts to use when dry-hopping would be greatly appreciated. Turned out a lot more amber than I wanted but no big deal and from what I understand that is pretty unavoidable when using extracts.

Cheers

[jimp2003]

Welcome to Jim's beezer!

Thats probably a little more carapils than I would use but I don't see any reason why it won't work. It will certainly help add a bit of body to the beer and that is something that is lacking in all-extract brews I find.

20g of cascade is quite restrained but I like that - there is quite a trend for going mad with the hops (I am guilty of this sometimes). When you say 20g of dry hops planned for 12 days do you mean you will leave the hops in the beer for 12 days? If so that is more than I would usually dry hop for. I find that 7 days max is all it needs.

[beezer]

[quote="jimp2003"]Welcome to Jim's beezer!

20g of cascade is quite restrained but I like that - there is quite a trend for going mad with the hops (I am guilty of this sometimes). When you say 20g of dry hops planned for 12 days do you mean you will leave the hops in the beer for 12 days? If so that is more than I would usually dry hop for. I find that 7 days max is all it needs.[/quote]

Thanks

I'll lower the dry hopping period a bit then, do you ever taste the beer when dry hopping to know when to stop or do you just go by experience?

[jimp2003]

I have always gone by experience.

To be honest I only taste the beer when taking the hydrometer sample and at bottling. I find I only need to take one sample as I leave the beer for at least a week before doing so and I have a pretty good fermentation regime so I can usually guarantee that it will be where i need it to be at that point.

I have always avoided messing with the brew during fermentation and I think it would be very difficult to notice the difference in the aroma between dry hopping for 7 days and 10 days. Others have said that dryhopping for long periods with large amounts of hops can impart a grassiness to the beer. I have never experienced this myself as I don't keep them on the beer too long but it might be worth bearing in mind.

[Rookie]

Welcome to Jim's beezer!

20g of cascade is quite restrained but I like that - there is quite a trend for going mad with the hops (I am guilty of this sometimes).

I went a lot of years thinking I didn't like cascade hops until last year at a beerfest where I had an excellent APA. I e-mailed the brewer to ask what hops he used and he replied "centennial and cascade". It was nice and hoppy, but very well balanced and not a hop monster. It got me rethinking my aversion to cascades.