Best Kit

[kererra]

I am a real ale fan and decided to "brew"my own to obtain my own supply of ale,I have difficuilty buying good beer in the west coast of scotland, I particularly enjoyed the Harvey of lewes best and old ale.
The two kits I have tried recently have been disapointing,Woodfords Admirals reserve, a TCP, very yeasty taste at present and a Hambleton bard, made with brown sugar and brewers suger, looks great very watery taste.
Are there any recomendations? I notice that Brupaks have a good write up do they have anything that would suit me.

[louthepoo]

One of my favourites and it appears a lot of other peoples favourites on here is Woodfords Wherry - my first successful homebrew

Its my brothers birthday soon and i'm getting him a woodfords wherry kit with it

[steve_flack]

The two kits I have tried recently have been disapointing,Woodfords Admirals reserve, a TCP, very yeasty taste at present

Do you make any effort to remove the chlorine from your tap water? It's probably that that's causing the TCP flavour.

[CrownCap]

I'm certainly a fan of the Brupaks range. They include hop and adjunct grain bags (like big tea bags) to steep or boil for a bit of extra zing!

The Pride of Yorkshire range has some good 3kg kits and the Brewers Choice range has a huge selection of styles in dried form (just make sure you make up the Brewers Choice with DME or LME rather than sugar).

[sparky Paul]

Woodeforde's Wherry is an excellent beer, but if you like an 'old ale' style beer, you may find it quite light.

You could try the Brupaks Brewer's Choice Old Ale, which is supposed to be excellent - but as CC says, make sure you make the kit up with 1kg of Spraymalt rather than sugar.

[kererra]

If I was to pick the brupak, what spray malt is the best to use I see muntons do dark and extra dark also SFX and malt extract

[Bazzer]

Do you make any effort to remove the chlorine from your tap water?

Being a newbie after 30yrs. off, can you elaborate on the chemistry, method involved?

Ta.

[steve_flack]

You can either use a carbon water filter or use a crushed campden tablet in water you use for your beer. I didn't think TCP was usually a problem for kit beers but if you're tasting it then maybe your water is the culprit.

[stevezx7r]

I think a lot depends on your water type as to whether you need to declorinate it (as much). I have never bothered using campden tablets and have yet to taste that tcp taste (except once where I made a ginger ale using asda water). Iirc, leaving the water to stand will alow most/all of the chlorine to leave the water anyway as it evaporates at room temp.

[steve_flack]

If your water company uses chloramines to sterilise then they don't evaporate.

[maxashton]

The Brupaks kits don't require additional spraymalt, they have all the sugars you need right in the cans.

Use DaaB's instructions here

[sparky Paul]

The Brupaks kits don't require additional spraymalt, they have all the sugars you need right in the cans.

The Brupaks Brewer's Choice Old Ale kit I suggested to kererra does require the addition of spraymalt or LME.

These kits are the dry bagged ones, and not the 2 can ones.

If I was to pick the brupak, what spray malt is the best to use I see muntons do dark and extra dark also SFX and malt extract

The instructions on the Old Ale pack say to use Brupaks Amber Spraymalt, which despite the name is quite dark - so I would use Munton's Dark Spraymalt, or half and half Dark and Medium.

[kererra]

OK guys Ive bought Brewer's Choice Old Ale kit , after 2 hours of sterilising the equipment making up the kit the yeast foamed up for a day and has now receded its now bubbling merrily away however it says after 7 days to siphon it into another vessel with an airlock stir gently and after a further 2 days keg or bottle it.

1 do i siphon off all of the fluid leaving the yeast at the bottom
2 Stir it

any help(again) please

[BlightyBrewer]

The transfer to another vessel is for secondary fermentation and clearing / conditioning. Plus you will avoid off flavours if you get the beer of the trub currently sitting in the bottom of your fermenter. Transfer carefully without inducing any air into your beer as this will cause oxidation and possibly spoil the beer.

I don't think its worth stirring after transfer. Just get the lid and airlock on and leave it for another week. Obviously, remember to sterilise your second vessel and anything else that will come into contact with the beer prior to transfer.

[kererra]

Thanks for that