big decision!

[rhodian]

ok, brew number 4 going on tonight! BUT...

i have both young's harvest lager and tom caxton's dark real ale. I like ale, but this time i want to impress the wife and neighbour. my truly delicious products to date have not quite been suitable to their palates... they prefer crisp, clean lager. indeed, with as little flavour as possible, i suspect.

so, i'm going to brew the lager. BUT...
i have 1kg of beer kit enhancer, or i could use 500g brewer's sugar and 500g spraymalt.

originally i thought i should use the beer kit enhancer to compensate for young's being a relatively budget product, but now i'm thinking that it might be wasted on lager and sugar and spraymalt might give a cleaner (or perhaps i mean less) flavour...

i'm not averse to lager myself, but i do like it to have been brewed properly by germans. i made homebrew lager once before (cooper's australian), which i thought was fine, but the wife wasn't impressed... she's a miller girl. or rolling rock. mind you, recently she's been drinking becks...

at the end of the day i'll please myself anyway - i'm making the lager cos i want to save the ale for kegging and the keg is occupied at the mo. the big decision is whether to use the beer kit enhancer or the sugar & spraymalt. it'd be nice to create a brew that the others liked too, though! is there a solution that will please everyone?

decisions, decisions... i hope no-one ever makes me prime minister...

[CrownCap]

Beer kit enhancer is a 50/50 mix of spray malt and brewers sugar - so your two options equate to the same thing

[rhodian]

d'oh!

thanks

[mr lil]

I'd certainly recommend the enhancer for the Harvest lager. I made this a few months ago and used glucose powder.
I found the result incredibly sweet and a bit tasteless, and it went flat quickly but I found out that the washer on my keg had split.
Let us know how you get on as I would'nt mind trying this again

[EYE JAY]

mutons connoissuer's range export pilsner.

can't go wrong with that for the stella,fosters lager type kit,nuff said

But remember conditioning is the key as it is with any kit,about two to three weeks should be fine

[EYE JAY]

I allways like to point out that a 4 pack costs £4 and a kit costs £10 for 40 pints

[delboy]

You could always go with 750g spraymalt 250g brewing sugar/glucose (or evening just normal sugar), this ratio seems to be a winner with cheaper one can lager kits

[nicktherockstar]

be a man, go all malt

having said that the brew i knocked out last night is 75% malf 25% nothing as it boiled over and coverd the kitchen, I just make a liter or so less to compensate! haha

p.s. my method is a short sharp boil with kits, then revigerate it with teabag technology before anyone flames me for boiling!! lol

[rhodian]

well, it's on, fermenting merrily away! i've used the "beer kit enhancer" - i notice that on the label said spraymalt and something like dextrose-something-ose, which i now realise is just the same as brewer's sugar, but that must have been what confused me.

big pop from the hotpress last night (that's the airing-cupboard to english-speakers!); thought the cat had exploded, but the fermentation gases had blown the lid right off my primary fermenter! have replaced it, open a crack at one side this time!

am now concerned about the weather being very warm - i've heard cool fermentation is better for lager, but also that this is only worth doing if i've bought really excellent yeast, which i haven't! no point worrying really cos my only other option is to keep it outside where it'll be potentially hotter during the day and then a big drop at night.

maybe i should do lagers in the shed at winter?? low temp, but never quite freezing?

ho hum... will definitely consider all malt or 75/25 split in the future! but next one's an ale - i know i can do it right! lager is too stressful!

cheers everyone!

ps, eye jay - by conditioning does that mean in the secondary fermenter, ie bottle? so just leave it an extra couple weeks before drinking?

is that what "lagering" is?? leaving it to condition longer? or does it mean leaving it for longer in primary fermentation (because of the ideally cooler temp)?

sorry for being so dim! i've been trying to read up and have in fact just succeeded in confusing myself!

thanks again

[delboy]

Its a geordie lager kit so im guessing the yeast is actually an ale yeast rather than a lager yeast.
Agree with everything DaaBs says you need to take it out of the hotpress and get it somewhere a bit cooler, try under the stairs that works for me (usually about 16-18C in there).

[rhodian]

great, now safely re-located to the hallway. i'll let youse know how it turns out.

thanks folks