Ambiguous Admirals Reserve instructions

[titeyorkshire]

Hello, I just received a Woodforde's Admiral's Reserve 32 pint kit and I'm a little confused by the instructions regarding the hop sachet.
The box says "Add contents of hop extract sachet on day 4" after starting the fermentation. The sachet inside says "Add complete sachet prior to yeast". Which instruction should I follow? The sachet says the ingredients are Maltodextrin and hop oil if that information is useful.
Thanks for your help and apologies if this is already on the forum, I did try to search this and didn't find it, although I did learn loads of other useful things...

 

[fury_tea]

Hello, I just received a Woodforde's Admiral's Reserve 32 pint kit and I'm a little confused by the instructions regarding the hop sachet.
The box says "Add contents of hop extract sachet on day 4" after starting the fermentation. The sachet inside says "Add complete sachet prior to yeast". Which instruction should I follow? The sachet says the ingredients are Maltodextrin and hop oil if that information is useful.
Thanks for your help and apologies if this is already on the forum, I did try to search this and didn't find it, although I did learn loads of other useful things...

I'd go for 4-5 days myself. Fermentation can blow off a lot of hop aroma so you want to try and do it towards the end

 

[Wherrypuzzled]

Hi Titeyorkshire.. Great name. I bought same kit (Wilco) a few weeks back and was set for brewing this morning But ran into same problem

Wherry instructions are not great and Reserve ones not great and so I was surprised to see instructions say "add hop sachet on Day 4" so I thought OK!

Opening kit I saw the Hop sachet which was clearly marked " add complete sachet prior to yeast"

Can they both be right? So I too searched for answers and found your question so hopefully the good folks on here will have come across this before and I will delay brewing till I get definitive answer

PS come on Wodfordes / Muntons please correct this contradiction asap

If the Hops are bought in en masse and go in other brews before the Yeast but need to go in on day 4 in AReseve then get maker to supply sachets that say that OR indeed say nothing

Wherry puzzled another tight Yorkshire man

 

[fury_tea]

It won't ruin your brew either way and i'm sure you'll get a pretty similar result. You could try it one way this time and try it the other way next time and see if you prefer one way or the other (or if you can notice a difference. I wouldn't delay your brew over it.

 

[marshbrewer]

I'd go for day 4, the logic being;

• As has been said, hop aroma can allegedly be driven off by the CO2 during the vigorous initial part of the fermentation. This is why people usually dry hop towards the end.
• Maltodextrin is a non fermentable sugar / carbohydrate that is often added for mouth feel / body. As it is non fermentable, it doesn't really matter when it is added.

Just my opinion!

 

[Wherrypuzzled]

Sorry double post

 

[Wherrypuzzled]

Thanks for info so far and will go for Day 4 to add Hop sachet

Still hope Woodforde's / Muntons fix this problem as I believe they want Hop sachet adding on Day 4 but if they do the supplied Sachet should say that #notrocketscienceisit?

 

[marshbrewer]

I agree, it is confusing, and Muntons would do well to at least include a errata sheet clarifying when to put it in.

 

[titeyorkshire]

Thanks very much for your help. Your logic makes sense. Day four it is.
If what I read elsewhere is correct, the sachet is mostly to add hop aroma, which is why you are saying that fermentation may drive it off. If I understand it right, the hop taste is able to be contained in the malt in the cans but the aroma is lost, hence the sachet.
I did send an email to Muntons yesterday but with today being a bank holiday I'm itching to get this started. If they reply any different I'll post it on here.

 

[marshbrewer]

In conventional brewing, hips are added at different points in a boil to provide either bitterness (beginning or near the beginning of the boil), taste (last 30 - 5 mins of the boil) or aroma ( end of the boil, dry hopping, whirlpool etc). It's a bit more complicated than that but that's the general principle.

With a beer kit, the boil has already taken place then the wort is reduced by further processing. Thus, as you say, it is very difficult to have any hop aroma left by the time it is put in the tin.

I would also suggest that the processing removes a lot of the hop taste.

Thus, many people pimp up kits by dry hopping or making hops teas.

So, basically, yes, you are correct.

 

[titeyorkshire]

In conventional brewing, hips are added at different points in a boil to provide either bitterness (beginning or near the beginning of the boil), taste (last 30 - 5 mins of the boil) or aroma ( end of the boil, dry hopping, whirlpool etc). It's a bit more complicated than that but that's the general principle.

With a beer kit, the boil has already taken place then the wort is reduced by further processing. Thus, as you say, it is very difficult to have any hop aroma left by the time it is put in the tin.

I would also suggest that the processing removes a lot of the hop taste.

Thus, many people pimp up kits by dry hopping or making hops teas.

So, basically, yes, you are correct.

Thanks for taking to time to write and explain this. I've been a simple follow-the-instructions on the kit kinda person since I started homebrewing a few years ago but maybe its time to learn more about the process and how to pimp it up and even make from scratch. Plus making hops tea just sounds cool!

 

[Wherrypuzzled]

Same here TY - Ive learnt a bit more even after being at it "donkeys years".

Cheers jjsh very useful (irony is I dont have a sense of smell - but those I offer it to will )

 

[Rob63]

I believe, the Admirals reserve is just a wherry kit with a pack of hop extract and instructions to brew short.

 

[Wherrypuzzled]

Interesting because it says on the Pack that you can still brew 40 Pints using the kit and you will end up 4.0 to 4.4 abv

So I would think you are maybe right. Wonder if others have an opinion

 

[landcare]

I have brewed two Admirals kits to 32 pints, the instructions said to add the hop sachet at the same time as the yeast so they must have changed the instructions to 4 days recently, it is quite different to Wherry in my opinion. I found the Admirals very bitter to start with but it improves with age.

 

[Wherrypuzzled]

Hi Landcare

That would stack up as the Hop Sachet simply says "Add complete sachet prior to yeast " so that would mean you could add it just 10 seconds before the yeast

So if they have just changed it (the packaging looks different to some on HB Sites) then the Sachets just need to be reprinted to match the Instructions on the Box

 

[Rob63]

I've actually got an Admirals in a fv at the moment, I split the difference and made it up to 20 litres, as I don't particularly want the high abv at 18 litres. I started it last Saturday and put the hop powder in after 5 days, when the bubbler stopped. I'll rack into a keg with a priming solution this coming Saturday, leave it for a week and then bottle it.

 

[titeyorkshire]

Received a reply from Muntons:
"Thank you for contacting Muntons.
I apologise if the instructions were unclear on this particular kit. You can add the hop extract at any point during the brewing process, depending on your taste. I always add mine at the beginning as I like a hoppy aroma and taste."

So yes, it would seem that its not that big a deal after all!
Now back to researching large buckets and aquarium thermostats...Brewing was so much simpler when I was ignorant...

 

[archno1]

I've actually got an Admirals in a fv at the moment, I split the difference and made it up to 20 litres, as I don't particularly want the high abv at 18 litres. I started it last Saturday and put the hop powder in after 5 days, when the bubbler stopped. I'll rack into a keg with a priming solution this coming Saturday, leave it for a week and then bottle it.

Hi Rob63, just wondered if you've sampled this one yet and if you have, what is your verdict. I bottled my 18 litre batch on Wednesday, so will wait a few weeks to sample (or maybe 2!) Cheers

 

[Rob63]

Hi Rob63, just wondered if you've sampled this one yet and if you have, what is your verdict. I bottled my 18 litre batch on Wednesday, so will wait a few weeks to sample (or maybe 2!) Cheers