Coopers Devils Half Ruby Porter

[jayk34]

Tried a few bottles of this batch after 4 weeks conditioning and pleasantly surprised. Great head and retains it to end and the taste is quite good albeit a bit thin.

Probably should have asked this before I put the 2nd batch on but it has been bubbling away for 3 days now. Is there some way I can improve the body of this after the first fermentation has stopped.

I did read somewhere on the forum about possibly lack of calcium in water. I live in a hard water area but put all of the water for the kit through a brita maxtra filter.

 

[terrym]

I live in a hard water area but put all of the water for the kit through a brita maxtra filter.

What for?
If you drink your tap water without a second thought it's good to go imo, unless it is obviously loaded with chlorine and all you need to do then is pretreat your brewing water with half a campden tab.
Your kit is on the thin side because if you brewed to the full 23 litres there isn't all that much malt in it relatively speaking, it is in fact only about 3.7 % with an OG of about 1037.
If you want to get more out of a one can plus a kilo, brew short say 20 -21 litres which is what I used to do, and if you want to get a little adventurous use some steeping grains like crystal malt or carry out a minimash to give it a boost.

 

[jayk34]

What for?
If you drink your tap water without a second thought it's good to go imo, unless it is obviously loaded with chlorine and all you need to do then is pretreat your brewing water with half a campden tab.
Your kit is on the thin side because if you brewed to the full 23 litres there isn't all that much malt in it relatively speaking, it is in fact only about 3.7 % with an OG of about 1037.
If you want to get more out of a one can plus a kilo, brew short say 20 -21 litres which is what I used to do, and if you want to get a little adventurous use some steeping grains like crystal malt or carry out a minimash to give it a boost.

I thought I was removing the chlorine from it but the Campden tablet sounds easier. I've also had a realisation that I'm thick as a plank when I just read your reply. I filled the fermenter to 25 litres !!!!! Don't ask me why, thought I had read it but obviously just filled to the last graduated mark on the fermenter. I did think that putting less water in might help hence this one was filled with 22.5 litres which is certainly less than 25 but not much less than the recommended 23 litres. Lesson learned. Don't mind as it's the current batch is still very drinkable, so if this one works out should hopefully have a bit more body.

I have a coopers premium Irish stout ordered from brew 2 bottle so will put less than 23 litres into that one.

Thanks

 

[terrym]

I have a coopers premium Irish stout ordered from brew 2 bottle so will put less than 23 litres into that one.

One of my favourite kits. I have one in my store to do soon, even though I rarely do kits now.
I brew to 19 litres, with kit can plus 500g Golden Syrup, 500g Dark DME, 120g dark muscavado sugar and 4 shots of strong coffee (but not instant ). OG about 1.047
There's a thread on this kit and the other Coopers stout here
https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/threads/coopers-irish-stout-review.17818/https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/threads/coopers-original-stout-review.17817/I think the Irish is slightly better.

 

[jayk34]

@terrym thanks.

Was having a look at the Brewers friend calculator trying to understand it. I can see where I enter the fermentables such as syrup, DME, etc but can't seem to add the malt from the actual kit. Was looking to input the coopers devils half ruby porter to try a few things but it's not listed in the fermentables drop down. Is there something I'm missing ?

 

[terrym]

@terrym thanks.

Was having a look at the Brewers friend calculator trying to understand it. I can see where I enter the fermentables such as syrup, DME, etc but can't seem to add the malt from the actual kit. Was looking to input the coopers devils half ruby porter to try a few things but it's not listed in the fermentables drop down. Is there something I'm missing ?

Your kit has 1.7kg of Liquid Malt Extract so just find that in the drop downs and enter that. The quick way is to enter Liquid (in this case) and the app will find it for you.The colour isn't really important because all that does is to allow the app to calculate overall colour and in your case its already pre-determined.
And for LME based kits just enter Extract and make sure you have consistently entered the volume of your wort across all the boxes, upper LHS.
When I mostly did kits I usually found there was always good agreement with the calculated OG and what I measured with my trusty hydrometer
PS Brewers sugar/dextrose is known as Corn Sugar and DME /Spray Malt is known as Dry Malt Extract

 

[jayk34]

Thanks, got it now.