New Hoppy Youngs kits.

[LeeH]

My LHBS gave me these, fresh off the press!

They look great so I'll be having a look at them.

 

[boab42stout]

LOOKS INTERESTING MORE INFO ASAP

 

[GavH]

http://www.brewuk.co.uk/store/beerkits/american-beers.html

 

[Vallyred]

Got sight of these yesterday and having tried many decent APA recently I think I may just get one to try out.

 

[NickW]

I believe these are not 3 kg kits. They contain dextrose to make up the extra fermentables. This is what my LHBS has told me anyhoo :thumb:

 

[chrig]

I'm sure You would need more than 3kg of malt extract to make 40pints of 6.5% beer (as I see at least one of them is), so some extra sugars must have been used to bulk it up? I wouldn't write them off for the alone. :wha:

 

[supersteve]

I believe these are not 3 kg kits. They contain dextrose to make up the extra fermentables. This is what my LHBS has told me anyhoo :thumb:

With a 4KG kit I'd assume I'll get 2 cans and extra fermentables?

 

[kev]

Most big ABV US beers I've paid a lot of money for have dextrose in them.

Wouldn't bother about that tbh.

K

 

[Fuzzy-felt]

Yesterday I received two boxes of each of these kits (bought whilst they were on offer at BrewUK), as they looked interesting. I usually brew double batches, as the band I play in wallop it down like nobody's business.
I've opened up the boxes, and here's what you get:

American Amber Ale
3kg pouch of LME
600g of Brewing Sugar
100g hop pellets (Pacific Jade, Summit, Cluster) for dry-hopping
10g Newcastle Dark Ale yeast
small bag of priming sugar

American Pale Ale
3kg pouch of LME
600g of Brewing Sugar
60g hop pellets (Centennial, Columbus) for dry-hopping
15g US West Coast yeast
small bag of priming sugar

American IPA
3kg pouch of LME
1kg of Brewing Sugar
100g hop pellets (Simcoe, Centennial, Chinook) for dry-hopping
15g US West Coast yeast
small bag of priming sugar

My question would be, has anyone any experience of making these kits, and would there be any suggested modifications? My main concern here is the use of Brewing Sugar - would I be better off substituting it with a similar quantity (perhaps a little more to achieve the intended strength) of DME, or maybe going 50/50 Brewing sugar/DME?

Any thoughts on this, anyone?

Cheers,

Mark.

 

[LoveToBrew]

Just received these kits in, along with a sample bottle of each, which I will be trying tonight. Young's told me that the IPA is a clone of Goose Island IPA, the Pale Ale is a clone of Sierra Nevada Pale but didn't specify what the Amber Ale was based on. They also said that the Amber Ale tasted like Doombar, which looking at the hops used and the ABV, I'm sceptical of, but will find out when I do a proper taste comparison over the weekend.

As for the dextrose, you'll get plenty of body from the 3kg of LME in the pouches, the dextrose is there to bump up the ABV (just as it is in the festival kits). You could add BKE instead, but you'd change the balance of the flavour and body. Plenty of commercial breweries add dextrose to their beers, so don't worry about it.

These are aimed squarely at Festival's market share, even down to using the same boxes, but with a

 

[LoveToBrew]

Don't know why but my answer was truncated.

Anyway, these are aimed at the Festival kits but have a

 

[chrig]

Thanks for the extra info LTB, the forum is a bit flaky at the moment, try to avoid any crazy symbols like pound signs or formatting of any sort. The recent forum update struggles with anything other than text, numbers and basic punctuation :lol:

 

[chrig]

I would be tempted to brew them to the kit instructions with the brewing sugar... most commercial breweries use normal sugar to get the correct abv' and balance.

 

[LoveToBrew]

Thanks for the extra info LTB, the forum is a bit flaky at the moment, try to avoid any crazy symbols like pound signs or formatting of any sort. The recent forum update struggles with anything other than text, numbers and basic punctuation :lol:

Seems my use of the pound sign is what broke it!

What I was trying to say, before I gave up is that the Young's kits are aimed squarely at the Festival kits, they even use the same boxes, but come in two pounds cheaper (on RRP, at least). The instructions are not as good as Festival kits, but far superior to the normal ones you get on the side of a box (yes, I'm looking at you Muntons!).

No hop straining bag, so cold crash or allow extra time for the hops to drop.

I will be trying out the samples tonight, so will report back with my findings in the next few days. If they are as good as the Festival kits, then Young's are onto a winner, although the high ABVs may put some folks off - many of my customers shy away from the Festival Old Suffolk Strong as it is 6%, the Young's American IPA is 6.5% :grin: (Pale Ale is 5.6% and Amber is 5.4%).

 

[LoveToBrew]

With a 4KG kit I'd assume I'll get 2 cans and extra fermentables?

It's a single, 3kg pouch of LME, with a bag of dextrose (weight varies), to make up the ABV.

 

[Fuzzy-felt]

I will be trying out the samples tonight, so will report back with my findings in the next few days.

I'm likely to make my first batch tomorrow of one of these kits. I'm not sure which to do first so if you've got any comments you can give sooner rather than later I'd appreciate it.

Ta,
Mark.

 

[howyoubrewin]

I received the IPA kit in the post yesterday and it is a pretty cool kit actually. Included is 1 bladder of liquid malt 1 bag dextrose 1x 100g hops (simcoe chinook centennial)1 bag priming sugar and 1x 15g west coast american ale yeast. It was easy to brew up and is currently in day 2 of fermentation. The instructions suggest 10 days in primary with the hop addition going in on day 8 at latest. Two of the hops included are used in my favourite beer, punk ipa so i am keen to try this. If you are interested in this kit i will do a little brew post from now up to tasting. Stay tuned folks. Cheers!

 

[LoveToBrew]

I'm likely to make my first batch tomorrow of one of these kits. I'm not sure which to do first so if you've got any comments you can give sooner rather than later I'd appreciate it.

Ta,
Mark.

So far I've tried the IPA and the Amber. Don't know what the chap at Young's has been drinking, but the Amber ale is nothing like Doombar, and indeed, why would it be, if it's an American ale? (Festival Father Hook is more like Doombar, IMO).

The Amber is very pleasant, good bitterness, pine & pink grapefruit aroma, some sweetness. The IPA is supposedly a clone of Goose Island IPA, but uses quite different hops. It's similar, but not the same. Most of you probably won't be familiar with Bristol Beer Factory's Southville hop, but this is the closest kit to that style. Massive hop aroma, grapefruit, mandarin and lime aroma, with a very dry astringent bitterness, which sounds horrible, but works very well and I love it! This is a very hop-forward kit and compares very favorably with Festival's Razorback, although somewhat stronger on the ABV front.

I'll be trying the Pale ale tomorrow, so will post again after that, but for now, out of the Amber and IPA, the IPA gets my vote.

 

[Fuzzy-felt]

Good stuff. I look forward to your comments on the APA later on.

 

[LeeH]

These sound great. Thanks for the reviews.