Small introduction, and recipe ideas.

[cossie.j]

Hi all. This is my first post and I’ve gained some great knowledge reading through the posts. I’ve been brewing kits for the last 9 months, I’ve had some successful brews and some not so much so!

So I’m after some advise if possible please? I’ve obtained a kit which entails steeping grains, i do have instructions etc (which I’ll ad) below. But after reading up so many other ways of doing things, along with endless amounts of YouTube videos I’m not convinced theses instructions are good to be honest? The recipe consists of..
Coopers innkeepers daughter (sparkling ale) can 1.8 kg
CBW BRIESS sparkling amber pure malt extract
BRIESS caramel Vienna malt 20l crushed grains 500g
2o grams of cascade hops in a form of a Tea bag

the instructions say to steep grains in 3 liters of water @ 66_68 degrees C for 30 mins
Then make up the extract as you would normally, then add the water from the steeped grains to that. However it’s hasn’t said to boil the wort from the grains prior to adding to the beer kit? Should i do this? as the endless video on YouTube I’ve watched have all done that ( boil the wort before adding to the kit).

I’m open to some suggestions on how you guys would go about using this recipe, as this is a whole new process to me. I would certainly appreciate all your feedback, also as for yeast, i have a number of different ones I’ve been hoarding waiting to use and all with good dates on too which consists of
Danstar Nottingham
Danstar Windsor
Safale us-04 and 05
The coopers kit yeast
Again i appreciate any feedback on your thoughts and insight with this, and thanks for taking the time to help another (newbie)ish out
Thanks
James

 

[stevey]

I assume the hop bag is for dry hopping? If so, it's not really necessary to boil your wort. Your extract will have already been boiled and bittering hops added. So basically, you just need to do a mini mash to extract the sugars from the grains. Just follow the instructions, although you could mash for longer if you can maintain the temperature. Use the coopers yeast, it will have been chosen to match the style.
It will probably take longer to ferment than the instructions tell you. Good luck, hopefully it'll be ready for crimbo.

 

[cossie.j]

Thanks for the reply stevey. Yes the hops are for dry hopping, I’m glad you cleared that up for me with regards to not having to boil the wort made from the grains. Regarding the yeast, it obviously has the coopers one which was supplied with the can of extract. However the yeast supplied with the whole recipe was safale us04 and i have no experience with it? So I was kinda hoping that any seasoned brewer would know what yeast would be more suited? But as you say, the coopers yeast will probably be more suited? Thank you

 

[Zephyr259]

Boiling the wort from the mini-mash will ensure than any bugs from the grain have been killed but 30 mins at 63c is enough to pasteurise I believe and you're a bit warmer than that. Giving it a quick boil shouldn't hurt and will probably help you dissolve the extract like on a normal kit.

Yeast wise I'm not sure, haven't done kits in years but the yeast used to be smaller packs and no guarantee of it's health so going with one of your hoarded packs may be wise. Folks seem to like Nottingham but I've never used it. S-04 vs US-05 is mostly a choice of english esters or clean american style. Winsor tends to attenuate lower than others so probably isn't the best plan for this brew.

 

[cossie.j]

Thank you for your reply zephyr. I’ll take all comments on board for sure, I just thought I’d get a good idea of the process before upgrading my brewing equipment and splashing out on all grain items, also having a good understanding of techniques etc to get the best out of what i have. I know for certain though that i will be moving on to all grain in the near future. Again thank you for your input
James