What spraymalt (DME) colour to use?

[JT101]

Hi everyone

I have one of those beer kits from wilkinsons for a dark velvet stout.

The instruction booklet suggests using brewing sugar or light spray malt (DME) for a maltier flavour. I really like my beers dark, sweet and malty e.g. London Porter, or dark trappist beet such as Blue Chimay. I discovered that spray malt comes in light, medium, dark and extra dark.

Wilkinsons only sell the light spray malt, but it is very convenient for me to get to, and is very cheap so that is a big plus. All the other colours I have to order from internet or travel miles.

So my question is, what difference will it make to the beer using light vs extra dark in terms of colour, taste etc? If it isn't much of a difference I'll use the light.

Cheers

 

[Bubblehead08]

I can't really comment on difference light spray malt would make to this kit but I made one up last year using 1k dark spray malt, 500g demerera sugar and some fresh coffee (made wih cold water to prevent bitterness) - got to say that it turned out much better than I had hoped. Really dark with deep flavour and a taste of coffee coming through afterwards.

I got my spray malt from one of the forum sponsors - although the delivery is quite pricey, the products are very well priced so I just ordered a load of stuff.

 

[rpt]

I'd just use what you have or can easily get. If I had a choice I'd use the dark malt but I doubt it would matter much.

 

[GavH]

Coopers recently recommended to me (via Twitter) the use of Amber LME in place of the Dark. I ended up using the Light instead. It's been a week now in the FV and my hydrometer jar samples are every bit as dark as you'd expect of a stout but smelling absolutely lovely!

 

[MyQul]

Like yourself I like my dark beers. One of the last coopers kits i did before recently going BIAB was the stout. I've done the coopers stout an number of times with coopers brew enhancers, medium DME and the last time I did it was with 1kg of dark dme. I feel it really makes a difference. The colour is the same but you get a more maltier task and it tasted more "stouty" with the dark dme. However using any of the DME's from extra light to extra dark is fine use in a stout kit because its so dark (I once put dark DME in the coopers aussie pale ale to see what would happen). So if cost is a consideration just use the wilko light.