Home Brew Beer is flat - What to do...

Home Brew Beer is flat - What to do...

Posted:
May 17, 2012
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beerbottles.jpg

Home Brew Beer is flat – What to do…

This weekend it will have been 4 weeks since I bottled my Blushing Blonde and Woodfordes Wherry brews. I tried both last week, 3 weeks since bottling, and both home brew beer kits were flat, but still very drinkable.

After I bottled both the kits I straight away stuck the beer down in the shed at the bottom of the garden in the beer bottle boxes I have. The weather hasn’t been great lately (a typical English Spring with lots of rain!) which couldn’t have helped in the secondary fermentation.

The Blushing Blonde went into Coopers PET bottles and the Wherry went into glass swing top bottles, but this shouldn’t affect any secondary fermentation.

After reading some forums, and the instructions of the kits it does recommend to keep the bottles warm for a week or so. So last week I brought both batches up to the house and wrapped them in 2 blankets to keep them warm and put them near a radiator, hopefully, this has done the trick, but we’ll find out this weekend or next.

Another suggestion I found was that the bottles needed to be left longer, I guess I could be too impatient!

If you have any ideas on why my home brew beer is flat then please leave a comment.

Posted:
April 29, 2012
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coopers-scotch-ale

Scotch Ale – Using Coopers Sparkling Ale, Dark Brown Sugar and Amber Malt Extract

I started a Scotch Ale that was recommended on the Coopers home brew website. For this brew I used

  • Coopers Sparkling Ale Premium Selection – from Brew Genie
  • 500 grams Dark Brown Sugar – from Waitrose
  • Amber Malt Extract - from Brew Genie

All 3 items came in in at just over £20, not too bad if it works and makes 40 pints, about 50p a pint.

I added all the items into the clean fermentation bucket with 2 litres of hot water and mixed.

I filled the fermentation bucket up to the 21 litre mark and added the yeast that came with the kit.

Commercial yeast was recommended on the website but the yeast that comes with the kit is good enough for me.

I’ll be bottling this kit 2 weeks, will post some results up then. I have done the Sparkling Ale kit before and followed the instructions on the can, the results weren’t great as it was very flat and not sparkling, it still got drunk though!

Posted:
April 29, 2012
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irish ale using coopers draught ale kit

Irish Ale using Coopers Draught Kit

Today I started a Irish Ale using Coopers Draught Kit. Based on a recipe found on the Coopers website I used:

  • Coopers Draught Beer Kit
  • Beer Enhancer 1
  • 300 grams of Golden Syrup

With all my equipment clean, I added the Draught Beer Kit, Golden Syrup and Brew Enhancer 1 into the Fermenting bucket with 2 litre of hot water and mixed.

I filled the bucket up with 21 litres of cold water and added the yeast that came with the kit, although commercial yeast was recommended.

In 2 weeks I’ll be putting this brew in a keg, I’ll post up the results.

Posted:
April 9, 2012
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Woodforde’s Wherry Bitter

Finally got my Woodforde’s Wherry Bitter home brew kit going. I’ve had it for over a year but not got round to it. At first I wasn’t impressed with the other Woodfordes kits I had done, they were ok.

After putting a few bottles in the shed for a over a year then revisiting them at the end of last year they were excellent. My tip for Woodforde’s kit is to leave the kits for secondary fermentation as long as possible.

Posted:
April 7, 2012
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Blushing Blonde Home Brew

 

  • Coopers Canadian Blonde
  • Coopers Brew Enhancer 1
  • 500g of frozen berries

I’ve added the Canadian Blonde and Brew Enhancer 1 to the fermentation bucket and mixed thoroughly. The sprinkled the yeast on top.

What makes this brew different is that after one day in the bucket I added 500g of frozen berries from Tescos wrapped in a clean cloth and just placed in the bucket.

 

Coopers Canadian BlondeCoopers Brew Enhancer 1

Posted:
March 2, 2012
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Tesco Direct for Home Brewing

The brewing season is back now the weather is better and its just in time as I’m running out of home brew. I’m looking at doing a Coopers Canadian Blonde brew with some frozen berries and some Coopers brew enhancer.

Having got the beer kit and some berries I needed the enhancer and discovered that Tesco Direct does a decent range of home brew stuff including a lot of the Coopers kits and bits that even the local home brew shop doesn’t stock.

With decent priced kits, cheap delivery and Tescos even allowing you to pick it up from your local store for free makes it a useful place to stock up on home brew.

Check out the home brew range at Tescos, its worth knowing about. I hope it isn’t a short lived run of stock!

Posted:
November 16, 2011
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Homebrew – Can i reuse my fermenting bucket immediately after a brew?

Yes! As long as the fermenting bucket has been cleaned completely using steriliser. We use Richies Steriliser that can be picked from Wilkos or the local home brew shop.

fermenting buckets

Posted:
November 16, 2011
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Peach Schnapps Home Brew – Results

Here is the the final result of the Peach Schnapps, the kit made about 6 wine bottles in the end, I half filled some bottles so I could give a couple of bottles to friends.

The taste is very sweet and takes a lot like peach schanpps you could buy in your local supermarket, although not quite as nice and definitely not as alcoholic. I’d certainly do this kit again, but with the range that is produced by Prohibition I’ll try some other kits before coming back to this one.

The last process was fairly straight forward, I cleaned my equipment and used a large bucket -

  • Moved the liquid from the demijohn to the fermenting bucket
  • Added 500 grams of sugar
  • Added the peach schnapps flavouring
  • Syphoned the peach schnapps into the wine bottles

peach schnapps bottled

Posted:
October 28, 2011
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brewer bill coventry

Brewer Bill Coventry

Popped into Coventry City Centre last weekend and made it to the market to see Brewer Bill in Coventry Market. Been there a few times now and its great to pick up brewing bits and bobs including a decent range of beer and wine kits. Its a bit easier to call in on Brewer Bill than travel out to Solihull to see Brew Genie and saves money on postage and packaging if ordering online.

To find Brew Bill it is best to enter Coventry market from the Sports Direct entrance and go into to the market through the doors on the left. Brew Bill is down the first aisle in-front of you.

brewer bill coventry

Posted:
October 10, 2011
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Adding Chitosan – Prohibition Peach Schnapps Part 4

Its been one day since I added the kieselsol and it was time to add the Chitosan to clear the liquid. The demijohn was starting to clear after 24 hours, with the liquid a grey colour and black sediment at the bottom.

The chitosan comes in a packet and you just add it to the demijohn and gently shake it for 20 seconds. Nothing happened but now I need to leave it for 3 days . Will see what happens!

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