Somebeerguy - Reviews
Coopers Wheat Beer | September 6th 2016 | |
A great kitThis is the new Preacher's Hefe wheat kit (all older reviews from 2015 and back fall out of this category) new kit has Belgian Wheat style yeast, old kit was American style wheat (ale yeast, no esters)
I've done probably around 8-10 of these kits now, all slightly different. Lately I've been adding too much seed (20-30g crushed) and it's been too overpowering, to the point where it merges with the yeast to form a ‘sewerage’ type taste and aroma, n that aint' no good.. the sewerage dies off over time and then you just get a coriander seed beer. I've also tried brewing with honey, no different in taste whatsoever because it's so highly fermentable, honey malt would be the go.
I've stopped adding peel and settled on 10g coriander seed, 15g pride of Ringwood (very short boil) a bit of Hallertau or similar (again, very short boil) and sometimes some specialty ‘pale ale’ fruity aroma hops (all thrown in to the fermenter) but to tell you the truth I can never even detect these. They have massive effects on ales I brew with clean ale or lager yeast, but the Belgian style yeast provided within the kit is so good these are undetectable. I always use 1.5kg wheat malt extract and the Pride of Ringwood helps bring the final product up to ‘Redback’ clone territory. Another favorite of mine. Always brewed under 22 degrees but finally have one in the fridge at 24 so see if I can detect more banana this batch
I feel you can quite easily make a Hoegaarden clone from the kit also. It's versatile, it's simple, choice of yeast is excellent, it's been rated #1 at beer comps over all grain, it's a great piece of kit
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Coopers Australian Pale Ale | September 6th 2016 | |
As good as the real thingAlways a good tasting kit no matter what. I prefer to use a BE2 (slightly lower fg over all malt and the final product has a more attractive, lighter colour as most would expect from a draught tap beer, making styles too dark is a mistake most brewers make. Throw an additional couple hundred gms of malt in too for a higher abv) control your temperature, brew it as-is or dry hop with some specialty hops you'll have a beer just as good as a Little Creatures or Fat Yak. I have some US-05 on hand but have never used it with this kit because I fear it might not be as good. That's saying something. It's an excellent base for alot of 'test trial' hamster beers, as is the Coopers Mexican cerveza kit. I use that alot too if I'm looking for a wort without the bitterness ibu. The Mexican kit has about the same bitterness as a VB CUB style draught beer |
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Coopers European Lager | September 6th 2016 | |
Damn good kit
MemberOnlineRegistered: 2016-03-12Posts: 180
Well, it's been a while now but I feel compelled to come back with the results of my latest EU lager. As previously written I wasn't looking forward to brewing another after my last all malt attempt. So I took my learning from that to l completely experiment on a new brew I thought might work. And it did!
This time I used the kit and kit yeast, DRY ENZYME (yes, I hear those Internet cowboys screaming now..) 300g LLME and 700g dextrose to 25l. I used the dex because last attempt saw what I'd call a ‘nut brown’ ale appearance, which was totally off for the style. Finish seemed to me too thick, aroma too ‘strong’ and tasting notes just too strong and dark for an EU lager.
This brew was brewed @ 13 degrees for 4 weeks and has been bottled for 5 days (yea, bit short of the 3 months; I know!) I tried a 3 month old I'd kept just a few weeks ago and it did taste better than I remember so there's definitely something to it. But tasting notes so far are: Great color and clarity, fantastic ‘look’ upon opening and drinking (head looks like a store bought beer with beautiful tiny bubbles making a nice ‘froth’ not the slightly larger bubbles forming head I see brewing most other beers, nose is ‘fresh’ much what you'd expect of a store bought lager, taste? Oh my… wow is all I can say. This one went down quicker than anything I've ever made before, left me tounging for another! But it's only 11am, soooo.. mouthfeel at 1.002fg?.. bloody excellent, I'd never guess in a million years the beer finished that dry without proof of hydro. I'm off to order more enzyme and a few more cans! Happy brewing EDIT, Just been through my brewing notes and I actually used 500g brew sugar, not 700g dex. With figures lile that I'd say everything fermented out to 100% attenuation bar the malto (Coopers brew sugar has maltodextrin mixed in) SG/OG was 1.040 so 5.4% in the bottle Cheers |