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What are you drinking in 2023?


Aussiekraut

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14 minutes ago, Classic Brewing Co said:

Friday arvo at Phil's Bar & Grill, Annie from next door who doesn't drink beer likes my beer, so we are having a Pale Ale, been in the keg 8 days, she is a good old stick & has a heart of gold but after a few she tends to go on a bit about money & stuff. I don't really care as it is nice to have neighbours who you can talk to & have a beer with.

Cheers.

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Nice looking Beer 🙂

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Side by Side Taste Test - Coopers Pale Ale versus my Coopers Pale Ale.

IMG_3561.JPG.24296d84773a847fd7f7f446460ff0b8.JPG

Mine:

  • Aromas of banana with underlying citrus.
  • Malty flavour.  Smooth bitterness (smoother than the taste-test with the real Coops Pale Ale).
  • Banana-ery yeast flavour on par with the real CPA.

The main difference is the bitterness.  I was aiming for 26 IBU as per the real CPA.  However, maybe my diluting the brew by another litre might have brought my IBU's down to 23. Mine came out 5.3% too.  That threw the BU:GU ratio from 0.57 to 0.48.  That would have helped "smooth" mine out.  Otherwise quite close.

The glass from the can was very cloudy.  Mine from a keg was fairly clear, with a hint of haze. Good carbonation in both. Head retention is not great but not bad.  Small circle of foam in the middle of the glass for the whole time.  No lacing on the glasses to speak of.

 

 

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3 hours ago, Classic Brewing Co said:

Looks pretty good Shamus, did you use any other hop than POR?

No Phil.  Just PoR. I forgot to include a link to the recipe.  Go here if you want to check it out.  Next time I will probably add more PoR to the 60 minute boil to hopefully get a brighter bitterness.  That should be closer to the commercial COPA.  Plus I will do a whirlpool addition of PoR at 80C to get more citrus aromas that I notice in the real COPA. Also, getting my volumes and gravities right will help.

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First pic share of a brew - Its a Cooper’s Mexican Cerveza.

Reliable little recipe. I used the supplied yeast. 
Good carbonation after 4 weeks in the bottle ( I tried them at the 2 week mark and left them as I had Christmas beers in the fridge). Seems to have improved.

Definitely the Cerveza (Corona) taste and colour, although slightly darker. Good carbonation. Good mouth feel. Head retention was a bit disappointing, but I don’t think This style of beer is known for that. Surpringly clearer than I’d expected. Very slight and sweet banana aftertaste sort of gives it away as a home brew, but still, I’m pleased with this as a summer drink and 2 cartons for less than the price of one. 


I will do this one again, but I’ll use a different yeast maybe and leave it in the fermenter a little longer to experiment the differences ( I bottled on the 8th day).

Now I’ll go back to pondering why nobody has thought of 10 over cricket? 1010 I would call it. Much quicker game.

E1AE3B02-5286-443F-B880-4670784DD24F.jpeg

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On 1/6/2023 at 6:43 PM, Classic Brewing Co said:

Cheers it is nice, this is the one I didn't force carb as I don't like 'ice cream' heads.

If you are getting 'ice cream heads' then you are not doing the process correctly I am afraid. It is really just about how much CO2 you are getting into solution, whether you do that fast, slow or somewhere in between really does not make any difference. What makes a difference is how much CO2 you end up with in solution. If you have too much head then you have too much CO2 in solution - you applied too much CO2 to the beer.

Any form of carbonation is "force" carbing and really has nothing to do with the speed or pressure that you use, if you are using any pressure then you are forcing the CO2 into solution. Using a lower pressure over a longer time may allow you to have better control of the dissolved CO2, or it may not.

Everyone has differing experiences of carbing beer in a keg and will advocate different regimes, but in the end you just want a regime that works with you. 40psi at 20 hours works for a lot of people, the so-called 40/20 rule.

My 2 cents worth🤩

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2 hours ago, Mackbrew said:

First pic share of a brew - Its a Cooper’s Mexican Cerveza.

Reliable little recipe. I used the supplied yeast. 
Good carbonation after 4 weeks in the bottle ( I tried them at the 2 week mark and left them as I had Christmas beers in the fridge). Seems to have improved.

Definitely the Cerveza (Corona) taste and colour, although slightly darker. Good carbonation. Good mouth feel. Head retention was a bit disappointing, but I don’t think This style of beer is known for that. Surpringly clearer than I’d expected. Very slight and sweet banana aftertaste sort of gives it away as a home brew, but still, I’m pleased with this as a summer drink and 2 cartons for less than the price of one. 


I will do this one again, but I’ll use a different yeast maybe and leave it in the fermenter a little longer to experiment the differences ( I bottled on the 8th day).

Now I’ll go back to pondering why nobody has thought of 10 over cricket? 1010 I would call it. Much quicker game.

E1AE3B02-5286-443F-B880-4670784DD24F.jpeg

Looks good but yeah, the head is a little sad.

You could use some wheat malt to help with the head formation and retention. See if you can get your hands on a bag of dried wheat malt or go for a Coopers can of liquid wheat malt. Just use something like 250g in your beer (about 400ml liquid malt) and reduce the BE you used by about 250g. That should help. 

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16 minutes ago, Aussiekraut said:

Looks good but yeah, the head is a little sad.

You could use some wheat malt to help with the head formation and retention. See if you can get your hands on a bag of dried wheat malt or go for a Coopers can of liquid wheat malt. Just use something like 250g in your beer (about 400ml liquid malt) and reduce the BE you used by about 250g. That should help. 


Aww, thanks very much! I will give it a go. 
Getting heaps out of this forum. Cheers all.

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1 hour ago, kmar92 said:

If you are getting 'ice cream heads' then you are not doing the process correctly I am afraid. It is really just about how much CO2 you are getting into solution, whether you do that fast, slow or somewhere in between really does not make any difference. What makes a difference is how much CO2 you end up with in solution. If you have too much head then you have too much CO2 in solution - you applied too much CO2 to the beer.

Any form of carbonation is "force" carbing and really has nothing to do with the speed or pressure that you use, if you are using any pressure then you are forcing the CO2 into solution. Using a lower pressure over a longer time may allow you to have better control of the dissolved CO2, or it may not.

Everyone has differing experiences of carbing beer in a keg and will advocate different regimes, but in the end you just want a regime that works with you. 40psi at 20 hours works for a lot of people, the so-called 40/20 rule.

My 2 cents worth🤩

Mate, thank you for your input, I appreciate it, but I have found now the process I use now works fine.

I am happy with the pour even if at times it may be more vigorous it comes down to an acceptable beer.

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Looks like I forgot to report the outcome with this Wheat Beer I did a while ago.

This was from one of the bottles I did.  I seem to recall that the kegged version had better foam and retention.  This bottled version had none.

  • Banana notes from the yeast.
  • Malty bready flavour with very mild bitterness.
  • Still not a bad beer. 

IMG_3564.JPG.982c3ab7807188f1c703b774649bba51.JPG

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I did this side-by-side taste test last night.  One was the Sierra Nevada I did a little while ago (3 months).  The other was a Columbus Pale Ale from even longer back (5 months).  The Sierra Nevada is essentially a Cascade Pale Ale, so I was interested to compare the two.  Both of these were from bottles.

Columbus:

  • Most of the aroma is gone
  • Bitterness is low
  • Some sweet flavour still remains or has become more prominent

Cascade (Sierra Nevada Pale Ale):

  • Citrus aromas remains
  • Moderate bitterness
  • This one seems darker than the earlier one I reviewed in October

IMG_3563.JPG.13fe3e10edd5b0dbd0eb876f4847043a.JPG

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18 minutes ago, iBooz2 said:

@Shamus O'Sean was that the COPA recipe?  I am hanging to get one or two of those back in my kegs.  Just gotta get some more grain.

Hey Boozer, My recipe is here.  It is largely based on yours, just upsized to a larger batch.

I am planning to do this one again next weekend.  However this time I will use 

  • 23g of PoR (11% AA) for 60 minutes for 23.5 IBU; and
  • 20g of PoR (11% AA) as an aroma addition for 20 minutes once I get temp to 80°C. Supposedly for another 2.8 IBU
  • 26 IBU total

Also going with a little less malt to hopefully get a 4.5% ABV beer.

Mash profile the same.  Using Coopers Commercial Ale yeast I will harvest from the trub of a Sparkling Ale I will be kegging tomorrow.

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Old Perc Clone, with Windsor yeast. Not as partial to this as I was to my first attempt. Maybe needs another few months. Hope it picks up a bit - I have a few bottles left but mainly a cornie waiting patiently 

Can’t see anything, thought I should use the pewter for once, and it seems appropriate in front of the fire 🔥 

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1 minute ago, Mickep said:

Looks great Phil.

Thanks Mick, I am very happy with it, it has a nice tight head on it thanks to the wonders of CO2 unlike the ice cream heads you get from bottles. It certainly doesn't taste like homebrew & everyone loves it; it is very hard to achieve this result with bottling but pretty soon I will be buying some Coopers Malts & fire up Mr. Brew Zilla, so watch this space. 🤭

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9 hours ago, stquinto said:

Old Perc Clone, with Windsor yeast.

I suspect that Cornie will be great @stquinto Sainter  : )

For mine I used the below dry yeast... Lally London Ale Yeast... but I cannot say whether it reflects the real TOP or not... but was just very happy with the beer outcome and note it does allow a tiny bit of residual sweetness... 

LalBrew London does not utilize the sugar maltotriose (a molecule composed of 3 glucose units).
Maltotriose is present in wort in an average 10-15% of all malt worts. The result will be fuller  body and residual sweetness in beer.

LALBREW LONDON™

LalBrew London™ is a true English ale strain selected for its ability to produce authentic, traditional UK beer styles. Fermentation performance is fast and consistent producing moderate esters and lower attenuation due to an inability to metabolize maltotriose. LalBrew London™ is one of the original Heritage Strains selected from the Lallemand Yeast Culture Collection when Lallemand Brewing was founded in 1992. A more subdued yeast character allows the flavors and aromas of malt and hops to shine through in styles such as Extra Special Bitter Pale Ale, Bitter and Mild.

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31 minutes ago, Greenyinthewestofsydney said:

Kviek Sour. Galaxy hopped. First taste and its a step above the other 2 times I have done this beer. The extra hops has really made a difference. For some reason the head also holds nicely as well. The other times it disappeared quite quickly. Like a sour passiona. Won't last long this one.

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Hey Greeny, How did you get the sour into this one?  Head retention in a sour is challenging.

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Had a few days off the Grogs with the thankful support of my festive Brew Colleagues and concurrently did some fasting.... 

so this AG Dubbya Pilly tasted pretty good coming back on: 

Just the routine suspects re malts and hops but lotsa Wey Carapils : )

image.thumb.png.64c08824a5974497688d84b0e4abf005.png 

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2 hours ago, Shamus O'Sean said:

Hey Greeny, How did you get the sour into this one?  Head retention in a sour is challenging.

The sour is a co pitch of imperial "kvieking" and 8 IBS tablets which is lacto plantarum. Fermented at 35c which is a great temp for both kviek and lacto. The initial stages of the ferment are unhopped as plantarum won't work with hops. After 48 hours I stop the lacto with a stovetop hop addition. Works a treat. I also use a dedicated keg as the lacto is still alive in this brew. Not killed like a kettle sour.

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