Many many questions! Ginger Beer / Mex Cerveza / What have I done / LDM and Dextrose.

[Jimmy78]

Hi Guys

 

I have done about 10 brews now and all have been varying degrees of drinkable.. I have a few questions though.

 

1. Ginger Beer

I have done 2 ginger beers to the recipe of 1 kg of raw sugar.. I found this far to sweet for my liking and a bit light on the old alcohol factor. What can i do to reduce the sweetness, boost the ginger flavour and increase the alcohol content?

 

2. Mexican Cerveza

I have found that after secondary fermentation this does not have as much carbonation as other beers, anyone else experienced this?

 

3. I have a draught that has been bottled for just over 2 weeks now. There is no carbonation present in any of them and the beer still tastes like it hasn't started its second fermentation. It was a Draught kit with 1kg of brewing sugar.. Any sugestions?

 

4. Righto I have been reading that I am better off using Light Dry Malt and dextrose instead of the brew enhancers.. How the hell do I work out how much of each to put into a brew? The coopers LDM comes in 500gm lots, should I then add 500gm of dextrose? How is it best to work out the quantities?

 

I hope I haven't wacked down to many questions and look forward to any advise.. You have all been awesome in your other answers.

 

Thanks

 

Jim.

[Guest]

4: LDME does not make for better carbonation.. just better beer... Replace the 'enhancer' with same weight of LDME.. get to a brewshop and start to buy int in bulk, much cheaper mate... I tried to never get above about 200-300g DEX in any brew without a good reason.. keep to kilo for kilo until you work out why/what else you should be doing to improve.

 

Never brewed a cervessa... never brewed a Ginger beer (bought it just never brewed it)

 

re the draught with no carb... fk kn ows.. are you sure you added priming sugar? ahve you opened one? what temp have they been at?

 

erm....

[Jimmy78]

I'm confused as on the back of the coopers packet of LDM it says that the 500gm gives 3.8% does that mean that 1kg of LDM gives 7.6% ?!?!. Or should I go with 500gm and then 200 - 300 of Dextrose?

 

Draught... yeah opened one tonight to taste (been in bottle for 2 weeks) Horrible! like it tasted before I bottled it (definately added 2 carb drops to each bottle too). I have made this recipe twice before and they both worked out fine.. this one is just different.. I suppose that I should just leave it and see in another week or 2.

[GregT5]

Jim, I have only done the ginger beer as a non alco version so I am not much help to your there.

 

I haven't done a Mex Cervesa yet, but am planning on doing one of Chad's recipes & making it into a ginger beer shortly.

 

I have used a Draught can a few times & like the brews it has produced. I use a kilo of LDM & have usually dry hopped them with 25g of cascade hops. There have been no problems with carbonation. I used to keep them in the freezer section of my brew fridge with a light in a terracotta pot with the temp controller set at 19 degrees & they usually carbed up in 7-10 days in PET bottles.

 

Where & at what temp have you been storing them? Also what did you use to prime them - carb drops or did you bulk prime?

[Hairy]

I'm confused as on the back of the coopers packet of LDM it says that the 500gm gives 3.8% does that mean that 1kg of LDM gives 7.6% ?!?!. Or should I go with 500gm and then 200 - 300 of Dextrose?

Jimmy, the quoted ABV of 3.8% is for the kit (eg. Draught) and 500g of LDM. So you will only get 7.6% if you double the kit and LDM.

 

The kit plus 1kg LDM in 23 litres will give you around 4.6% ABV.

 

If you are after a lightish bodied beer then 500g of LDM and 200g of dextrose will be fine. It will give you an ABV of around 4.3%.

 

Adding another 500g LDM to that mix will beef up the beer a bit and give you an ABV of around 5.1%.

 

Hope this helps.

 

It will be good when Coopers bring out their Brew Enhancer 3 boxes containing 750g LDM and 250g dextrose. This is a good mix for K&K brewers.

[LordEoin]

Ooh, i love 20questions.

Pardon me if some of the answers are conflicing or redundant, I didn't read any previous response so that I could read and answer independantly.

 

1. Ginger Beer

Reduce the sweetness: This is (I think) the only kit with artificial sweetener and it is very hard to mask. You can try overwhelming the sweetness with other flavor, but I've not found anything I like.

boost the ginger flavour: add more giner. Grate a load of it, skind and all, chuck it into a liter of boiling water for a couple of minutes and dump the lot (or strain if you wanna) into the FV. Increase the alcohol content: add more fermentables.

 

2. Mexican Cerveza

Actually yes, but i think that it's probably more to do with it having far less bitterness and just tasting like its not as fizzy.

 

3. no carbonation

Did you forget to prime them? Are they warm enough?

Give them a shake and leave them somewhere warm and see what happens.

 

4. BE + DME

1:1 DME/dex is not a good balance in my opnion. 4:1 is better.

1kg DME + 250g dextrose is my favorite basic addition, you get the benefit of the DME with the ABV boost of some dex. Match the darkness of the LDM to your beer.

To replace the BE2 matodextrine for body/head, I generally use 300g carapils, and often use wheat malt for half of the kilo of malt.

 

edit:

5 - 500gm gives 3.8%?

You're forgetting the 1.7kilos of concentrated malt extract in the can.

 

edit:

Everything everyone else said is true too. FACT!

on

[ExpatSthAussie]

Hey Jimmy,

I might be able to shed some light on your perils..(See how we go)

1. Ginger beer - Muddy posted this recipie some time ago, noting that he might like to go a bit sweeter next time.Might suit your palate.

 

Ginger Beer

 

Cooper\u2019s Ginger Beer kit

500gms DME

1kg dextrose

500g Raw sugar

250g Ginger

1 cinnamon stick

10 cloves

2 lemons (Juice & Zest)

 

Mince Ginger, zest and squeeze lemons. Put ginger, lemon juice and zest, cinnamon and cloves in a few litres of water and boil for an hour. Mix in fermentables at end and strain into fermenter. Add Ginger beer kit and top up to 19L with water. Pitch Yeast.

 

I came in just over 5.5% I think.

2.Cerveza - I have only brewed 1 Batch, yes it doesn't seem to be tooo gasey, just like Corona so you can slam it down with a lime wedge without the bloat..

3.Your poor ol Draught..I'm with the other gents. Could be just a matter of low conditioning temps. ( Hope)

4.I have a method from an old indian that works well based on a standard measuring cup @125g this is my basic combination for most of my brews....

 

3 Cups@375g Dex

3 Cups@375g LDM

2 Cups@250g Maltodextrin (Dried Corn Syrup)

Total 1000g (1Kg)

Blend them well before adding to FV.

 

Can change the ratios if you like to suit the style of beer.eg 4 cups LDM,2 cups Dex etc...

Handy if you havn't got scales. Others might not agree with this method but it works on the principles of K.I.S.S.

Fact.

Hope this helps..AdamN [joyful]

 

[Canadian Eh!L]

Jim, I have only done the ginger beer as a non alco version so I am not much help to your there.

 

I haven't done a Mex Cervesa yet, but am planning on doing one of Chad's recipes & making it into a ginger beer shortly.

 

I have used a Draught can a few times & like the brews it has produced. I use a kilo of LDM & have usually dry hopped them with 25g of cascade hops. There have been no problems with carbonation. I used to keep them in the freezer section of my brew fridge with a light in a terracotta pot with the temp controller set at 19 degrees & they usually carbed up in 7-10 days in PET bottles.

 

Where & at what temp have you been storing them? Also what did you use to prime them - carb drops or did you bulk prime?

 

Hey Greg,

 

I had my first sample of my latest Ginger Beer after a week being bottled. I had two back to back just to see if all the bottles were coming a long so well[biggrin] . It's fresh and crisp. Light amber and very clear. I get the essence of honey on the nose and the palete. If I was to critic it I would say it sould be done to 23-24L instead of 25L.

 

The Draught recipe you describe with the OS Draught can, 1kg Dme and a dry hop of 25g Cascade is one of my all time fav's! I've tried it with a few different yeasts (ie Coop's, us-05, notto) they all work well. In fact I think the Cooper's Ale yeast works best![sideways]

[GregT5]

Chad, thanx for the heads up with the ginger beer, I will make the mods when I get to brewing it (in 3 brews time).

 

I have made a few brews of the Draught & shamelessly taken the accolades from my mates for a great easy drinking beer. Unfortunately I have then admitted that the recipe is a knockoff.[crying] ...but I'm still pretty happy how a simple recipe like that turns out.