Amber ..... I hope

My older brother has been brewing beer for a while and the hobby has gotten my interest recently. So, today I decided to start my first batch. I like amber beers so that is what I have attempted to make.

I bought a basic plastic bucket starter kit from the local brewing shop. The following are the ingredients I used. Feel free to laugh at me as I am an obvious noob.

1 can munton's amber liquid extract already hopped (3.3 pounds)
2 pounds plain light malt extract powder
5.5 pounds corn sugar
1 teaspoon gypsum
1 teaspoon irish moss
1 packet of lager yeast
6 galons of water

original gravity at 74 degrees is 1.083

not sure how it is going to turn out, but I'm hoping for the best.

I guess it's cold enough there to ferment a lager in a basement, but this will take a long time to ferment. That combination of fermentables won't be anything like an amber though.

Welcome to the obsession.

I'm not real wild about your recipe, but hey, it's going to be beer! I would suggest for your next batch looking around for some recipes (we have a recipe database on the site) and post your recipe for critiquing before you make it!

I would be concerned about a beer with 5 pounds of malt and 5 pounds of corn sugar. You've got more sugar than malt in there. (And no hops except the pre-hopped extract- beer needs some hops!)

I would get rid of the corn sugar all together and buy some hops. Pre-hopped extract tends to not be to good with bitterness. Since this is your first brew I would do an ale as well. So here is a proposed shopping list if you have a LHBS or if you want to wait for a shipment.

1 can munton's amber liquid extract already hopped (3.3 pounds)
2 pounds plain light malt extract powder
Double this to 4#s
1/8# Chocolate Malt
1/2# Crystal 20L
Buy precrushed and place together in muslim bag
Bring 1 Qt water to near boil shut off flame
and place muslim bag with grain in water and steep
for 30 min
3/4 oz of Perle (7.7%AA)
add to begining boil (60min addition)
3/4 oz Williamete (4.5%AA)
add at 15min left in boil

1 teaspoon gypsum
1 teaspoon irish moss
1 packet of lager yeast
Replace this with 1 pkt dry yeast (SfAle 05)

5.5 gallons of water (boil volume 3.5 gallons) Top off to 5.5 gallons.

Or just use what you have and brew. DWHAHB! Welcome to the club.

- WW

Scrapped it and am starting over.

I'd buy a pre-made ingredient kit from your lhbs or an online retailer. These tyipcally come with unhopped extract, hops, and specialty grains for steeping. The end result will be much better then using hopped extract and sugar.