Red Ale Additives?

I'm fairly new at this home brewing deal but I'm catching on quick and I have a ton of ideas... BUT, I just bought a Red Ale Brewer's Best Red Ale Kit and it has been in for about 5 days. My dilemma is that I want it to have more character than it has thus far... and I'm wondering if there is anything that I could throw in the Secondary to give it a little more... creativity?!

My thoughts thus far were:
dry hopping (but I already have a 90 minute IPA)
honey?
raspberry preserves (or something)

any suggestions?

Remember that Honey is 98% fermentable, so unless your beer is super alcoholic the yeast will finish that off in no time and leave little honey flavor.

Post the recipe so we can give you some more hints.

Wait and see. I bet it develops the flavor you're looking for.

dlaramie08 said:

Wait and see. I bet it develops the flavor you're looking for.

Click to expand...

+1 A good red takes weeks, not days. Mine was OK at 3 weeks but at 5 months is great. Learn patience.

I would wait and see, too. The kit would have been made to be balanced, and considering you're new at the game, get the feel for brewing a batch or few batches until you are comfortable in slightly modifying things.

In the early stages, a mediocre beer is just that, but will mature with some time in the primary and then in the bottles into something delicious.

Trust me on this one.

B

I'd leave it alone. I'm not one to brew to style either, but reds aren't supposed to have much hop aroma. Dry hopping might throw off the style, but do as you please!

Red hots! A friend told me that a friend of his racked onto them for a fall brew of some sort. They added a cinnamon flavor and some additional sugar.

But really, leave it alone for now--OR at bottling time, rack a gallon or so into a smaller container with a balloon airlock and experiment with that--you won't lose much and you'll be able to compare side-by-side to see the effect of what you did.

Thank you everyone for your input. I think for this batch I'll leave it be and let the kit do its thing.


@Tennesseean 87:
btw... what is a "balloon airlock"?

also, let me know how your apfelwein turns out, sounds good.