Dry, Liquid, or both

My extract kit directions tell me to use the liquid and/or the dry extract....Does it hurt to use both or just the liquid? It was the brewers best english brown ale kit.

Doesn't matter. They are really the same thing. The difference will be how much you use. If your recipe calls for 4 lbs of dry you would need to use 5 lbs of Liquid to get the same amount. I would choose one or the other just for simplicity sake but you can use both.

Don't take my math for an exact science its just a rough estimate.

From my interpretation, he has an ingredient kit, not just a recipe. Use whatever it came with. The instructions were probably written so they could be used for any kit. If they included liquid and dry, it's because you need to use both, not to let you pick one and let the other go unused.

It was a recipe and had 3.3 pounds of LME and 2 pounds of DME. The video I watched said you could use either and the directions has and/or init. it doesn't say use both for sure...It Measured good with the hydrometer at the beginning and after 10 days is where it needs to be. It smells and looks like what it is supposed to so I am not to worried (ok, a little).

They wouldn't include ingredients that are not intended to be used.

The recipe(s) that came with my first kit were very confusing. One said just use the can. Another said use the can plus DME. A third said use the can plus sugar. I didn't know what to do!

What I did was read up a bit, and used everything...

The can (3.3 lbs of liquid extract) was hopped, so I knew I had to use it. It came with 2 pounds of DME and about 4 lb of sugar. I used the whole 2 lb of DME and a pound of sugar.

If you just use the can, you will get beer. But it will be very weak. Not much there for the yeast to turn into alcohol. If you add cane sugar, it will be stronger, but very dry. Cane sugar ferments all the way out, giving alcohol but not much in the way of flavor. Malt adds to the overall taste and texture of the beer (the "mouthfeel"), as well as alcohol content. Any of these will make beer - it just depends on what you want to drink!

Download a free copy of beersmith and you can play around with changing stuff around. Its fun, and cheap if you decide you like it.

BTW - I'm drinking a bottle of my first every batch right now, and it came out OK

But the beer looks nice and dark..It measures good. I am just upset that if i was supposed to use it, why did it say and/or...

It was giving you "alternatives". As I said - all of them will give beer, just different beers.

BTW - Did you use both the can and the DME, or just the can?

billk911 said:

But the beer looks nice and dark..It measures good. I am just upset that if i was supposed to use it, why did it say and/or...

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taylornate said:

The instructions were probably written so they could be used for any kit.

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Did you read my post?

My main question is, is this going to be a good tasting batch or is this a lost batch. I am not really worried about alcohol content cause if I wanted to just get drunk i could go buy some cheap beer. It seems that people differ on here if I should have used both. Like I said, I watched a video and they said that i get the option on which to use. If the alcohol content was going to be low, would't the starting and ending gravity be lower to?

I didn't see the same video, but I bet the video gives you options as to what type of ingredients to purchase. You can buy dry malt or liquid malt, pellet hops or whole hops, for example.

When you buy a kit, though, the ingredients are already there. I bought the same kit a few years ago, and the instructions are very clear. You use all the extract, not choose between them. If you followed the instructions in the Brewer's Best kit, then the beer will come out just as the kit intended.

From what I can tell Brewers Best kit instructions are rather generic. They seem as if they are basic instructions for a type of brew as opposed to being specific to the ingredients provided in the kits. There is NO harm in mixing LME and DME. But for argument sake you decided to take the 'or' part of the 'and/or' literally and use decided to use just the 3.3 lbs of LME. Think about that for a minute. Have you ever seen any recipe that calls for such a tiny amount of LME as the only means of fermentables for a 5 gallon batch? Generally speaking you're going to want a minimum of 6lbs of LME or a min of 5lbs of DME (session beers could be less of course).

Use all of the ingredients that came with the kit.

In addition, if you're curious about what you're going to get use one of those beer software products to figure out what the ingredients will get you. This online one isn't as good some others but...its free: Beer Calculus . homebrew recipe calculator. Go ahead and plug the kit's ingredients in there and see what you get. Then try to use only the LME in the online recipe. You'll notice how weak (in terms of ABV) the brew would be.

Will it taste ok though?

Bill. I made that same kit and am currently in the process of drinking it. For what it's worth, it was the second kit I brewed. The instructions are pretty much generic instructions. I imagine if you opened another Brewer's Best kit, you'd find the same instructions. For comparison sake, I had an original specific gravity reading of 1.048 and a final of 1.012. It tastes great and I used all the ingredients included in the kit. Does this help?

billk911 said:

It seems that people differ on here if I should have used both.

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You ask 1,000 brewers, 999 will say to use both.

billk911 said:

If the alcohol content was going to be low, would't the starting and ending gravity be lower to?

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Yes. Did you take a starting OG? What was it?

there is no such thing as "lost batch" here on HBT, to answer your first question.

"If the alcohol content was going to be low, would't the starting and ending gravity be lower to?" Not true, OG-FG*131 is a plain way to figure out your alcohol. It is a ratio, say your OG was 1.070 and FG 1.050 you are going to have a very low ABV with high gravities, not that this is likely but hopefully you get my point

hopsalot said:

there is no such thing as "lost batch" here on HBT, to answer your first question.

"If the alcohol content was going to be low, would't the starting and ending gravity be lower to?" Not true, OG-FG*131 is a plain way to figure out your alcohol. It is a ratio, say your OG was 1.070 and FG 1.050 you are going to have a very low ABV with high gravities, not that this is likely but hopefully you get my point

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Well, technically, that formula is based on the difference, not the ratio.

My starting gravity was low (1.022) I was told that was because I didn't stir it up enough and got just a top water reading. i see the reason now why it was low. It looks good and smells good so I am hoping it will taste good. I am not too concerned about the amount of alcohol. I am just hoping for the taste. English brown ale is something I am not going to sit down and drink 12 beers at a time. And also, is there a recipe that I could add 2 pounds of amber dry malt extract to in the future...

Well, you could always just buy a 3.3 lb can of Amber LME, some hops (it was Williamette, I think?), a packet of Nottingham, and just try the same recipe again. Incidentally, the beer I'm drinking right now is an English Brown from that exact same kit. I added both, and the OG came out as expected, so I don't think there's any doubt about what was intended. Just relax next time and don't overthink it too much. Anyway, your batch will probably still taste good, just much lighter than it would have been.

If you only used 3.3 lbs of LME, you would barely get enough gravity to call it a beer anyway....I am positive you were supposed to use both the LME and the DME.....and the others are also right, they would never put ingredients inside a kit you weren't supposed to use.
.....one way to avoid things like this is to disregard those blasted instructions that come with your kit and read John Palmers How to Brew site and/or book (and my that I mean both as well)

Don't take my first reply as accurate. I misunderstood the question. As multiple others have said if you got a recipe kit use everything that was included in it. They would not put in extra malt extract in any form.

For what its worth when I brewed a Brewers Best Classic English Pale Ale (came with both LME and DME...which I used both) every single person who tried it has loved it.


In addition, I was at one LHBS where I bought a Brewers Best kit and the guy at the store asked me if I wanted 2 cans of LME or 2 packages of DME or a combination. It was strange that I had a choice but essentially they gave me a choice of going with the prepackaged 2 cans of LME (this was for the microbrew pale ale I think) or mixing it up with what they had. DME and LME are interchangable as long as you account for the differing amounts of each. If a kit comes with some ingredients use them all. There is just no way what so ever that someone is going to sell you a kit and that includes extra ingredients. That'd be a waste for the company making the kit.

Thanks guys....I learned something on my first batch so I guess that is the important part. I should have know better but it isn't as easy when you are doing the kit and you have to make the decision right there. This is the first batch of many so it can only be better. I will just to drink twice as fast. thanks again...

I have a several styled hopped malt kits. ie bock, ipa, etc Can i use unhopped lme for the corn sugar/dme requirements to complete the kits? If so how much lme = 3 lbs of dme or 2.2 of corn sugar thanks.

scubaphrenic said:

I have a several styled hopped malt kits. ie bock, ipa, etc Can i use unhopped lme for the corn sugar/dme requirements to complete the kits? If so how much lme = 3 lbs of dme or 2.2 of corn sugar thanks.

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Beersmith suggests 3.5 lbs of LME is about equivalent to 3 lbs of DME.