Coopers' Pilsner kit

Hi, all.

What day is it today? It's brewing day!

I'm going to attempt a lager from a kit. The kit is a Pilsner from Coopers' Brewmaster Selection, and here they claim that the yeast supplied is good for lager-style fermenting. I thought I'd try it out, as the cellar in my house has a temperature close to perfect for this. At least it had when I measured it last night. (I haven't a clue as to what strain of yeast they actually supply, but I'm willing to give it a shot in the names of Science and Rebecca.)

I'm going to skip their recommended dextrose and replace it with spray malt, too. That'll show'em. And I'll only go to 20L to avoid the weak, watery stuff you get at 23L. That'll show'em again. (Just who will be shown what remains to be seen.)

If anyone reading this has tried it before and knows that it'll end in catastrophe, please feel free to let me know.

I make this kit up with a kilo of Muntons beer kit enhancer and after a long maturing time it comes out fine, I make up 23L and its not at all watery.

Why not stick with your spray malt but boost the alcohol with 250g of brewers sugar as well and make a 23L batch, 1 kg of spray malt plus the original tin will produce a pilsner with plenty of body as far as I am concerned. After all a pilsner is supposed to be quite a light refreshing drink.

You may wish to proof your yeast before you pitch it, especially if you are doing this in the name of Rebecca. She'd hate to see the wasted beer. Science laughs at your waste of beer. Boil up a bit o' that dry malt in some water, cool it and toss in that there yeast. You should still have time to go to the brew shop to get some new yeast, need be.

I haven't tried lagering that yeast properly, but I know it works well under ale conditions. You may want to think about adding a few hops to your brew. I have found that adding all DME instead of sugar makes the final brew a bit under-hopped, and a bit too malty IMHO. That being said, I'll never go back to using straight dextrose. I usually add about 250-500g to adjust the OG to get a prober-sized batch after adding various combos of DME and specialty grains.

Hey, I brewed a batch with this kit before. I am drinking the beer from it right now. All I used was the extract and a kilo of glucose or whatever. It turned out fairly well. Mind you it has a bit of an after taste due to me using tap water which contains many minerals. I am making a coopers lager though and it tastes really good right now. I would recommend trying it.

Regicider said:

What day is it today? It's brewing day!

Click to expand...

Man, I wish my alarm clock said that. Then I'd be up and ready!

The happy mug said:

Man, I wish my alarm clock said that. Then I'd be up and ready!

Click to expand...

There might be a market for alarm clocks like that.

Thanks for the input, everybody. The wort's in the cellar as I write, bubbling happily (but slowly) away at 9°C (that's about 48°F for you non-metric people.) It had an OG of 1.043.

Your OG sounds about right (for a pils). I have made this one a couple of times before with differing levels of success. The last one I did was by far the best. In my oppinion the Two most critical aspects of any lager or pilzner are First and formostly yeast. Make the extra effort to get some premium quality yeast and you will be justly rewarded, you cant really go past Saflager S-23. Secondly KEEP YOUR TEMP DOWN. You sound like your already on top of that part. 9 degrees C is perfect and will keep out any nasty esthers.

Next time you make this one or one like it try this:

Start with the tin extract
Add
300 gms LME
300 gms dried corn syrup
1.0 Kgs Dextrose
and then steep
12g Saaz Hops for 10 mins

This will give you a very well rounded beer. The added hops helps balance the extra malt and keep the beer crisp.

I'll definitely get some other yeast for my next batch. However, this one seems happy enough so far. I noticed today that the outside and inside pressures in my primary were nearly balanced (levels in airlock close to equal). I'm thinking this means I transfer to secondary in a couple of days. It smells quite promising.