Getting fed up with brewing now! 4th attempt and still I am struggling to get the ABV over 4%
Ive only used ever used Woodfordes ale kits... Admirals reserve (twice), Nelsons Revenge, and Now Wherry.
The first 3 attempts went from fermenter to bottles and the most recent attempt has gone from fermenter to pressure keg.
With the bottles I found it was hard to get the exact amount of priming sugar into each bottle to keep them all the same, so the taste varied from bottle to bottle...
With the pressure keg I found it easier to chuck a couple of handfuls of brewing sugar in... however whichever way I do it, I cannot get the ABV above 4%
Every batch I have done tastes 'watered down'... Now at this point I am stuck with 20 something litres of weak ale just sat in my keg.
Genuinely pissed off.
I am starting to think the measurements on the side of my fermenter are totally out. Every time the instructions say fill it up to 20 or 22 litres or whatever, I always follow suit and end up with watery beer.
I reckon next time if it says 20 litres I will just fill it up to 16 or 18.... maybe then I will get actual stong ale/beer that is worth drinking.
Any advice or suggestions are more than totally ****ing welcome!!!!!!!
thank-you.
Noodleface84
Don't get discouraged with brewing, it can take time. I was 14 when I started homebrewing, I'm 41 now and own a small brewery. I spent years screwing stuff up at the very beginning, but it was mainly due to not having access to the right ingredients or know how....and oh no! No internet. Any way,
Are the kits you are using malt extract or is it an all grain brew? It might be a good idea if you got yourself a copy of say, Beersmith or go online to Beer Calculus. These applications can help you with formulation.
How long is your boil? Sure you can top off in a fermenter, but I don't encourage that. All your water should be boiled and then chilled properly. I highly recommend getting a heat exchanger and not use an ice bath.
To me it sounds like you are watering the wort down way too much. And the bit about handfulls of sugar etc... okay, first off, you should be boiling that sugar prior to adding it to your fermenter. Also, sugars like brewing sugar will bump up the gravity, but it will also thin out the beer. As far as bottling goes, unless you are using carbonation drops, what you should be doing is racking to another container onto a sugar solution. Check for volumes. It seems pretty standard for 5 oz per 5 gallons, though in higher voulmes of beer, you should recheck it. Its not as easy going fro. 5 gal to say 1 barrel. If you over carb, expect bottle bombs, its happened to all of us.
If you are looking for more mouth feel, try using flaked barley. You do not want to boil it, this would go into the mash. If you are doing extract, get your hands on a cheese cloth bag. Put the flake, maybe some paleale malt into the bag and steep it in 150 water for about an hour. Use this liquid to boil your extract in. DO NOT SQUEEZE THE BAG. Squeezing the grain to get that extra liquid out will result in tannins and other off flavors. I hope this helps.