So today I jumped on the band wagon and brewed Cheesefood's Caramel Cream Ale. I've only used LME thus far. I decided against going with my LHBS's LME and stick to the recipe with some brewer's gold DME and some Munton's Wheat DME (Oddly [luckily?], these were the only two DME my LBHS had in stock). I put one pound of DME in, just straight from the bag and it was kind of clumpy. I put the rest of the DME a pound at a time in a mixing bowl, poured some of my steep water into the mixing bowl, and used a beater to mix it in with the water. This eliminated the clumps, but put a huge head on my wort even before I started boiling it. Needless to say, right when my wort hit boiling, I boiled over instantly.
I took my chances and brought it to a boil again, but this time, immediately put my first hops in thinking that the oils would reduce the head in the stock pot. It seemed to, and I continued on.
My question is.. Why did I have such bad luck with the DME? I noticed even without the "beat" version of my DME (straight from the bag), it started putting foam on top of my boil. Is this normal? I didnt fill my pot any more water than I usually do with LME and it went from hot to boil over in like 2 seconds. No crap. Was it dumb of me to use the beaters on the DME? What'd I do wrong?
Nobes
I took my chances and brought it to a boil again, but this time, immediately put my first hops in thinking that the oils would reduce the head in the stock pot. It seemed to, and I continued on.
My question is.. Why did I have such bad luck with the DME? I noticed even without the "beat" version of my DME (straight from the bag), it started putting foam on top of my boil. Is this normal? I didnt fill my pot any more water than I usually do with LME and it went from hot to boil over in like 2 seconds. No crap. Was it dumb of me to use the beaters on the DME? What'd I do wrong?
Nobes