I Couldn't Be Happier

[HopSong]

I couldn't wait for the haze to settle out in my first brew.

Coopers DIY Kit that came with the OS Lager using, as I understand it, an ale yeast.

OG= 1.039 on Day 1 (Oct 5)
FG- 1.014
Bottled on Day 23 (Oct 28) Looked relatively clear and tasted fine but flat.. didn't get a ton of bittering.
Put bottle in frig on Nov 7 and asked questions cuz it became cloudy.. Chill Haze thread.

Well, I decided today, Nov 9, that I couldn't wait to try a first bottle.. a bit over a month from start. Wow, I'm happy.

There is still a bit of haze.. but not as much as I thought.. some of the haze might have been the irregular bottle surface.

Aroma.. I can smell the Cascade, which was packaged in 2002 but thought why waste it.. it looked green and had a good aroma. I used it as a dry hop on Day 20

Alcohol.. calculates out at 3.3%.. I expected it to be a touch higher than that.. but, I believe the sugar tabs I put in should raise that a bit.. but don't know how much. I put one tablet in the 12 oz (350ml) bottles and 2 tabs in the 25 oz (750 ml) bottles.

Color.. looking at the picture in Palmers new book.. somewhere between 5 and 10 SRM

Head: It poured with about 2 fingers of foam and left nice lacing on the glass when I emptied it. Dang, I shuda chilled two of them

Taste.. I can taste the bittering hops.. about the way I want it. Very similar to a Sierra Nevada. I can taste the bittering on the back of my tongue.. at the sides. I never paid attention to that until my son and I went to Russian River and had the Pliny the Elder.. There is a nice later hoppy flavor with a decent citrus tone to it.. I taste this at the back of my tongue toward the center.

I don't know if this makes ANY sense.. but, I'm liking it. Can't believe it's my first brew. No off flavors at all.. Maybe I'll call it Yellow Doodle Ale for my little Labradoodle.

 

[Troutmaskreplica]

i'm glad it worked out for you. my first batch was terrible (i don't think it finished fermenting).

were the hops really packaged in 2002? i only ask because i was under the impression hops lose their potency over time.

 

[HopSong]

i'm glad it worked out for you. my first batch was terrible (i don't think it finished fermenting).

were the hops really packaged in 2002? i only ask because i was under the impression hops lose their potency over time.

Yes, I started to want to brew in '02 and bought a bunch of equipment.. In fact I actually started in '63. I brewed ONE batch of horrible but potent "beer" using Pabst hop flavored malt extract and some cruddy yeast and corn sugar.. Neve knew anything about temp control etc..

Fast forward to 2002. Bought an ale kit and a bunch of equipment. Brewed it and kegged it.. Wasn't bad at all. Still, didn't have any controls.. but it worked.

So, I bought an American Brown Ale kit w/ grains in '02 as a followup and never did a thing with it. Called the LHBS and asked them about the ingredients.. bucket of malt extract, hops, etc.. They suggested tossing it. Well I did.. except the packet of bottling sugar and the hops. When the gravity stopped dropping I said, what the heck.. opened the packet and it smelled great. Added it to the primary and let it "cook" for another week +.

The hops were vacuum sealed pellets.. maybe in nitrogen.. ?? But, they seemed very good.. considering. I'm not smart enough to know the sublities yet. Which may be just fine.. They looked as green as other Cascade hops I've seen.

 

[Revlus]

I'm jealous... I'm finally bottling my first brew EVER this weekend. I'm so excited, it's a bit ridiculous really. It's been fun trying to quickly drink 50 bottles worth of beer so I had something to put my batch in.

Good luck with those hops. Maybe add in some viagra to make them more potent.

 

[H-ost]

Maybe add in some viagra to make them more potent.

HAHAHA

I think I have read on here that priming adds less than .5% ABV but cant be certain.

 

[HopSong]

Well, that's cool.. that brings the ABV up to something more respectable

After finishing my first bottle earlier today, and reflecting on it, I think that I would only add 0.5 oz of Cascade rather than that full ounce. The grapefruit lingered in my mouth for about 30 minutes or so.

I think that is the only thing I'd change. In fact, if I get this one down.. it may become my "HouseBrew"

I'll have to do a comparison in cost by using Coopers with the included yeast vs using DME and a different yeast such as Safale-05. I've read a lot of "trashtalk" about Coopers and their yeast.. but, sure worked for me.

 

[unionrdr]

Cooper's ale yeast always works well for me. I guess I just don't pitch enough to get a big beer to finish in 1 week like some claim. I wonder if there's a pitch calculator for how much to re-hydrate,besides the usual starter amounts? That'd be interesting reading,as I'd love to knock off 3-4 weeks of waiting for a stable FG.
Doing mid-gravity ales is great,but a bit time consuming thus far. But I think cooper's ale yeast is good. Just need to get pitch amount more accurate I guess.
I pitched 4-7g packets of it on my Burton Ale,now on week five. Looks like the FG might stabilize at 1.018,just waiting for a little clean up & settling. It started at OG1.065. Might check it again later,but I hate too many SG tests eating up bottling volume.
Gotta do what ya gotta do,though.