American Style Light?

[jdwoo87]

I made the mistake of going with a very cheap ale kit and fermenting at 72°F+ on my first home brew ever. It tasted nasty, so I read as much as I could online and discussed some ideas with a guy at my local home brew shop and came up with the following recipe:

1/2 pound 20L Crystal
3.3 pounds light LME
2 pounds light pilsen DME
1 pound rice syrup solids
1 pound corn sugar
1 oz Hallertau (Last 30 Mins)
.5 oz Saaz (last 5 mins)
1/2 teaspoon brew salts
1/2 teaspoon irish moss

Safale 05 yeast

I cooled my wort by pouring over 2.5 gallons of ice water and had piched my yeast about an hour after filling the primary.

I was petrified of off flavors from fusels and esters, so I put my 6 gallon fermentor in a giant "elephant poop bucket" (you know those big buckets they use at the circus, only this one was new when I got it) water bath. I keep a fan on the bucket as it is wrapped in towels and a towel is in the bucket draped over the fermentor to decrease temps by evaporation.

I keep a thermometer in the water around the fermentor and have been watching temps stay between 58 and 63. Ambient temps vary from 68 to 72.

Essentially, I am wondering how this might taste and if everything I've listed looks good and proper.

Long post, I know, thank you for reading!

 

[CDbrews]

the low temps will make the yeast flavor more nuetral which is good as you are making a lager style with ale yeast and the corn sugar will dry it out and keep the body light... it should taste close to what you are aiming for, enjoy you second batch and it will taste better than the first

 

[philrose]

did your lhbs recommend the brewing salts for an extract batch? thats pretty unusual.

 

[jdwoo87]

did your lhbs recommend the brewing salts for an extract batch? thats pretty unusual.

They give a complementary pack of brew salts and irish moss with most good sized purchases. In my ignorance, I tossed them both in at what I thought were appropriate times. I didn't even think about when and when not to use brew salts. I knew that irish moss helps clear up beer (who doesn't want that) but wasn't sure about the brew salts, I thought I read something awhile back about the salts helping to condition the water.

P.S. I used R/O water for the whole batch. My poor R/O system struggled to keep up with producing 5 gallons in a two hour period, but it makes bottled quality water.

 

[philrose]

They give a complementary pack of brew salts and irish moss with most good sized purchases. In my ignorance, I tossed them both in at what I thought were appropriate times. I didn't even think about when and when not to use brew salts. I knew that irish moss helps clear up beer (who doesn't want that) but wasn't sure about the brew salts, I thought I read something awhile back about the salts helping to condition the water.

P.S. I used R/O water for the whole batch. My poor R/O system struggled to keep up with producing 5 gallons in a two hour period, but it makes bottled quality water.

Well I guess if your using ro water it might make sense. I'll let an extract brewer chime in, but as I understand things, the salts are unnecessary. Also, if you weren't using squeaky clean h2o (like your ro water) to begin with i'd probably say that they're hurting more than helping.