Help!

[medic76]

Ok here is the deal, I have brewed 5 or 6 times and the color of my beer does not change. My last 2 times that I have brewed one is a Cream ale and the one I did last night is a honey wise. they have both came out dark like a Kilians. The cream ale I did I boiled all 5 gal. of wort. and the honey one , I did about 3 gal. boil and then added cool water after the boil to bring it up to 5 gal. and that one is a little lighter but still not like it should be. I use a turkey fryer for my boil. What am I doing wrong?

 

[phenry]

Post up your recipes, it's hard to tell if anythings wrong without knowing them.

 

[hillhousesawdustco]

I had that problem with my first couple of kits, which all used liquid extract to make up the vast majority of the fermentables. The liquid extract has essentially been cooked already, so when you boil it again for an hour, it darkens considerably.
One way to combat this is to dump in your Liquid Extract near the end of your boil, rather than at the beginning, or just use Dried Extract. Search around on here for some info for "Late Extract Additions" to learn more, as I believe using this method will change your hop utilization a little bit.

 

[beerkrump]

+1 Extract will always be darker than you want.

 

[medic76]

All my brews have been Extract kits from Northern brew Co. I have not yet moved up into ag due to time and space. When I do a boil could I add the extract at 30 min. and would that change the taste much?

 

[HoboBrewery]

you could even do it with 15 minutes left. it caramelizes the extract which darkens it. as long as you can heat it for 15 minutes you'll be fine.

the color from it caramelizing the extract doesn't necessarily alter flavor, but if you're trying to make a bright yellow cream ale and it's orange, it's likely the length of time the liquid extract is boiling.

my last cream ale had both dry extract (2 lbs extra light i think) and liquid extract (3 of light). i find that the combination of both lessens the likelihood of darkening the color of the finished product. my extract cream ale was straw yellow.

 

[unionrdr]

Since I use DME & LME,last time I put all 3lbs of DME in the boil,saving the LME for the end. This time,I'm gunna try using half the DME in the boil,saving the remainder With all the LME for the end,after hop additions. The previous batch was an APA,this one will be a dark ale made into "Whiskely". The APA looks to have that amber/orange color,while I want the dark ale "Whiskely" to be more of a Jack Black sort of color.

 

[medic76]

cool thanks for the advise, I thing next time I will add it with 15 min. left in the boil and I might try using some dme also.
thanks for the help

 

[lextasy23]

Mine have also been quite a bit darker than I had pictured. I made a belgian Wit from a kit, and is was also dark like a killians. So I just named it Belgian Dark lol.

A friend recently told me to just add the LME at flameout. So my Pumpkin ale was the first to do that. I made a Blonde Ale with ultralight LME (in the boil) and it came out a medium amber color. I'm betting if I added it at the end, it would have been much lighter.

I have yet to try DME. I'd like to get it for my next recipe. Scooping out LME goo is really starting to frustrate me, but I don't have the space yet for an AG setup. Waiting until we sell our condo, and get a house with a garage and a mantown.

 

[medic76]

I did some reading as Hillhouse said and learned a lot, so I think I will add 1/3 of the lme next time to start due to the hops needing it to do there thing. and the rest at flame out. Now for the next question how do I figure out on how much hops to use? thanks

 

[grace1760]

Scooping out LME goo is really starting to frustrate me

One tip I learned on here is to stick the cans in hot water in your sink for 20 minutes and it really thins the LME to where most of it pours out pretty easily.

 

[hillhousesawdustco]

I'm sure beersmith or some internet calculator could figure out EXACTLY how much to reduce the bittering hops by (to the the zillionth decimal place) but unless you have a weigh to actual weigh/measure that amount (and maybe you do) I think the rule of thumb is around 15-20% less. I haven't done an extract batch in a while but with those kits my hops always came in one ounce vacuum sealed baggies...I would just try to reserve 1/5th or so of the hops when I dumped them in the kettle.
I would go on to add the small remainder of hops at the very very end of the boil, to get a little hop aroma out of them without adding any bitterness. Plus you don't waste any hops.
If you really want to be specific, Beersmith has a free trial and can calculate for you. It is only 20 bucks the last time I checked and is really an invaluable tool.