Is this recipe any good? Changes?

[sentfromspain]

If I wrote in this forum it is because I had doubts about the recipe. It was the simplest recipe we found, and having no experience in making beer we couldn't possibly know that it wasn't right. There are other beer recipes and obviously I had googled them before, but you have to agree that making a stout is not the same as making a lager. So when we were looking at recipes that had varying levels of difficulty, we decided to go with the simplest.

Just because we chose a recipe based on its simplicity, and that recipe is wrong, doesn't mean we haven't looked at any material. And being told that the recipe is garbage doesn't help me see what's wrong with it so that I can figure out what to really look for.

I wasn't asking "teach me how to make beer," I was asking whether the recipe would really work, and if not, what was erroneous and if there was a proper recipe based on those materials. A person from a different forum did just that without criticizing me for writing a post in a beginner's forum. All that I got here is a "don't waste my time" response, which completely defeats the purpose behind having a forum.

When somebody asks for an opinion from people with more experience, that person needs to be pointed in the right direction. Yooper has been the only person to do that, and this thread already has 3 pages of commentaries. I would recommend being a little more patient.

 

[sentfromspain]

And as far as I can tell, the only major difference in ingredients between this recipe and other simple ones is that the others use malt extract instead of grain barley (which would need to be germinated and mashed before the process begins).

As for the technique, the technique in the original recipe is faulty, and I feel that the other forum pointed out where it went wrong fairly well without being pompous about it.

 

[superjunior]

Seriously sentfromspain just toss that recipe, there's way too much wrong with it to try to improve or correct. Like someone else suggested just get yourself a brewers best kit or a kit from Austin home brew supply or northern brewer. These kits are a great way to get into the hobby and they make some damn good beer - they're real simple to make with easy to follow instructions and there's lots of different types of beer styles to choose from. An even easier method would be a canned extract kit from coopers or muntons which will still make a decent beer. Do some reading in the beginners forum and get your learn on. Good luck

 

[user 19629]

If you are just starting out brewing, the first step would be to check out a local home brew store, seems there are quite a few in your area.


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[sentfromspain]

Actually I am currently living in Spain, so I have to make do with what I can find at health and natural food stores. Though I will look at the kits and see if I can fix this situation a little.

 

[Greyhound]

The biggest problem with your question was the timing. I think many of us are suspicious of posts dated April 1. You probably would have gotten more helpful responses on any other day of the year.

I would go with Yooper's advice. Buy an extract kit from your local homebrew shop or from an on-line store. And read the first chapter of How to Brew.

 

[ajf]

To make beer, you need malt, and you need to follow certain procedures.
The "recipe" you posted contains no malt and would not make anything even remotely resembling beer.
If you want to make beer, I doubt you could get suitable ingredients from anywhere but a home brew shop. Even if you can get malt elsewhere, I doubt that it would be brewers malt, and brewers malt is what you need to make beer. If you don't have a home brew shop locally, you could try http://www.masmalta.com
They seem to have a number of kits.

-a.

 

[sentfromspain]

Actually I have ground malt. I assumed that the recipe required malted barley, which would mean making a mash (which seems to be the first part of the recipe, though the times are off). If I only had the barley, in grain, I would have to germinate it first.

 

[drathbone]

When somebody asks for an opinion from people with more experience, that person needs to be pointed in the right direction. Yooper has been the only person to do that, and this thread already has 3 pages of commentaries. I would recommend being a little more patient.

My post had 3 different examples of where to find relevent information regarding how to brew with no experience whatsoever, by typing fewer words than in your original post. They also included how and when to use your basic ingredients (malted barley or extract, yeast, hops and water).

If the information already provided isn't enough for you to find an answer, hopefully this is the kind of response your looking for. There are four main ingredients in beer, Malted Barley (or extract malt) for fermentable sugars and flavor, hops for bitterness, aroma and to balance the sweetness, water and yeast for converting sugar into alcohol. The recipe you listed sounds like it is a very cheap way to make an alcoholic beverage as it provides sugar, water and little else. However I would not say it would make beer per se and it will probably taste disgusting. The types of hops, types of sugar, process and yeast dictate the flavor of your final product.

Along with the websites and links already posted, finding a cheap ingredient kit would probably be ideal to make a drinkable beer and learn the process moreso than that recipe you found.

 

[sentfromspain]

The recipe I posted had malted barley (though I only cited barley), sugar, water, hops, and yeast. What are you talking about

 

[sentfromspain]

After some tweaking, and comparing to other similar recipes, I am considering doing an 10 liter batch (2.5 gallons) of something like:

-make a mash of malted barley (1 kilo) and yellow corn (250 grams, flaked and boiled already) in about 2 liters of water, cooking at 65ºC for an hour.

-move the mash to a larger stainless steal pot, filtering out the grains with a grain bag, add the rest of the water (8 liters thereabouts), dip the bag a couple of times, bring the mix to a boil.

-add the hops (45 grams) and 600 grams of brown sugar gradually while boiling during the course of an hour.

-cool the pot until it reaches room temperature

-move the contents of the pot to a fermenting container adding 15 grams of diluted yeast.

-let sit for 2 weeks

-siphon the contents to the bottling container, mixing in 100 grams of brown sugar which had been boiled/dissolved in water.

-bottle and wait for 6 days.


This leaves out the sanitation method, and some other details (which I really don't feel like typing out), but does this sound like an acceptable mix?

 

[drathbone]

The recipe I posted had malted barley (though I only cited barley), sugar, water, hops, and yeast. What are you talking about

I'm sorry I'm not trying to come off with an attitude, but the information has been presented. The need to elaborate further isn't necessary since you wanted to be pointed in the right direction.

I'm not sure what other recipes you are comparing to that use mostly brown sugar and adjuncts as fermentables. Since you seem insistent on this recipe, just make it and report how it turns out. From what I can guess this will be dry and will have a hot, alcohol like flavor and could possibly be undrinkable. Then again, you didn't say what kind of yeast, hops or barley you're using, however with that recipe I don't think it would make very much of a difference.

 

[sentfromspain]

Well it just seems that some of the other forum members don't understand that we are trying to make a malt mash instead of using malt extract. It's impossible to get malt extract around here (southern Spain), there aren't any homebrew stores because homebrew is not a thing they generally do in Spain, and making a mash for beer is not unheard of. As for repeating the recipe, I am trying to get the quantities closer to what other recipes use for what would be a 2.5 gallon batch (around 10 liters).

The brown sugar: it will do the same job as corn sugar or any other primer sugar. There are some recipes that add sugar while the mix boils, see this page: http://eartheasy.com/eat_homebrew.htm

So whether it is brown sugar or not shouldn't effect the flavor that much. Though after considering that I am changing the quantities, the amount of brown sugar should be reduced to less than half a pound to avoid the hot cane sugar taste....

 

[drathbone]

If I'm not mistaken brown sugar is sugar and molasases. Depending on how dark the brown sugar is, it will have a drastic effect on flavor vs. Corn sugar if you are using significant amounts as your fermentable sugars. Again, the type of yeast hops and barley would also assist in the outcome of your beer.

 

[ajf]

It's impossible to get malt extract around here (southern Spain), there aren't any homebrew stores because homebrew is not a thing they generally do in Spain

I posted a link to a homebrew supplier in Barcelona, so it isn't impossible.

I don't think your recipe would taste at all good.
I don't know what malt, hops, or yeast you are using, but you seem to have far too much corn and sugar in that recipe.

-a.