Morgan's Kit Tampering...

[SeamusMac]

Hey guys!

I'm going to try my highest gravity beer yet, a tolerable 7% ABV

My first kit ever was a Morgan's Indian Pale Ale, and even though I used Dextrose it turned out to be pretty good after a couple of months in the bottle. The ABV on that was about 5% following the instructions. I'd like to use DME for this kit, while at the same time bumping up the OG to 1.065-1.070 for a stronger end product. The instructions say to add 1kg of dextrose for 5% ABV and because DME is only 75% fermentable as compared to dextrose at nearly 100% I'll be adding 1.75kg of DME to get 7% ABV. Sound right?

Using Mr. Malty's pitching rate calculator I've determined that I'll need to buy another couple packages (5 gr.) of dry yeast to get it off to a good start. I'll rehydrate and pitch as per usual.

 

[Jmac00]

I bought one of these kits last week along with a few others.....was gonna do it with the dextrose first to get a taste, then start hacking it the next time with DME like you're doing. So i'm interested in how this turns out. What kind of yeast are you going to get? My area is limited for supplies so i'm curious.....

 

[Yooper]

I've never seen that kit. Is it a prehopped no-boil kit?

I was just thinking that boosting it up to 7% would be fine with the DME, but what about the hopping? If it's an IPA and the OG is brought up that much, the brew may be pretty severly underhopped. Good beer recipes are all about balance- the balance of malt and hops to give you the style you are after. If you add more malt, that will definitely give you more fermentables and boost the ABV, but it'll also swing the balance way over toward the malt side. I'm not sure you'll get an IPA as a result. But, again, I've never seen that kit, so I'm not aware of what the ingredients are and how much it's already got in the way of hops.

What's the ingredient list?

 

[SeamusMac]

Hey Jmac,

I believe it came with a packet of Cooper's Ale yeast, which may have excentuated the "cidery" flavour that dextrose has the tendency to impart. I'll be using another couple of packets all the same, just to increase the pitching rate. Where in NB are you located?

YooperBrew,

It is indeed a prehopped no-boil kit, I have access to BrewHouse and FestaBrew Kits but this kit has been developed to mimic the taste of a quintessentially Nova Scotian beer, Alexander Keith's IPA. I think it came pretty close last time I tried it but you're absolutely right, it's going to need more hops to get the balance right. I'm reading about dry hopping but I'm looking for increased bitterness as well as aroma, which dry hopping won't help with.

Here's a thought, has anyone ever made a sort of "hops tea" to add to the beer in place of plain water in order to top it up to 23L? Adding hops to some boiling water in the same way an AG or extract brewer would might impart the right amount of additional bitterness/aromas if I can get the quantities right...

 

[Jmac00]

Maybe i'll try this kit as is first.......i love Keiths, that's why i got this kit to try....speaking of the man himself, have you tried their Stout? i'm wanting to try it, however it skipped over NB and not available here yet...I'm in the fredericton area, originally from the cape though..

whatever you decide to do, post back your results...i'll be waiting.. :rockin:

 

[SeamusMac]

After reading a bit into the matter I'm now debating whether or not to use 2 kits to achieve high gravity or to just add additional DME. The cost would be nearly the same as 2 kg of DME from my LHBS! Thoughts?

 

[obezyana1]

If you want a beer with a higher ABV, then buy a kit made for that. It's a lot easier to get a better end product if the kit is designed that way. Until you get the hang of balancing flavors you are most likely going to end up with a beer that doesn't taste anything like what you expect. It may be good, but it can more easily be off tasting. There are plenty of high ABV kits and they are not much more than the kit you already bought. Plus they are tried and true kits, so you know the product should be good. If you do go through with your experiment, make sure to post the results, so we can see how it turned out. Good luck either way.

 

[SeamusMac]

Hey obezyana,

I'd love to try a high gravity kit before tampering with one intended for 4.5%-5% but I can't find any pre-hopped, no boil kits at any of the LHBS or on the websites of any Canadian suppliers. Right now I'm not able to manage any extract kits

I'm going to the LHBS today and one of the guys there is really experienced with the kits, he brewed a lot of them through his college years I guess. I'm going to ask him about 1 kit + more DME or 2 kits to get a high-grav brew.

 

[SeamusMac]

I'm going to the LHBS today and one of the guys there is really experienced with the kits, he brewed a lot of them through his college years I guess. I'm going to ask him about 1 kit + more DME or 2 kits to get a high-grav brew.

That was a waste of time, he had never done a double canned kit before. All of his high-gravity beers have been extract and AG brews. Can anyone suggest what I should be doing here? I've compared prices and doing a 5 gal batch with extra DME and doing a batch with two kits + additives is within $2 of one another.

Thoughts?

 

[billy_awesome]

I just did this kit too.

Overall, I liked it at 5percent, and adding more dextrose would make it pretty dry even at 7percent I would think. Have you considered using some maltodextrin? It increases the alcohol percentage without increasing the body of the beer.

I don't have a beer calculator to tell you how much to use though.

 

[SeamusMac]

I brewed it with dextrose the first time and the cidery taste was really evident, although after 2 months in the bottle it was pretty decent! At 5% it would be equal to Keith's IPA, which I've been told it's supposed to mimic. My perfect IPA has more then 5% alcohol though! I think I'm going to add 2kg of DME and 500g of dextrose to a single can of Morgan's and see what kind of SG that results in.

All the reading I've done has led me to believe that the fermentables in most pre-hopped no boil cans produces somewhere around 3% ABV. 500g of dextrose in addition to that provides a 1% boost, if in fact dextrose is close to 100% fermentable. So if I add 2kgs of DME, which is approximately 75% fermentable I should get 6.5% final ABV.

Kosher?

 

[obezyana1]

Why not just get an extract recipe for a beer you like out of the recipe index and buy the ingredients seperately. It shouldn't be that much more expensive and it would give you a better final product. Pre-hopped kits are quick, sure, but they are not nearly as good as doing it yourself, and you are only talking about adding at most an hour to your brew day and you will be much more satisfied with the results. Trust me, it really is not much more difficult. The only extra you have to do will be steeping some grains, which you can do if you've ever used a teabag and made tea, and add hops at the right times. Nothing to it and way better.

Just my 0.02.

 

[SeamusMac]

Getting into extract brewing is something I absolutely have to do now that I recently received a copy of Extreme Brewing! I think I'll forgo making any beer for the next couple of weeks and buy a 5 gallon pot instead, I'm a student so I'm on a very tiny beer making budget