Terrible 70's Homebrew Recipe - for the 2010's?

[khiddy]

I just put a batch in the fermenter of what I can only assume will be terrible "beer", based on a recipe copied from an old typewritten family recipe book that a friend's parents owned from the 1970s. Here's the original recipe, verbatim:

1970's "Home Brew"
1 10 gal stoneware crock
8 gal water
8 pounds sugar
1 can extra pale malt
1 ounce dried hops tied up in a small cheesecloth bag
2 pkgs dry yeast
1 beer-wine hydrometer
1 bottle capper
bottle caps and bottles

Dissolve the sugar and malt in the 8 gal water.
Mix the yeast and small amount of sugar in 1 pint lukewarm water.
When yeast starts to work, stir into crock.
Float bag of hops on top of water.
Cover with a towel, keep at room temperature approximately 4-5 days or until hydrometer registers 1-1/2.
Siphon into bottles, put 1/2 teaspoon sugar in each bottle prior to capping, tilt each bottle to wet the cap.
Store at room temperature until cloudiness disappears 4-7 days.
Cool and pour beer slowly into pitcher do not disturb sediment.
Serve very cold. Watch it because it bites.

Okay, so, many of the instructions (and heck, the recipe itself) can be disregarded as we know so much more today about home brewing and have access to far better ingredients and techniques than they did back then.

BUUUUUTTTT....

My friend has a fondness for the recipe as it's a link to her father, and has asked me to make it for her in his memory. What she told me is that she liked it because "it's not hoppy at all!" I pointed out that it probably tasted more like cider than like beer at all, because of all the sucrose, but that was a more technical than helpful explanation, and didn't decrease her desire to taste it once again.

I therefore modified the recipe as follows to stay as true to the original as somewhat reasonable, and then followed standard modern procedures as to sanitation and fermentation:

1970's Home Brew (2012 version), 5 gallon batch
OG: 1.054
FG: 1.014
ABV: 5.1%
SRM: 5 (yellow to gold)
IBUs: 13
Yeast: Munton's Dry

6 gallons water, divided
3lbs hopped dried malt extract (Muntons spraymalt)
4lbs table sugar
1 tbsp yeast nutrient
1oz leaf hops (Chinook)
11g Dry yeast (Munton's)

Warm 1.5gal water to ~150F, add DME, sugar, and yeast nutrient to dissolve.
Pour 4.5gal cool water into fermenter.
Meanwhile, rehydrate yeast in boiled and cooled water, per directions on packet.
Add malt/sugar mixture to fermenter, stir well with sanitized spoon to mix.
Add yeast to fermenter, stirring well to aerate and distribute.
Sprinkle hops on top of fermenter, seal and place airlock on top of fermenter. Ferment in mid-to-upper 60's.
When FG is reached, bottle or keg as desired, aiming for 2.7 volumes CO2.

One note: I chose Muntons dry yeast for two reasons: I had a packet around the house left over from a canned kit that someone gave me, and because this particular recipe is heavy on the non-malt adjuncts (table sugar), which Muntons has a reputation for dealing well with. I did double-up the yeast to 11g, and it was bubbling away happily when I shut the door to the brewhouse (that was probably dissolved oxygen escaping, but it sure looked like fermentation!).

Other than that, any comments? Or am I just wasting space in a fermenter for the next 2 weeks?

 

[FarmBoy530]

I think I would have boiled the sugar and added the hops to the 2ndary for a week or 2. I'm guessing you will end up with a painfully dry beer but I cant say I've ever done anything like it. With all the table sugar its going to taste hot. I would have tried a modified version to if I were you!

 

[NWBrewer]

that sounds pretty bad....I was given an olds family recipe quite similar except it was to be drunk straight after fermentation with out carbonation...I choose to skip that recipe

 

[beerandloathinginaustin]

"Watch it because it bites."

Best advice of the thread.

 

[Pommy]

It WILL be beer, the quality of which is doubtful though. Id expect a FG around 1.0 with that much table sugar. It will be hot and probably not good but it will be drinkable, barely is my prediction.

 

[FarmBoy530]

My Grandpa (who's not well educated) Makes what he calls "Sweet Lucy" An apple wine made with table sugar and bread yeast. He makes it very strong "watch it because it bites" fits perfectly! If your drinken it with him he'll always tell you, "You know, this batch turned out a little dry".

 

[ReverseApacheMaster]

Sounds like a very cheap way to make something close to BMC. Thin, light on flavor, etc. I'm glad homebrewing has progressed.

 

[mobilecabinworks]

My Grandpa (who's not well educated) Makes what he calls "Sweet Lucy" An apple wine made with table sugar and bread yeast. He makes it very strong "watch it because it bites" fits perfectly! If your drinken it with him he'll always tell you, "You know, this batch turned out a little dry".

Give him a pack of Red Star yeast and see what happens. Tell him it's from the same people who make bread yeast.

 

[tjderrington]

Back in my days of MR. BEER kit brewing, which also called for the use of table sugar, everything came out tasting alot more like apple cider. I'm guessing that's what you can expect.

 

[FarmerTed]

Other than that, any comments? Or am I just wasting space in a fermenter for the next 2 weeks?

How many ibu's does an ounce of chinook give? I have a feeling you may have over-shot what she is looking for. The hopped extract may have been enough, or even more than enough. Otherwise, your recipe sounds about 25% as awful as the original one.

 

[david_42]

What you have is a classic bitter. Dry, with very little hop aroma. An observation: many women who "hate homebrew and/or craft beer" just hate massively hopped, hugely bitter IPAs.

Softly, softly, catchie monkey.

Wise choice of yeasts. Munton's has low attenuation of malt, so the mix doesn't get too dry.

 

[BrewerinBR]

My Grandfather brewed beer during prohibition, a pre-prohibition lager I believe. My father and his brother and sisters would help. I have searched for the recipe amongst my many cousins and my aunt and uncles papers and effects, never found it. Unfortunately they are all gone now. The fact that my Grandfather was a bootlegger and got arrested for it was not discussed to openly. I would really have loved to have found it. Was supposedly best beer in the county at the time. Sad to lose a part of the family history like that, so I understand the connection.

 

[khiddy]

The brew has been furiously chugging away since Monday, and I just drew a hydro sample. It's down to 1.022 or so, but there's a long way to go - the hydro sample tasted like sugar water with a firm bitterness on the finish. It definitely has a beer aroma, and looks like a golden hefeweizen, so there's some hope for this yet, though the bubbler is starting to slow.

I suspect I'll need to raise the ambient temp a bit (it's down to 60F right now, after being in the mid-to-upper 60's the last two days). I want to get the beer down to at least 1.014, which with all of the sugar, shouldn't be a problem - it'd be a lot better if it was drier than that, like 1.008 or so, but I don't expect much from the Munton's yeast, and I don't really want to drop any more $$ on another finishing yeast to try to drop it down. Any ideas?

 

[bschoenb]

Hey; I think I saw that Recipe on Alaska State Troopers; .. They called it Homebrew as well?

 

[ao125]

I'm not going to lie... reading the original recipe gave me a wicked hangover headache... I can only imagine drinking it.

 

[FarmBoy530]

I know a prof. brewer who told me a tab of Beano would make your beer dry as can be (sometimes to much). I've never tried it. Apparently an enzyme that helps yeast eat more complex sugars, or breaks down complex sugars. Any one every hear of this?