better brew lager

beerbear

i thought i'd try the better brew lager kit and followed the instructions as the temp was slightly lower (18 to 20degrees) it took 18 days to get required gravity, so i bottled and this is where the instructions get a little vague, it says bottle and leave in warm room for 5 days to carbonate then move to cooler room/temp to clear, how long is it before its drinkable? i had a taste after it had cleared, and i'm very disappointed, i know the longer you leave it the better, but this needs to get consideribly better before its drinkable , i know theres not much else i can do to it now, i did use brew enhancer instead of standard brewing sugar. anyone else used this kit?

 

HBO_Staff

Hi, we must admit with this being a very new kit to the market, feedback is yet to properly filter back in any kind of volume, and we have brewed our own one of the Better Brew kits but it is still in it's relatively early days. We found, as expected, that the primary fermentation does take longer than with many kits, but this is due to the yeasts they have selected and should improve the final results. Using an enhancer was a good idea and again will improve the end result. Ours is a bitter which will become drinkable more quickly, with the lager versions we think you could be looking at quite a few weeks before it is ready for drinking and for it to really develop it's flavours and taste. Like any lager it can be drank earlier as it begins to taste alright, but they're normally worth the wait for the best taste possible. We would therefore suggest that you leave it in a cooler room, but not extremely cold, for a few weeks, perhaps another 4 and then have another taste.

The Coopers Pilsener and European lagers are exactly the same, they take much longer to become drinkable due to the yeasts used which are a lager strain, and the way that they ferment, and these two Coopers also taste un-drinkable for a few weeks before the proper taste begins to develop. We expect these Better Brews to be very similar.

We're keen to hear more on these kits, so any updates you could provide would be very useful to assist others....

beerbear

thanks for the reply,i was ready to show it the toilet lol, but i'll leave it a few more weeks and report back on this thread on how its developing, thanks again for your reply, cheers

HBO_Staff

Great, please do, other people have thought exactly the same with the European, but were pleased they didn't as it's just a slow starter!

beerbear

well i left it and left it, unfortunatly it didn't get any better so i've chalked it up to experience and poured it away. i don't think i did anything wrong, steralized and rinsed everything well,followed instructions to the letter but it still had a very yeasty taste which i found undrinkable, has anyone else had a go with this better brew?. one thing i found  was it was extremly fizzy( i put 2 coopers carbination drops per pint bottle) maybe 1 would of been enough,or it may of needed even longer before it was bottled i don't know. 

HBO_Staff

The sugar could be reduced down to one drop per bottle which would solve that, but the yeasty taste is another problem - the brew must finish it's primary ferment and read 1008 or below on your hydrometer which presumably it did before transferring to the bottles. It's hard to know what has gone wrong exactly, a yeasty taste can be due to disturbing the sediment when transferring into bottles and result in a yeasty or tangy flavour, and also leaving it in the fermenting vessel on the sediment for too long after completion can give off flavours. Proper cleaning and sterilising like you did would usually rule out a cleanliness problem, hopefully feedback will start to come in soon on the the new Better Brew range so there is more known about it and any tips or problems to be aware of