Any suggestions to improve a brew

[novicedave]

Hi All,

I am a novice brewer.. up to about my 14th brew now. Still using recipe mixes. Started with a specialist home brew stores' own recipes.. tried Coopers (ouch) and now back to a different brew stores own recipe.
I brew in kit supplied plastic tub. Have tried a home concocted ginger beer.. was quite good.

I have made a few brews that have been lacking body, lacking heaviness while tasting the leftover while checking the SG. I have left hoping it may improve after bottling but alas, it's still been average and I'd recon the alcohol was about 3.5%.
I bottle into 1lt flip top (grolsch style) bottles and use 2 coopers carbonation drops per bottle.

I am now brewing a Heineken style recipe, made up of
Morgans Golden Saaz Pilsener Malted Barley 1.7kg tin.
Dry Malt Mix 1kg .
Pilsner Malt Grains, 500gm. Roasted, crushed then boiled.
Northern Brewer Hop pellets - soaked in hot water, strained then liquid added to brew.
Saflarger S-23 yeast 11.5gm (I also added the Morgans Larger Yeast 6gm) (in hindsight perhaps I should not have done this?)

I brewed inside an old fridge at approx 12 - 14 deg, and a heatpad on a timer. In 5-6 day the SG got down to 1011, but that's where it stayed.
It's been there for about 5 days now. No change.
I do have another packet of Northern Brewer Hops to add at bottling stage.

I'd like a bit more omph to the beer, a bit more tasty as a european larger should be.

Should I a) bottle now at SG 1011 with the added hops and hope it improves.
b) add some more malted barley (say 300 / 400 grams) just before bottling and add some liquid yeast (or will this blow the tops off?)
c) add some more dry malt mix just before bottling and add some liquid yeast (or will this blow the tops off?)

Any thoughts from an experienced hand would be appreciated.

Many Thanks in advance. Dave the novice.

[jello]

A FG of 1011 sounds okay to me. I wouldn't recommend adding any more fermentables.

Don't boil your grains. It's too hot.

Otherwise the beer looks okay to me. I'd bottle.

[warra48]

Your original gravity would have been somewhere from 1.045 to 1.050 with those ingredients. Your FG of 1.011 would be right on the money for a reasonably well attenuated brew. I think you're OK to bottle it as it is.

I wouldn't go down the path at all of adding further to it, you'll only complicate things for no real gains. Adding further fermentables and yeast at bottling time, as you set out in b) or c) will only lead to bottle bombs as it ferments out.

The style of your brew is not really one for late hopping, so I'd go as you are and see how the brew turns out. If you feel you want some more bitterness etc, adjust it for your next brew.
Pilsner malt grains need to be mashed. That means soaking your 500 gr in about 1.5 litres of water, and keeping it stable at about 65ºC for an hour. You then drain the liquid. Rinse the grains with a further 1.5 litres of so of hot water, drain that also. You then boil the resulting liquid (do not boil the grains) for about an hour or so, uncovered. You can add further water to this to make it up to what your pot will take on the boil. Add your hops to the boil.

I'd recommend you use a brewing program to help you do your calculations. I use BeerSmith, but there are some good free ones available. Do a search of this forum, and you will find some. Brewmate is one, as far as I know.

If you want more oomph in your beer by way of ABV%, then adding Coopers dextrose will solve that problem.
If you want more body and flavour, you may need to add some more unhopped Malt. Or use a different tin than the Morgans Golden Saaz, which is clearly designed to give you a Bohemian/German style Pils. Have you investigated other styles of beer?

Beyond that, you may need to look at doing a larger partial mash than just 500 gr, or an AG brew. Have a search for Trough Lolly's partial mash procedure.

[Oliver]

Hi and welcome, Dave.

Check out the "Simple things that make HB better" sticky, which contains a lot of information about how to improve your beers, often with little or no effort.

Cheers,

Oliver

[novicedave]

HI All and thanks for the tips.

I have taken the advice and left the brew as is. I added the finishing hops just prior to bottling. Now bottled and sitting in the brew fridge (not an operating fridge) for a week or so before I store under the house.

I will post back here with an update on the brew... hopefully I'll report on how good it is.

Cheers David