Making a brew using LME

[Cadbury]

G'day,
I've been brewing using canned worts for a couple of years and want to try using just LME and adding my hops during the boil. Is the end product that much better and do you have any do's and don'ts that I should know about?

[damian44]

Hey ya Cadbury, welcome. I have my first EXTRACT brewing at the moment (smells great). So i cant say if its any better or not, but its definatly more fun. I think the most important thing is getting the bittering right. Some hops are very bitter and others arn't. So if the hops is less bitter (lower AA%) you need to boil more. BeerSmith is a program people use to help formulate recipes, you could try getting your head around that (gl). What size pot do you have?

Cheers Damo

[Chris]

You will need to get- if you don't already have one, a large stock pot or equivalent- 12L does a pretty good job.

As far as things to think about...

> Bittering hops for 60mins
> Flavour hops for 20mins
> Aroma hops for 5mins (or dry hop)

> If using any grains, do not boil them, but boil the liquid that you steep them in.
> If using grains, consider using irish moss.

Aside from that, everything is pretty much the same.

[Cadbury]

I haven't got one yet!

[damian44]

You can get a 19l pot from Kmart for $20. I need a pot too.

Cheers Damo

[Old Gil]

Does it matter if you use liquid or dry ME

[Kevnlis]

Liquid seems to add more body IMHO. I always try to use more than half liquid at least.

[SpillsMostOfIt]

I think that if you are going to use liquid malt extract, it is probably more important to ensure the shop you get it from has a decent turnover of the stuff and treats it well than if you were using dried malt extract. My thinking behind this is that I would expect most shops to sell more dried than liquid (particularly if they sell to grain brewers, but also if they sell kits) so the liquid might spend more time in their shop. We all know that once you put stuff in a can, it becomes effectively inert so you can treat it however you want and nobody can see inside the can until it is too late.

I like the dry stuff because I can buy a 5kg pack, happily measure out 2.589 kg and easily store the balance until I next need it.

When considering this, bear in mind that I have purchased just one tin of malt extract in my entire brewing experience.

[warra48]

I did a brew early last year using only dry malt extract, and Pride of Ringwood hop flowers.
I must say it wasn't one of my better successes. It was difficult to get rid of the malt sweetness, and it seemed to have a cloying quality. I suggest you need to get a very good attenuating yeast to chew through it all. Never had that problem when using liquid malt cans.
Also, it seems an expensive way to make a brew. What is the cost of say 3 kg of dried malt extract compared to 2 cans of liquid and some specialty grains?

[SpillsMostOfIt]

What is the cost of say 3 kg of dried malt extract compared to 2 cans of liquid and some specialty grains?

I buy 5kg dme at a time and it costs $6/kg unless I work it right and buy it on special, which I usually do not. Mind you, it's nowhere as near as much fun as making it yourself from grain. I keep meaning to keep my trub to filter for yeast starters, but basically at the end of a brew session, I am either too tired or too emotional to bother...

[Old Gil]

I've bought a 20kg bag of LDME and it worked out about $35 cheaper than the way I used to buy it in 4kg bags. It's OK if you plan on using that much by the time it expires, but I didn't check the use by date and I found out when I got home that I had 2 months to use 20kg. Let me tell ya, there was some serious brewing goin on in those couple of months.

[rwh]

Liquid seems to add more body IMHO. I always try to use more than half liquid at least.

Whether the malt extract is dry or liquid has no bearing at all on its fermentability. It is the mashing schedule used by the manufacturer that determines this. Clearly the manufacturer that you buy your LLME from mashes at a higher temperature than your LDME manufacturer. IIRC there's a section on this in the 3rd ed. of How To Brew (or Papazian's Complete Joy, I can't remember which) that enumerates a bunch of different malt extract manufacturers and their fermentation characteristics.

I've bought a 20kg bag of LDME and it worked out about $35 cheaper than the way I used to buy it in 4kg bags. It's OK if you plan on using that much by the time it expires, but I didn't check the use by date and I found out when I got home that I had 2 months to use 20kg. Let me tell ya, there was some serious brewing goin on in those couple of months.

Go to Grain and Grape and ask to be put in the Grain Book. This means that you buy a bulk amount of grain all at once, but can go pick up any quantity you like and they just subtract it from your overall pre-purchased amount. That way you always have fresh grain but you pay the bulk rate.

Cadbury, I recommend that you start with Section 2 of How To Brew: Brewing Your First Extract and Specialty Grain Beer.

[Trough Lolly]

...Go to Grain and Grape and ask to be put in the Grain Book. This means that you buy a bulk amount of grain all at once, but can go pick up any quantity you like and they just subtract it from your overall pre-purchased amount. That way you always have fresh grain but you pay the bulk rate.

...what an excellent grain purchasing system!

[SpillsMostOfIt]

...Go to Grain and Grape and ask to be put in the Grain Book. This means that you buy a bulk amount of grain all at once, but can go pick up any quantity you like and they just subtract it from your overall pre-purchased amount. That way you always have fresh grain but you pay the bulk rate.

...what an excellent grain purchasing system!

It gets better. They have two books: Australian and UnAustralian. It costs more to buy UnAustralian. You pay a flat rate, regardless of the grain type as long as it is within one of those two categories (and they sell it, etc). So, I bought Australian and could, if I wanted to, make a beer with JWM Light Munich as the base for the same price as a beer I make with JWM Trad Ale as the base. If I want to include some UnAustralian grain in my beer, they have a multiplier they apply.

[Trough Lolly]

Thanks for that...and apologies for drifting O/T in a thread discussing brewing using LME.

[ilovechocolate2002]

the only ldme my hbs had came from switzerland of all places...it does not appear to be modified much at all

[pixelboy]

I used to use the coopers liquid extract tins but am halfway thru a 20kg bag of LDME at the moment, a bargin @ $120.00 ($6/kg)

I boil 1kg of the LDME in a 6l pot and hop @ 60min for bittering and @ 20mins for flavour. Then add another 1.5kg LDME when its done. Bring it back to the boil to disolve the LDME, turn it off, add some aroma hops and into the fermentor.

So far its working a treat