What next...??

[Beer]

After my first batch of corona style beer what sort of refreshing style beers or lagers can you fellow homebrewers recommend for the coming summer months.

Am a bit of a fan of the european style lagers, after saying that i can and have drunk many different syles of beer over the years but not alot of homebrew...!! So what can you guys recommend ? I am open to all suggestions.

Thanks.

[Kevnlis]

Do you want to stick to Lagers or are Ales alright?

Ales are much easier to brew at home and generaly give a better result.

Do you like hoppy beers or more of a malt fan?

[warra48]

This is my personal view only, so don't shoot me down in flames etc etc etc.

Quality lagers are difficult to brew, and to get a really acceptable result (this is different to a drinkable result!) a lot of brewers will say you have to brew AG, and invest time and temperature control. It is my view the difference between an acceptable commercial lager and a well brewed HB lager is not that great and, for me, not worth the investment in time and trouble. I might buy only about up to about a dozen or so stubbies of the locally brewed Wicked Elf Pilsner a year for the few times I feel like a lager.

My preferred beer is ale. IMHO, you can get much more of a quality improvement over commercially available beers if you brew ales. I brew AG, but only ales (american, english, and brown), dunkelweizens and hefeweizens. I get my kick out of both malt and hops. There is nothing better, for me, than an ESB brewed with Maris Otter as the base, a good dollop of crystal, some choc malt for colour, and a healthy dollop of English hops or even with Saaz B, delicious.

[Chris]

Very little is as easy to brew, or quite as tasty as a nice pale ale. Tasty, and very refreshing.

A wheat beer is also a pretty good option- easy, fresh and tasty.

[Lachy]

I'd second the suggestion to try ales. They are easy to brew - far easier than lagers - and go down a treat in all weathers. An American Pale Ale like Little Creatures is a fave drop of mine, and if you follow Boonie's LCPA recipe, it's well within the grasp of even beginning brewers. However, if you want to keep it really simple (and still work within the style), a Pale Ale can, a kilo of LDME and some Cascade or Amarillo hops in a five or ten minute boil will get you a nice little quaffer.

If you want to try a kit lager, Coopers European seems quite alright, although will need a bit of bottle aging to come up to scratch. If you want to try a lager with an unusual flavour, something a bit like Knappstein Reserve (sort of passionfruity, really quite unique) is actually quite simple. I did the following with very pleasing results...

1 x Brewcraft Munich Lager
1kg LDME
25g Nelson Sauvin @ 15 min
Saflager S-23

[timmy]

I'd have a shot at the wheat beers for a really good refreshing summer brew.

A simple one is:
1 x Thomas Coopers Wheat
1 x 1.5kg Coopers Liquid Wheat Malt
WB-06 dry weizen yeast

A cracker and really easy to brew. Just make sure you keep the ferment temp 20 degrees or under (you could probably go to low 20's but it depends on whether you like the banana esters or not...)

Cheers,

Tim

[Beer]

Love the ideas of the wheat beers and the ales. Some intersting receipies to look at there. Never really thought you could go this in depth with home brew beer. Great that there is the avaiability to by all the differnt hops and yeast here.

However, i know it seems to be a bit of general feel that it is a waste of time brewing lager as home brew but I would love to be able to brew a real great tasting lager. If only to sit on the balcony after a hard days graft in the height of the summer, clean, crisp and refreshing.....

What are the basic rules in fermentation for lager or pilsner brewing, and is there a specific yeast type that would benefit..??

Thanks again for the ideas, great forum this as a newcomer to the homebrew scene. So many helpfull hints.

[Chris]

As far as lagers go, you can brew very good ones, and as long as you have a fridge, you can make excellent ones. But a fridge is pretty necessary, simply to give you the ability to lager the beer at low temperature.

Any noble hop is good for lagers (hallertau, herz, saaz etc), and saaz is a great hop for pilsners.

As far as yeast, the 34/70 is probably the way to go, aside from using liquid yeast.

[Zuma]

http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter10.html

[drtom]

+1 for wheat beers.

My mainstay beers are wheat kit + malt & hops. Fermented with K97 or T58. The T58 give a really nice spicy aroma to the beer, but results in a somewhat more intense beer, so the K97 is better for a summer afternoon.

T.