Brewing with two malt kits

Brewing beer with two malt extract kits 

As a beer kit brewer - I've often seen brewing forums chatter about brewing with two cans of malt rather than the traditional one can with added sugars such as dextrose.

I thought it was time to do an experiment and see for myself if using solely two kits for a beer would translate into a good tasting beer.

Given two kits can effectively double the cost of your brew, I grabbed two cans of the cheapest kits I could find at the supermarket which just happened to be Cooper's Stout. Having made reasonable brews with Coopers DIY Kits in the past, I was confident I'd be able to make a drinkable beer!

So how did this experiment go down?

One makes the double kit beer wort in the traditional one kit way except the recipe is effectively doubled.

This means I am adding double the usual amount of malt. This means there's going to be a lot of fermentable molecules in the wort, at a higher ratio than normal (standard 1 KG plus roughly 700 grams more).

Given there is hops oil in each can, I am also doubling the hops count of the batch - this will likely mean that the bitterness of the beer will double (well, let's see how that pans out).

What is also happening is that we are not adding any extra sucrose or dextrose (I usually use a beer enhancer to assist with better taste and good mouth feel). I think that is going to have quite an effect on the beer as I noted above that there will be a vastly higher ratio of malt to water than my usual beer kit brews.

Given this, I suspect the Final Gravity will be higher than the norm and I imagine the ABV may be in the range of 5 - 6 percent though that may be pushing it. Even if it's not that high, I'll get a nice sweet brew.

I am also adding double the yeast as having two kits means I've got two sachets. I think I could have got away with just using one packet but figured let's roll the dice and see what happens. It's possible the extra 700 grams of malt could give the yeast some trouble so some extra will probably help.

I added both packets to a glass of warm water so that it was 'activated' before it when into the wort. I'm not hugely convinced this actually makes a massive difference but I've read that it helps where there's a lot of sugars (malt) in the wort.

The Dark Knight watches over the yeast

I prepared the brew after cleaning and sanitizing the fermenter drum and left it overnight in the kitchen where it was warm.

Here's my trick for getting all the malt out of a can without making too much mess:



So how did this experiment work out?

On return from work that evening (so roughly 36 hours) I observed that fermentation had been going really well. This is probably due to having used two yeast sachets as I have never seen this much bubble activity before:



Those dark brown spots you can see are actually yeast clumps that got caught in the foam after fermentation went into hyperdrive (attack of the Krausen!). I grabbed a clean spoon and gently stirred them back into the wort. I then closed the lid back up nice and tight and carried the drum up to the shed where I wrapped it up in a pile of old towels.

It's just settling into spring here so it will not be too cold in the shed. I'll leave it there for a week at least to let the fermentation fully complete. If I'm really patient, I'll leave the brew to settle a bit longer than that.

Let's see how we go.


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And we're back!

It's been just under two weeks since we pitched the yeast into the wort.

I have bottled the beer. A test taste at the time revealed it has quite a strong flavor and it smelt really 'heavy'. It also had a very 'Coopers' taste to it. It appeared to be a nice dark brown color.

Let's wait another couple of weeks before we do a taste test once the bottles have carbonated and conditioned.

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Time for a drink?

Spring has kicked in quite nicely so there should have been a fairly even brewing / conditioning temperature (other than night and day changes).

The verdict:

This is a 'fair beer' and with another two weeks of conditioning, it will be a very enjoyable beer.

It's malty as fuck. That should really be no surprise eh?

Having drunk the whole glass fairly quickly, I get the impression the beer has an ABV higher than the brews I usually make (around 4 per cent ABV) so I would suspect it's over 5 but not close to 6. Yes, yes, I should have done some gravity readings...

This double malt kit brew would have benefitted definitely from some additional hops such as Goldings or Fuggles. This mostly is because Coopers is simply a 'stock standard' beer kit.

Given this is the first Cooper's stout I've brewed, I'm fairly happy with how the beer has turned out.

The beer had little head as I suspect I slightly under sugared the batch for the secondary carbonation.

In terms of economy, the two kits cost about 35 bucks (NZ price) whereas a usually single can and enhancer combo would cost around 27 - so the question is whether the extra 8 bucks makes enough of a difference to the brew?  If one is trying for a higher than usual ABV stout, then yes, especially one that is dripping with malty tones!

Leave a Comment abv, beer kit, beer kit review, malt, stout

Brewing with a Mangrove Jack's Stout Kit Review

After my relatively successful effort with the Mangrove Jack's Dutch Lager kit (review), I thought I'd have a crack at their Irish Stout.

Brewed in the normal good manner of proper sanitization, careful cleanliness and a half-assed attempt to keep the brew warm during these winter months by wrapping it in several sheets, I am expecting a stock standard stout but I'm quite keen to compare it to Black Rock's Miner's Stout as I've brewed a fair few of those in the past year and found them to be excellent brews.

I'm keen to see how creamy the kit is.

I prepared the kit and added a beer enhancer that was specifically tailored to a stout and then left the unit in my shed outside to ferment.

During fermentation in the shed, we had our first winter frost. Not ideal for an ale but whatever.

I waited 10 days before conditioning at which point I batched primed with 70 mls of sugar that I dissolved in boiling water.

Honestly, batch priming makes it so easy to get a consistent brew across the batch and reduce the chances over an over-sugared bottle doing a gusher. I don't know why I was so reluctant to do so!

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So it's now been over a week since I bottled condition, so I'm going to have a sneaky sample. I left the beer in the fridge overnight so the ale was nice and cold. It felt like it had a good body and it tasted like an ale but one that clearly needed to condition a fair bit longer.

So we wait.

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Week 2. A wee sample after a nice chicken korma proved to be an odd, but a rewarding combination. The stout has settled somewhat.

Detected a hint of coffee which I expect will be gone in a week or two.

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Week  3. This beer has turned out OK, I've made enough beers to know that if I give this batch another month to the condition it will be fine but nothing to write home about. I suspect I over sugared the batch as the beer gets quite the head when being poured. I'd say 50 to 60 grams probably suits.

The slight coffee notes remain.

Given this was actually the cheapest beer kit I've ever bought, the resulting beer is pretty fair. I do however prefer the Black Rock Miner's Stout over this.

Leave a Comment black rock, mangrove jack's, stout

Review of 'Dry Stout' Kit by Williams Warn

So are these dry stout kits worthing using?

Having had a fairly good experience with the WilliamsWarn's 'Bohemian Pilsner' homebrew kit, I thought I'd give their 'Dry Stout' a go.

If you think of Irish stout's like Guinness or Murphy's, that's the ballpark we are in.

The product maker makes this claim:

"Our Dry Stout has a black appearance from the crystal malts, roasted malts and roasted barley employed in the grain mix. The result is a great Dry Stout that has liquorice, roasted coffee and chocolate flavours dominating."

Getting ready on the kitchen bench!

Will I be able to make a beer that matches this claim?

Let's find out!

I did the basic preparation as you do for kits.

Basically, I followed my own beer making guide!

I left my wort to sit in a fermenter in my garden shed. As winter was starting to settle in, I took measures to ensure the temperature remained consistent by wrapping the fermenter with a few old painting sheets.

By controlling the temperature during fermentation, you can produce a better tasting beer. The cooler temperatures of winter can be an ideal time to brew, as long as you take precautions to maintain a consistent temperature. In my case, I was able to create an optimal environment for my beer to ferment by using a simple technique of wrapping the fermenter with old painting sheets.

The fermenter started bubbling within 24 hours and stopped doing so around day 4 or 5.

I bottled 8 days after getting the beer down. I didn't taste it but it had a nice smell, perhaps one more noticeable than many other brews I've previously done. 

And now we wait.

So while we wait for the stout to bottle condition, let's shoot the breeze about a few other things.

What was the yeast used for the stout?

The yeast that came with the beer kit was a 11g pack of Fermentis S-04 yeast.

This yeast is often used with English ales. It's an adaptable yeast that actually suits a range of ales (you could use it with a nut brown ale for example) and is known for its ability to form a compacted sediment at the bottom of the fermenter. This is awesome as when bottling there's less chance of sediment getting into your finished beer, giving you the oft prized clear beer.

Fermentis recommend that their yeast should be added to the wort when it is above 20 degrees centigrade. Frankly, after I filled the fermenter with water from the garden hose, I just pitched in it!

I've read that the kit also sometimes comes with the Danstar Nottingham ale yeast.

With the kit and same branded Light Dry Malt Extract, I paid 44 dollars which is a bit on the steep side, if you ask me. The DME cost 20 bucks! Nearly as much as the kit as itself.

So I guess the idea is that Williams Warn is supposed to be a 'premium beer kit' producer. Actually, the prices on Amazon are about the same as what I paid so go figure.

But to be frank, when I made the Bohemian Pilsner I didn't notice any real difference in quality say compared to a Mangrove Jacks or Coopers kit. I'm actually pretty sure that most kits on the market these days are quite suitable kits for brewing with.

But enough of this 'chit chat'.

The tasting results are in.

First up, I brought a few bottles in from the shed after a couple of weeks conditioning and left them in the fridge for two nights.

I then opened and slowly poured into a long glass. The beer smelled really good and was a nice dark colour, just the kind one would expect. A small but creamy looking head formed which bode well for the taste test.

And I gotta say, this was a pretty good darn beer. It had some thick body and it felt like it was heavy enough to count as a stout. The Williams Warn kit had delivered.

But did it deliver on the promise of making beer in which "liquorice, roasted coffee and chocolate flavours" dominate?

It's a romantic description but in a sense it's true.

While I certainly haven't detected any liquorice notes, the coffee and chocolate notes where present but they are not pronounced.

I can't help but wonder if this brew would have been better if I had used oak chips to give it some flavour boost.

Review Verdict: Recommend you have a crack. Order the kit from Amazon today.

You can also check out the time I made a double beer kit stout!

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