alcohol content

[bobby]

hi everyone, I have been drinking plenty of home brew lately,My aicohol content has been around 4%/4.3% how can i lift this to5%/5.5% is there a table for this.

[earle]

Hi Bobby

There's a useful calculator here http://www.brewcraft.com.au/wa.asp?idWebPage=9616&idDetails=120

The easiest (but maybe not best) way to increase the alc% of your brews is to add dextrose. 1kg of dextrose in 23L gives 2.8% extra alc% according to the calculator. Dextrose is better than table sugar as table sugar can give a cidery taste in larger quantities. Dextrose will not add extra body to your beer, which may be what you're after.

Another way to increase the alc% is to add more malt extract. Per kg you'll get less alc% from malt (2.1% for a kg a dried malt extract) than dextrose as the malt is not as fermentable, but you'll get more body and flavour from malt. The malt will also increase the sweetness of your brew though so you may need to add a small hop boil to maintain the balance of the sweetness of the malt and bitterness of the hops (and whatevers in the kit you use).

Hope this helps

[bobby]

Htanks Earl,I havn't tried your recipe yet but i did try a brew with hops very not if i like it, your recipe had a lot of hops is a strong hop tast

[barrelboy]

Good reply Earle but I'm now lost with the response??
Cheers BB

[earle]

Bobby is referring to my stone and wood recipe. How strong hops 'taste' is pretty subjective and really depends on what you're used to drinking. However I would say that the hops are noticeable, unlike many mainstream lagers, otherwise there would not be much point in the late additions.

Check this graph out to see what hops add to a brew. http://www.brewsupplies.com/hop_characteristics.htm
In general terms, long boil = bitterness
Medium boil = flavour
Short boil = aroma
so while a recipe may have several additions it doesn't necessarily mean it makes it 'stong' as each addition can contribute something different, rather than just adding more of the same.

[bobby]

Earl when you say about boiling hops do you just boil the time you say our are you,Talking about the boiling hops schedule on the web sit you showd me. to those who read my messages i;am sorry about gramma all this is prety new to me.

[earle]

How much hops you boil and for how long depends on a few things:
- the gravity of your wort
- the alpha acid % of your hops
- how much bitterness you want to 'extract'
- whether you want bitterness, flavour and/or aroma from your hops
- other things that I've probably forgotten to mention

Heres a link to some kit recipes, some of which include small hop boils that might help you get started http://www.grainandgrape.com.au/gg_kit_recipes.htm

Here's a link to a hop calculator, if you have a play on it, it'll help you get an idea of how things work, and you can use it to help plan brews
http://www.grainandgrape.com.au/Calculators/hop_calc.htm

[bobby]

Thanks Earl those web sites,Iam slowly getting there how long have you been brewing for.Iam putting on a lot wait drinking my mistakes but it is not that bad.

[earle]

Ha ha, drinking mistakes, been there. I probably first brewed about 15 years ago but that was just a kit with a kilo of sugar, the bad old days. Its only since I joined this site in 2006 that I started to plan more what was going into a brew, since then the quality has improved immensely. Still plenty of room for improvement.

[earle]

Is anyone else wondering if I'm being trolled??

[drsmurto]

It has crossed my mind

[SuperBroo]

mmmmmm.... someone 'fast' comes to mind...

[Guru]

It has crossed my mind

And mine.

[bobby]

Trolled.mmmm.ok See u later.

[earle]

Trolled.mmmm.ok See u later.

PM sent

[SuperBroo]

Trolled.mmmm.ok See u later.

pm sent as well...