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Making a "Kit" Red Ale Better
Today is my first day on the site and I'd like to pose a question. I bought a Red Ale Kit, which I've used before, but I wanted to jazz it up since it's kinda bland. I've been reading discussions about dry-hopping and my question is: Would an addition of, maybe Sterling, or another hop after 5 or 6 days in the primary improve the Red Ale? I like a hoppy, rustic flavor, and the posts I've read sound like dry-hopping is for me, but I've never tried it before. Any helpful comments or directions are greatly appreciated!
Dry hopping will increase hop aroma thus increasing hop flavor in your beer. Its as easy additional step you can add to your brewing process. I tend to dry hop my American pale ales, ambers and IPAs. If you post the kit's recipe/ingredients then we can offer some specific suggestions.
First off, welcome to the site. Lotsa good folk here.
Let's also ask, by improving the Red Ale, what tastes are you referring to?
I.E. what would you like different?
Taste is a matter of, uh, taste. So, an improvement to one can be the opposite to another.
Who's kit?
Psssttt, (whispers) hey buddy, try puttin the zest of half an orange into the primary for an additional week after fermentation stops, and maybe a half ounce of casecade in a hopsock for the same duration. Dont tell anybody you did it, then have your friends try it. Watch their face, then go visit the mack and jack's thread.
Seriously, there are a number of different options you can do to "kick it up a notch" for that type of profile. I would suggest everything in moderation and see how you like the difference, then maybe next time adjust from there. Almost like seasoning a soup, add about 80% of what you think you need, then if you need more flavor later, you can always add it. But if you go overboard in the beginning, you may ruin it altogether and get turned off of something that may have been brilliant.
And welcome!
Welcome! Lots of great people and great ideas here. If you are really up for some experimentation get a bunch of gallon glass jugs, split your batch up and "spice" up each batch with different extras or varying amounts of the same stuff.
Have a good time with it.
When in doubt age it.
ID
First, welcome. Ask many questions and you'll be as good as bruguru in no time.
Next:
Get the freshest ingredients you can. So if you have brewed the kit before I'd suggest buying the ingredients separetly from the shop you go to. Mainly getting the hops fresh out of the cooler vs whats been sitting in a box since the kit got packages will help.
If the kit doesn't use any grains for steeping, I'd think about doing that too. It always seems to freshen up the taste of extract kits. (If you post the kit recipe and it has things like Amber extract in it someone here will help convert it to an appropriate balance of grains to base extract.)
Lastly, what ever yeast you are using... pitch two packages of it. And do your best to keep the temperature steady while it ferments.
post that recipe and you'll be making a great Red ale in no time.
Cheers
Thanks to all who gave me a response and a welcome! The kit is Brewer's Best which includes: 6.6 lb light LME, 8 oz crystal 120L, 1 oz chocolate, 1 oz. each (bittering and aroma) Williamette hops, and 11 grams Nottingham yeast. Other notes: IBU's 19-23, O.G. 48-52, ABV 5-5.5% for 5 gallons. I do not use a secondary fermenter. And for now, I bottle. This may be my last "kit", but I don't want to waste it. I'm encouraged by what I've read on the posts to try new recipes without relying on kits. Purchased beers I like are Founder's Centennial, Sheltowee Hop-A-Lot, and I've always liked Beck's Dark. I've been to Seattle and loved Mac & Jack's and I intend to try bruguru's clone recipe next (except 5 gal., not 10).
Might also take a look at some brewing software. You can use a simple version of BeerTools for free, or buy the upgrade, or BeerSmith. My personal favorite. Makes putting recipes together easy & fun.
I agree with Brewchez and Thirsty.
Get the freshest ingredients you can. The LHBS I get my supplies from has kits and they have the grains already crushed and bagged and measured. Nice, but you don't know how long the grains have been sitting in those boxes after they've been crushed. The fresher the ingredients the better the beer will taste.
Also when Thirsty mentioned adding the orange zest and hops he was right. it will add a lot of good flavor, the orange zest can be fresh or you can buy dried orange peel at your homebrew supply or online at midwest homebrew supply.
Read that thread about the Mack and Jacks we have going on here. It's outstanding. fantastic beer. you can make it as an extract grains combonation.Being a beginner though looking at that thread might hinder your growth as once you make that mack and jacks you might not want to bother with making other beers.LOL.
as others said, post your recipe and we can go from there.
Welcome
DC
I'd go with adding orange zest. It should help it be a bit more flavorful, without going overboard.
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