Help with nettle beer please

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mikeb185

mikeb185

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Hi all,

I am completely new to brewing so please be gentle! Ha ha.

I've had a go at making some nettle beer but think it has gone wrong some how.

The recipe I used for 6lt batch:
1 full bag of nettle tips
600g sugar
2 lemons
3 tsp of bakers yeast

It started off well and for the first day or so it frothed like mad as to be expected, but after about day 2 it's seemed to stop. At this stage it had a smell like sweet cider.

Today is day 5 and I took a sample to test the sg ( only got a hydrometer today )

It has a strong smell of alcohol but is a very week yellow colour.

The problem is it tastes like stale water with a tiny hint of ale after?

It's very weak and unpleasant.

Where has/ have I gone wrong?

Thanks

image.jpg
 
I've never had a nettle beer, but the recipe doesn't sound very appealing. It seems it would be thin because there is nothing there to add body, and bakers yeast isn't great for brewing. Still, its only day 5 and it should improve.
 
I've never done nettle beer but I put 6L of water and 6oog of sugar into my brewing software and had an OG of 1.038, by your numbers that would make the beer roughly 5%.

It sounds like you haven't given the "beer" time. Give it a week at least in the demijohn and then when you bottle, 2 weeks in the warm an 2 weeks in the cold. You may well find that the flavour developes.

It doesn't sound like an inspiring recipe but it may end up OK.

You'll be doing all grain beer before no time :)
 
I made nettle beer not long ago. My recipe was awful, way too much sugar. Anyway, your colour looks about right. Remember, there's only nettles in it somit will never go proper dark. If you wantmit fizzy you'll have to bottle it somthe co2 can disolve in the liquid. Best if you search on here a bit, theres loads of advice on bottling/carbonating :)

It willmalways be somewhat thin and have no body or crazy excitment to it. The point of making nettle beer is to have bit of a "nature beer" I guess. Try not to compare it to normal beer and it's quite nice :)

Oh and maybe get some brewers yeast...but once you do that you'll get all the other kit and get infected with the brewing bug. Happened to me a month ago and i started with 2l nettle beer...now I've got 23l IPA ans 23l ginger beer brewing :whistle:
 
Thanks guys that's a real help! I think I'll bottle it with some priming sugar tomorrow and see how it goes.

Funny you should say about the brewing bug, I've got all the ingredients ready to make a batch of the fiery ginger beer recipe from on here.

Hoping that will have a bit more of a punch flavour lol
 
mikeb185 said:
Thanks guys that's a real help! I think I'll bottle it with some priming sugar tomorrow and see how it goes.

Funny you should say about the brewing bug, I've got all the ingredients ready to make a batch of the fiery ginger beer recipe from on here.

Hoping that will have a bit more of a punch flavour lol
Click to expand...

I did the fiery ginger beer last weekend. It's fermentinb like a whirlpool so I've got high hopes :grin:. Good luck with yours!
 
SwissBrew said:
I did the fiery ginger beer last weekend. It's fermentinb like a whirlpool so I've got high hopes :grin:. Good luck with yours!
Click to expand...

I'm really hoping for at least 7%, 8% if possible :) I want some knock out juice lol. Any tips for getting it more alcoholic?
 
mikeb185 said:
I'm really hoping for at least 7%, 8% if possible :) I want some knock out juice lol. Any tips for getting it more alcoholic?
Click to expand...

Dilute with vodka? :grin:

I only just started so others will know much better, but i believe you can just add sugar to increase the initial gravity. I think this was mentioned on here in the original fiery ginger beer thread. Logically I would have thought it would then take longer to ferment..not sure tho.
 
mikeb185 said:
Funny you should say about the brewing bug, I've got all the ingredients ready to make a batch of the fiery ginger beer recipe from on here.

Hoping that will have a bit more of a punch flavour lol
Click to expand...

The fiery ginger beer is lovely. It can also be a bit thin, but 1tsp of glycerine per gallon can help with this. Tastes great though.
 
SwissBrew said:
Dilute with vodka? :grin:

I only just started so others will know much better, but i believe you can just add sugar to increase the initial gravity. I think this was mentioned on here in the original fiery ginger beer thread. Logically I would have thought it would then take longer to ferment..not sure tho.
Click to expand...

I have been reading quite a bit about but there doesn't seem to be a definite yes or no answer.....
 
IainM said:
The fiery ginger beer is lovely. It can also be a bit thin, but 1tsp of glycerine per gallon can help with this. Tastes great though.
Click to expand...

Interesting, where can i get glycerine locally? supermarket or does it have to be from a brewing shop?

Do i add it before or after primary fermentation?

Thanks
 

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