Kit Review: Tom Caxton Real Ale (customised)

[Beer Elzibub]

This was a Christmas present, I asked for a cheaper kit that I could customise. Made this one-can kit up with light spray malt instead of sugar to get a decent OG of 1050. This kit comes with a hop extract sachet and advises you can choose the amount to add. I added about 3/4 of the sachet as was customising with my own addition of Savinjski Goldings (pellets) 50g as a hop tea added to the FV and 50g dry hop during fermentation. After 2 weeks it had settled at SG 1017 for a notional 4.33% ABV. Carbonated with 45g leftover spray malt and 65g sugar. Conditioned 2 weeks in bottles and then into cold storage.

Tastings during fermentation and at bottling were "average" but on cracking open the first bottle this is a decent pint of (slightly dark) bitter. It's improving a bit on storage (about 3 weeks now) and is very drinkable - a touch malty - albeit not especially characterful. If I did it again I'd add the full hop sachet and pick some more characterful hops. Will be a good staple beer.

 

[dad_of_jon]

This was the first beer I ever made. it left a dry mouth puckering astringency which I suspect was down to not fully rinsing all cleaner off. I switched to starsan and the next beer (my own made up extract recipe) was a great improvement.

 

[Beer Elzibub]

This was the first beer I ever made. it left a dry mouth puckering astringency which I suspect was down to not fully rinsing all cleaner off. I switched to starsan and the next beer (my own made up extract recipe) was a great improvement.

No dry mouth here, so it probably was the cleaner. I’m moving on to extract recipes myself next, then probably a small scale all-grain later in the year.

 

[dad_of_jon]

No dry mouth here, so it probably was the cleaner. I’m moving on to extract recipes myself next, then probably a small scale all-grain later in the year.

It was almost 10 years ago and still learn new stuff even now . I do some partial AG's but usually DME/DWE. An extract wheat beer is particularly quick and easy to do. Welcome to the journey down the rabbit hole.