Adding Bittering and Aroma Hops to Geordie Lager

[BrewerRS]

Hi All,

Bit of a noob question even though I've been brewing for a while.

I'm doing a Geordie Lager kit again soon, and I want to ramp up the flavour.

Bear with me, I know it's quite a plain, low grade kit BUT...

I got the kit cheap, and I want to add 1KG BKE and 500g light DME + bittering hops and aroma dry hop. What do I do? I imagine I could mix the dme with water and do a mini boil but I haven't done one before.

Which hops should I use, and how much?

I have done this kit before, short to 20L with 1KG BKE and it's ok but very bland and hardly any discernible bitter aftertaste at all!

Help me please :) , I will get on the AG train soon, brew shed pending.

Ryan.

 

[simon12]

Its hard to answer as you don't say how much more bitter you want it or what sort of hop flavour you want, you don't need to boil the DME so you can do the mini boil with just water. Whats BKE?

 

[BrewerRS]

I thought you get better utilisation if you boil hops with wort? I still want it to be fairly light bitterness and aroma wise but the kit as is tastes pretty much of sod all. BKE is Beer Kit Enhancer.

 

[simon12]

I think you get less utilisation the stronger the wort is. Around 20g of a hop around AA 10 in a 20 min boil will give you a light bitterness maybe add another 20g for the last few mins of the boil. To keep it lager ish try magnum for the 20 and Saaz for the last few but you could try any hop you want like Cascade to make it more of an APA or goldings for a UK style.

 

[MmmBeer]

Most lagers stick to traditional Central European aroma hops like Saaz, Hersbrucker, Tettnang etc.

For bittering you can use pretty much any hops, it often comes down to economics; a cheap high AA hop like Magnum, or larger quantities of your aroma hops, to save having to buy a second bag.

Try to avoid adding too much, play with the calculators and Brewers Friend to work out how much to use. I wouldn't go more than 10 IBU's over what's already in the kit.

 

[Nicks90]

That's exactly what I used on a cerveza lager kit, and brewed using cml cali-common yeast.
Turned out great. Really pleasant beer

I think you get less utilisation the stronger the wort is. Around 20g of a hop around AA 10 in a 20 min boil will give you a light bitterness maybe add another 20g for the last few mins of the boil. To keep it lager ish try magnum for the 20 and Saaz for the last few but you could try any hop you want like Cascade to make it more of an APA or goldings for a UK style.

 

[Sandimas]

Here's what I'd do:
- Do a hop boil /steep in 6-8L water with the BKE dissolved in it
- 30g of Hallertau (or Saaz) for 20min
- Another 20g Hallertau added after 10min at the mid-point of the boil
- Turn off heat, wait 10mins, then add another 30g Hallertau and steep for 30min
- Strain and use the liquid to make up the kit
- Brew it short to 20 or 21L

 

[tobyjrn6]

I did exactly this recently, aiming for the classic lager with a lime (or grapefruit if centennial had anything say say about it) wedge - came out great

Think i read somewhere that you need the wort to have some dissolved sugar for proper hop utilisation because enzymes or something so maybe go ahead and dissolve half your bke for the boil.

I steeped 250g carapils to make sure head retention was there (its a bloody delight)
used a 1kg bke
25g ultra for 10 min boil
25g ultra & 10g centennial dry hopped for 5 days - I cant say ive tried hallertau but ultra is supposedly similar to saaz with the same aromatic qualities of hallertau and i like.
brewed to 20l - think i treated ashbeck water with a little bit of epsom salt and gypsum.
Surprisingly big fan given i hate most macro lagers