Coopers, Australian Pale Ale Review

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Pearlfisher

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I'm interested to read the review on this one , I can't decide whether to do this one with a can of 1.5kg Cooper's light malt extract or try the same with the Better Brew IPA kit. :hmm:
 
I wil post a review when I can free up some equipment and space, I will then get mine on the go. I was hoping that someone else on the forum may have brewed this kit already
 
I wasn't too fond of this one, there wasn't that much taste in at all. Mixed the kit with 550g of Light DME and 250g of caster sugar (sucrose). Light fruitiness but not enough of it and a mild bitterness, aroma smelt of sulphur for awhile then improved after a few weeks. Could be the sugar I added :oops: . Probably could do with 1kg of Light DME instead.
 
I brewed this one about 6 weeks ago. Used 1kg light DME. It really needs a minimum of 6 weeks to mature but I find it just ok. There is it much taste. If I did it again I would definetly add some more hops to it and dry hop it but I do like them hoppy!
 
i have about 10 pints of this left, i used the Coopers brew enhancer 2. half the bottles were primed with white sugar, and the other half were primed with demarera. the white suger ones had a slighty bitter taste, with a good head, whereas the demarera ones were slighty darker, with a sweeter, nuttier flavour, and took a lot longer to condition.

in both cases you could tell it was a homebrew kit, but it is by far the best one i've done.

i brewed up another last night, using brew enhancer 2, and 250g of demarera sugar, hopefully it will turn out good.
 
I brewed this one at christmas time and tipped it down the sink yesterday after giving up on it.

I used coopers brew enhancer instead of sugar and primed with carbonation drops, after 3 months they were flat as a pancake but when i binned it they had gassed up but were undrinkable. It wasn't an infection-type taste, just a really strong "homebrew" taste and smell which overpowered everything else. Not sure why it went wrong as i stuck to the process religiously :hmm:

Anyway after a few months when i realised it probably wasnt going to work out i bought another kit and it is currently 2 weeks old in bottles, will give it another week and try one. I'd read good reviews on this so hopefully it will come good this time.
 
Update on this.

Just tried the first bottle from my second attempt at this and it's much better :thumb:

Brewed to 22 litres with 1kg brew enhancer and batch primed with 100g white sugar. After bottling it sat at room temp for 2 weeks then somewhere cooler for 10 days so far, popped it in the fridge for an hour first before drinking.

It poured with a good inch of frothy head and had a nice aley smell to it, unlike the first attempt which just smelled home brewey and yeasty. Tasted like a proper beer too - my first thought was that i would be happy to buy this in a pub. The 100g sugar i used for priming is probably about perfect for my tastes, though I think i'd prefer it properly chilled before drinking.

Will only get better from here so after this first taste i'd recommend it :cheers:

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This (and other Coopers) was on offer in my Tesco the other day for about £6 with a good date on too!
 
This was my first kit brew about a month ago. I did the kit with 1KG of brew enhancer 2, and fermented it for 14 days (it had reached FG in about 5 days, but I left the yeasties to tidy up).

I batch primed it with 120g of white sugar, dissolved in some boiling water, and bottled.

2 weeks after bottling, I thought I better have a little try, to make sure everything was going ok (well, you do, don't you? :party: )

I have to say, I'm quite impressed. It's not going to win any depth of flavour awards, but it had a reasonable fizziness and was a refreshing pint. I would definitely do this again, and will be as I managed to snaffle another when Tesco did their half-price thing a while back.

Looking forward to seeing how it develops over the next few weeks.

:cheers:
 
I've heard several people recommend this kit for tweaking, and I have used it to make a citrus ale which turned out very nice. Never actually brewed it on it's own though. I really ought to try it to see how it turns out. It probably helps to know what you're starting from if you adapt a kit.
 
Just bottled this one, seemed to smell nice when bottling :cheers:
Will report back in a few weeks when I open one :)
 
I dry hopped this with a handful of Chinooks and primed with carb drops. Had first bottle last week which smelt great, was very refreshing but nice and hoppy! A little flat but then it has only been conditioning for a couple of weeks. Agree that it may have been a little bland without the extra hops.
 
Hi guys,

i bought this and BE2 yesterday with a view to getting it on soon.

However, looking through the reviews, people are saying there is not too much taste to it.

Would i be better foregoing the BE2 and putting this in with a kg of light malt?

Also, i have some cascade hops. I was thinking of a hop tea for this using the tin and possibly dry hopping after several days in the fv.

With regard to the dry hopping, are you ok just to launch them into the fv or should i use a muslin bag?

There seems to be differing opinions
 
I found it best using half kilo BE and half kilo light spray malt.
adding extra hops if you like but you then change it from a Pale Ale a little but do whatever you like. If dry hopping its immaterial how you add them loose and you have the problems of bits floating around , in a bag you have the extra worry of contamination.
 
yep the aussies would...

its a bit like the 0200am good idea meal after a skinfull of ale... fried peas or instead of eating bread hows about eating yeast flour water and then jump about a bit...
 
Just thought I'd report back, another 4 weeks in the bottle and I'm having trouble keeping visitors hands off of it.

It tastes more like a nice lager than an ale, but chilled in the fridge is perfect. I'm glad I got another when tesco did their half price malarky a few months back. From memory it isn't quite as hoppy as the Coopers retail version, but it isn't far off.

If you are a kit brewer looking for this sort of beer, then I recommend you give it a go. Follow the instructions and you won't be disappointed.
 
good to know, i made mine exactly as yours with the BE2.

It is 1 week in the fv and i will keep it there for a second prior to bottling.

So you reckon 6 weeks after bottling it is getting good?

I was going to add coopers carb drops to the bottles for carbonation, but i am concerned on the whole fizz factor!!

How much sugar did you allow per bottle for this?

From your post i reckon that that is about 2.6g per 500ml bottle, based on 23 litres recovered.

Apparently the coopers drops are roughly 3.2g so that should be there or thereabouts.
 
Hi Barry,

It's drinkable after about two weeks in the bottle, but it is definitely worth waiting the extra month - the bubbles are finer and last longer in the glass, and any hint of a yeasty residue disappears.

I used 120g for 22L (after leaving the trub at the bottom of the primary FV), so it's going to be around 2.7g per 500ml - for my tastes it was fine as I prefer a mild fizz, but could easily take the extra 0.5g if you wanted to use the drops.

I batch primed using my bottling FV (basically an FV with a little bottler tap attached to the bottom) as it was easier - I just dissolved the sugar in 100ml of water, brought it to the boil, then put it in the FV and syphoned the beer onto it, making sure it was well but gently mixed.

That way I knew I was getting an even carbonation, as I was using a mix of 300ml, 330ml, 500ml and 660ml bottles (whatever friends and family saved for me!). Way too complex and confusing to try and bottle prime that lot.
 
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