DME Brewing

[Merlin5054]

Happy New Year to All

My first post here - I've just read in Graham Wheeler's Book - British Real Ale 3RD Edition (pg 10) that Dried Malt Extract has less of a Malt Extract Tang ( or dare I say a Home Brew Tang !? ) is this true? - I'm considering having a go using it - anyone got a recipe/ingredients to enable this.

I have just purchased the Pinter1 Barrel/system and will use this to do a DME brew

My first Brew With Pinter1 after a 7 day fermentation with the ''Von Tap'' brew produced a final sg of 1.020 what went wrong here - decided to extend fermentation an extra 4-5 days - thoughts anyone...joe

 

[Lee111]

Hello,

I used to have a pinter and I had the same issue with all 9 brews thatI done. I changed the yeast and I got a little better FG however it still wasn’t great.

As an experiment I used two Pinter press and put it into a normal fermenter and changed the yeast. I was then able to control the temperature doing this. This they gave me a better FG. I had to then put the beer into bottles and carb it up that way.

Sorry I couldn’t be more helpful

 

[MrRook]

The twang is from using old lme. Dme lasts better.

 

[DavidDetroit]

Same thought as above.
LME is great if it's fresh but I don't have a way to keep track of how my LHBS handles storage and age of the LME so I go 100% DME. Whenever LME is called for in a recipe, I substitute .8 DME for 1 LME.
Personally, I find DME easier to work with except for its tendency to go airborne/fly everywhere--can't emphasize just how powdery that stuff is. First couple times, I made the kitchen floor a little sticky. My solution is to go slowly, zero aggressive dumping. I empty the DME gently into a steel mixing bowl and lower just above boiling wort and add. If you know DME, you know it will cake with the steam. For that I use a ladle and rinse into the wort.
I also will buy DME for near-exact amounts so as not to have leftovers. You can certainly store it properly and for a long time if you know what you're doing but, for me, it's just easier to have none left over.

 

[dad_of_jon]

I very rarely use LME on if it's part of a kit. DME and DWE are my preferred goto's. They keep very well unless a bag bursts in transit then its a PITA

 

[DavidDetroit]

DWE

What's that?

 

[soupdragon]

Dried wheat extract? Might be wrong though.

Cheers Tom

 

[dad_of_jon]

What's that?

Dried Wheat Extract

 

[Merlin5054]

Questions questions - why do we not boil LME as used in the regular canned brew kits and do we also not boil the substituted DME for the LME - also when DME is substituted in a recipe why is less used...joe

 

[soupdragon]

Questions questions - why do we not boil LME as used in the regular canned brew kits and do we also not boil the substituted DME for the LME - also when DME is substituted in a recipe why is less used...joe

Regarding the quantity used. The dried extract has had the water content removed so is more concentrated. As @DavidDetroit has mentioned, he uses 80% compared to LME the missing 20% being the water that was removed during the drying process.

Regarding the need (or not) to boil. The wort evaporation process is done under a vacuum. Under vacuum liquids will boil at a much lower temperature. So it has already been boiled.

Cheers Tom

 

[jof]

I like DME. I used it all the time back when I did stovetop partial mash brewing.
But yes, it does clump & takes quite a bit of stirring to get it dissolved

 

[Worf]

I like DME. I used it all the time back when I did stovetop partial mash brewing.
But yes, it does clump & takes quite a bit of stirring to get it dissolved

I've actually never had a problem with clumping providing there's a constant stir while adding the DME. LME, on the other hand, can really screw-up the bottom of the pan if not added rather slowly.

 

[DavidDetroit]

I still use an hour to make an extract w/grain batch. It's only an hour and I'm not in a rush. I'm sure the no-boil is great but I don't feel like converting recipes for that method, hop-wise. I do add most of the DME late.
I use up to 5kg of DME in my Belgian Triple and that amount does want to foam up for a while so I keep a close eye on it. Eventually it settles down completely.

 

[Victor Churchill]

I've used DME occasionally as a booster for a kit, in combination with brewing sugar (dextrose) - I did find it clumped terribly but could get round the worst of it by pre-mixing the dry ingredients so that the sugar and malt were added at the same time. Kind of like pre-mixing sand and cement before adding to water.

 

[DavidDetroit]

It does clump but it melts on it's own. It might be that doing an hour boil makes that quality unimportant.

 

[MrRook]

Same thought as above.
LME is great if it's fresh but I don't have a way to keep track of how my LHBS handles storage and age of the LME so I go 100% DME. Whenever LME is called for in a recipe, I substitute .8 DME for 1 LME.
Personally, I find DME easier to work with except for its tendency to go airborne/fly everywhere--can't emphasize just how powdery that stuff is. First couple times, I made the kitchen floor a little sticky. My solution is to go slowly, zero aggressive dumping. I empty the DME gently into a steel mixing bowl and lower just above boiling wort and add. If you know DME, you know it will cake with the steam.

I put my dme into a bowl and scoop it out a cup at a time and keep the main amount clear of the steam.

 

[DavidDetroit]

I put my dme into a bowl and scoop it out a cup at a time and keep the main amount clear of the steam.

Aaah, I like it. Great idea.
Dang stuff is like powdered, powdered sugar. I've sent more streams of it in the air than I care to count.

 

[soupdragon]

I've read that it mixes in better with cold water but I don't use it now so can't confirm or deny. The only time I've ever used it (many moons ago) it clumped like a proper clumpy thing with hot wort. Didn't know about the cold water trick then

Cheers Tom

 

[Redwulf]

You want about 1-2kg of DME for 6L pinter batch and assuming a boil of about 60 mins I reckon about 8.5L of water

This is a DME version of my favourite recipe adjusted for a pinter.

Fermentables
1kg Light DME
0.25kg Wheat DME

8.5L Water

Hop Additions
5g Amarillo @ 60 mins
5g Amarillo @ 15 mins
5g Amarilo @ 5 mins
10g Amarillo - 15 min @ Hop Stand

Yeast
5-6g of US-05

It comes about 32 ibus and 5.5% if I did it correctly. You may need to top it up a bit depending on your boil loss

 

[Merlin5054]

Redwulf - I've been looking for an all DME Brew thanks - I will try your recipe after my Pinter1 Von Tap is bottled

Please point me to other other recipe's

I'm also going to do ''Small Batch All Grain Brewing'' using kits from ''alesmithinghomebrew'' from Paul Morgan shop Nr Malpas Cheshire - £10/kit brews 8 pints will add a hand full of DME or how much you recon to bring this up to Pinter1's 10pint volume - picked up a couple of kits today - sumert todo during this semi lockdown - will report back in a month !! ...joe