• Welcome to the new forum! We upgraded our forum software with a host of new boards, capabilities and features. It is also more secure.
    Jump in and join the conversation! You can learn more about the upgrade and new features here.

A maltitude of questions...Priming with malt exract?

beercheez

Apprentice
Joined
Nov 7, 2006
Messages
9
Reaction score
0
      I am about to bottle some nice bitter (real ale) I have just brewed from a pure grain recipe recomended by the helpful brewers at beersmith, ( it smells absolutely fantastic by the way, so cheers Fred!) I don't want the beer to be too gassy, I want just enough secondary fermentation to preserve the beer for a month or two. I was going to add a 1/4 tsp of granulated cane sugar for each 26oz bottle, but it occured to me that instead I could dissolve some pure malt extract (available from my local health food store) and use that as a primer instead. Has anybody done this before? If so, what amount of the malt extract should I use for a five gallon (imperial) batch of beer?
                                                Thanks everyone, Chuck.
 
DME is less fermentable than corn sugar.  ( I use corn sugar) 

You need about 6 oz of of DME for 5 gal. If you use corn sugar you only need 4.5 oz.

Boil it in about a pint of water then add it to the bottle bucket and rack the beer onto it.  The action of the transfer will mix the primer for you.

There is a ton of debate about DME V. sugar.  I have done both and other than needing a little more DME I have noticed no diff.

Don
 
When using it for carbonation there is very little impact on the flavor of your beer, almost always (just because I hesitate to say always) undetctable.  I use corn sugar when I prime.

BTW did you hit your numbers on the brew?

Fred
 
Thanks for the advice Don, since I have primed beer before with sugar, I am trying the malt extract this time and followed your amounts for the batch of beer. I'll let you know what I think.
  Hey Fred, after I boiled the wort for just over an hour I was left with 4.25 gallons of liqour which the hydrometer read at 1.045. I elected to put some boiled and cooled water into the fermentation bin to bring the quantity to an even five gallons. This made the final gravity at this stage 1.040 which was still a little high for the recipe estimations.(1.038)
    It occured to me that because I was straining the grains of malt through a muslin bag which was squeezed dry each time I could be getting a higher sugar concentration than simply letting the wort drain off (which is how I imagine you professionals do it in a proper mash tun). At any rate, the last reading I have just now taken after bottling is 1.005 so according to the instructions with my hydrometer this means my batch of beer will probably be about 4.7% alcohol. Does that seem about right for these figures?
        Thanks alot, Chuck.
 
Back
Top