Bad HMEs?

[blaxbear]

Hey folks!
I'm looking to have a good discussion about two MB HMEs that i have seen panned here on the borg and on the other forum. Those HMEs are the Mexican Cerveza and the White IPA seasonal.

I've generally heard bad things about both. I'd like to hear some concrete reasons from those that have brewed and disliked these kits. Are you not a fan of the style in general, or are the kits bad examples of the style?

I personally love white IPAs and though i know many dislike Corona and Landshark, but i think they're great beers for the beach!

[FrozenInTime]

Have not done the white IPA, sounded like a bad idea to me, IMHO. I did the cerveza, it was very thin, lacking in flavor and needed time to be drinkable, IMHO. I will say it tasted at it's best at about 8 weeks in the bottle, I've also heard lots of ppl say the same thing. A slice of lime in the glass made it more drinkable, to me. I have not tried it again so I can't personally say what would be good added to it.

[mashani]

The White IPA doesn't come across as an IPA brewed straight up. It just seems like an extra strong Belgian Wit type of thing, which really disappointed people expecting an actual White IPA. Some folks got fermentations stuck at 1.020 with it too, and that made it even less IPA like. You can turn it into something more like an IPA by hop bursting an ounce or more of hops in some LME/DME and then adding the refill to that. You can dry it out using Bella Saison instead of the T58 that it comes with and that helps too. I've done both and like the result of both modded versions. I'm actually drinking the one that I hop bursted with 1oz of Nelson Sauvin hops right now and I like it a lot. But those are intense hops, and it's nothing like the base HME flavor because of it.

The Mexican Cerveza, I never brewed it straight up because I didn't buy it... I won it in a contest. I was in Frankenbier mode with those cans and turned it into a steam beer using some DME and Northern Brewer and White labs California Lager yeast. That beer was delicious FWIW, so the base HME if nothing else can be turned into something decent. I think it and the Canadian and the CAL and the Oktoberfest are all good choices to be used as a base for something else and end up with good results if you want to just start with an HME to avoid a long bittering boil.

[blaxbear]

Im really interested in the white ipa. What kind of white ipas have you had? I personally enjoy Riptide by heavy seas and whitewater from sam adams. Is the HME not like an IPA because the hops dont stand out or there isnt enough hoppiness to begin with? You say adding hops in the boil will help, and thats something id like to try doing so this might work out well.

As far as the cerveza, would it behoove me to add some lme or dme? I can wait for it to condition for a long time, not really worried abput that, but i would like to get something like Landshark. Is there a MB recipe i havent seen or a clone i could adapt?

[DirtRacer]

I haven't done the white IPA but I got the cerveza and pilsner in a gold premium kit or whatever comes with 2 refills and they both tasted exactly the same to me. Neither one to me tasted like what they were supposed to be. I brewed them straight up and had tried them at 4,6 and 8 weeks conditioning time and then let the rest of the bottles sit for up to 8 months and still didn't like them. Not sure what I did wrong, if I did anything wrong. Maybe using my hard tap water was an issue with them as light as they were. Might have been better to use some spring water.

[blaxbear]

I just saw the El Diablo Blanco IPA. Pretty sure that's what I'll be trying for my white ipa..

[mashani]

The pilsner has a strong Pride of Ringwood (weird woody) taste. It demolishes whatever Saaz is in there and makes it taste nothing like a Bohemian Pilsner. I pretty much hate that extract and would purchase BrewDemon pils over it any day if I want a Pils HME.

Different people have a different threshold for the Pride of Ringwood flavor to be noticed. it's very possible the Cerveza has it too, since Coopers uses that as their primary bittering hop (and yes, you do taste Pride of Ringwood when used as a bittering hop, ignore bittering vs. flavor, you still get flavor). So it's possible that the cerveza has it too. I likely just added enough of my own hops to it to mask it when I made the Steam beer out of it. Northern Brewer is a good choice to cover up that flavor. Simcoe would do it. Columbus/Zeus would do it.

[Bluejaye]

As far as the cerveza, would it behoove me to add some lme or dme? I can wait for it to condition for a long time, not really worried abput that, but i would like to get something like Landshark. Is there a MB recipe i havent seen or a clone i could adapt?

I can only say that the Cerveza was the first HME I made, and it was weak/watery. It got better with time, but I just pulled out the last bottle a few weeks ago from last December, and I still thought it was weak. I definitely would add more DME/LME if I were to ever brew it again (which honestly I kind of want to, just to see how big a difference it is with more UME). Adding some lime to it helps a lot. Now, I'm not exactly a Corona drinker (if someone hands me one, I'd drink it), so I can't really comment as to how true to style it is.

A point for consideration is that I think Mr. Beer's Pilsner (Deluxe) the best one they make. Again, though, I'm not interested so much as to how well it represents a style, but rather if it tastes good to my buds. I do want to try BD's Pilsner, but have almost a years worth of HME's to work through first, since I went hog wild ordering stuff during one of Mr. B's sales.

[blaxbear]

Thanks for the tips! And good luck getting through all those HMEs!

[RickBeer]

The Cerveza is not like a Corona. It's just a weak, watery beer.

[monsteroyd]

My wife likes the Cerveza when I drown it in lime zest and juice. That's the only way I make it. Its ok if you like lime beer.

Monty

[jpsherman]

I also used the cerveza to make a lime beer that was decent. I would say its not so good alone, but a fairly decent base for making fruity beers.

[DaYooper]

Most of the standard refills will be "week and watery" since there isnt a whole lot of fermentables. Nothing a little malt usually cant fix as long as you like the style. Steeping grains will add a little body to boot.

Regarding the white IPA, if you can get over the fact it is NOT a white IPA I think it is quite good and have received many favorable comments on it. Same goes for the El Diablo variant as the Falconer's helps kick up the hoppiness a bit. I've done both as is but lost a bunch of the El Diablo due to a broken spigot (which MrB replaced both recipe and spigot) so when I do the next batch I plan on using Belle Saison yeast and trying both a hop stand and some dry hopping.

[blaxbear]

What happened to your spigot?

[RickBeer]

If you search the Mr. Beer forum, you'll see a bunch of posts about spigots breaking off. Many of them fell off during fermentation, i.e. while the keg was untouched. Mr. Beer says people overtighten the spigot and gave directions - basically put it at 3:00, tighten until barely snug, then tighten 1/4 turn. Every time you take it apart to clean it, examine it closely. Again, the Mr. Beer forum has pics and arrows pointing towards the area that fails. I believe the discussion was that failure was in the low single digits, percentage wise.

If yours does fail, contact Mr. Beer and they will replace the spigot and your lost beer.