Brewer's Best Trad. Euro Bock

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Travisty

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Anyone ever made this kit? I just cracked my first bottle open (my first homebrew as well) and it tastes pretty good, but it does seem a little thin. I know that my OG came out a bit low at 1.051 after I topped the wort off to 5 gallons with water, so I wonder if it's a bit watered down because of that? I don't have the instructions around anymore, but I think the OG should have been in the 1.060's.


I'm curious what anybody else's experience has been with this kit.
 
A bock should start about 1.058+, so that was a little low, but still a bock should be about the taste, not the OG. Bock's should feel "thick" to me. Thin might be because of the low OG. To me a bock is all about the water, and that it comes from "spring water". By spring water, I don't mean natural springs, but melting ice water from springtime. Growing up, we only used to see them around spring/easter time. I'm still pretty young at 39, so I don't want to give the impression of wisdom yet, by saying "growing up", but around my area in western canada, we only got bock beer at easter.

It was always dark, and very malty...in short very VERY nice.

Sorry, but I haven't done that kit. I'm just waxing poetic about bock beers.
 
Actually, just about every beer is about water. I personally use Distilled water for extract kits as most extracts are condensed from water that meets the style guidelines. When I do all grain I use my tap water and add minerals to try to mimic the style if my water chemistry is too far out of whack.


Now, in regards to your Bock. To mimic a true Bock will be sort of tough with the Brewer's Best kits. You will make a decent beer but more than likely not one that will closely resemble a traditional Bock. To meet the style of a Bock the OG should be between 1.064-1.072 with the average around 1.070 with a FG of 1.013-1.019


A German Bock Lager or Bavarian Lager yeast should be used. Notice I said Lager yeast? A Bock is a lager. You need lager this beer to bring out the traditional Bock flavors that are rich, clean and malty. The lagering contributes to the clean, crisp flavor. Bock should be fermented at 50 degrees F.


So, from what I would guess from your description your "thinness" in flavor would come from a low OG, not a yeast for the style if you used what came with the kit and restrained flavor profiles from not lagering. The length of time bottling conditioning and actual hops utilizationcan affect body as well. The kit should of had a high alpha (13%) Magnum hops.


Your flavors are probablygoing to match more to an amber or brown ale which are tasty but not as rich as a Bock. Who cares though, Chill it and enjoy it. You didn't do anything wrong at all. It is just the restraints of the particular kit.I am currently drinking an all grainMunich Dunkel where I didn't hit the style profile as it came out too sweet. I didn't lager it long enough. I should of went a couple more weeks.
 
You're right smurfe, the flavor is more of a brown ale to my untrained palate, though the color is much darker than what I've seen brown ales at. The kit came with 1 oz. cluster hops (AA 6.1%) for bittering and 0.5 oz. Saaz (AA 4.4%) for finishing. Not quite the high AA you're talking about! I did use tap water as well. Next kit I do, I'll use distilled water.
I don't think I would buy this beer again if I had purchased it, but, like you said, I'm enjoying it regardless. Fruits of my labor and all that.
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Next time I try a bock, I'll probably put the "kit" together myself using the correct hops, the correct lager yeast, and I'll lager it. I'm not quite ready to go all-grain yet, but I'll try to get as close as I can using extracts!
 
Oh yeah, also, this has only been in the bottle 2 weeks. I'm curious to see how it changes as it sits a few more weeks since there's no way I can drink 50+ bottles of beer that fast!
 
Travisty said:
Oh yeah, also, this has only been in the bottle 2 weeks. I'm curious to see how it changes as it sits a few more weeks since there's no way I can drink 50+ bottles of beer that fast!


Sure you can. You just open them one at a time and drink until gone!
 
appleman said:
Travisty said:
Oh yeah, also, this has only been in the bottle 2 weeks. I'm curious to see how it changes as it sits a few more weeks since there's no way I can drink 50+ bottles of beer that fast!


Sure you can. You just open them one at a time and drink until gone!


Is that how it's done!?!?!


Man, I've been doing it wrong this whole time!




haha
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