No head on beer

[Ryan D]

Hi all, i have made several kit beers now using 1kg dextrose which were good but lacked body. I recently made a coopers mexican cerveza and coopers euro lager using 1kg of light spray malt instead of the dextrose. This has definetly given them more body - maybe too much for the type of beer but they both arent very fizzy or have much head. Both were primed as per all my other brews using 1 tsp normal sugar. Is using the spray malt caused the lack of carbonation? I thought it was actuall ymeant to have better head? Only other thing i can think was i made both the batches of beer in winter, and i left one at room temp for a week and the other for two weeks before going into the fridge but maybe being a cold winter it wasnt warm enough to fully carbonate? any ideas? i think in future i may use 1/2 dextrose and half light spray malt for the lagers....

[James P]

If you are buying from your local home brew shop which has "Gemdex Booster" by brewcraft you can use that to increase the body and head, but that is basically dextrose and "maltodextrins" or complex sugars which are not broken down in the ferment.

If you can push to doing partials (grain and kits) then you will notice a big difference.

Good luck Ryan!

[Doublehoppy]

Hi Ryan

I've never used that spray malt so can't comment on that. But I think the most likely cause of the lack of carbonation, as you suspect, is that the temperature after you bottled it was too low.

It's probably not too late to rectify. Move the bottles to a warmish place. Say 18C and the yeast should kick off again

[Ryan D]

Good idea, will try that thanks

[Ryan D]

thanks will keep that in mind

[MrC]

James P and Doublehoppy are both offering good advice.

My bottle conditioned beers take 2 weeks at around 18C to fully carbonate. Taking them out of the fridge for a week will hopefully increase the carbonation as the yeast come back to life and finish eating any remaining priming sugar. Lack of carbonation can cause lack of head so the head may improve.

Another thing that can be detrimental to head retention is dishwashing liquid. If you wash your fermenter and/or bottles with dishwashing liquid you should change to different cleaner (brewcraft bottle wash powder works for me).

Due to the small amount of sugar involved in the priming process I wouldn't bother with dry malt extract. I always prime with standard table sugar, no complaints.

[Ryan D]

Thanks, definetly no d/w liquid used etc. I always prime with standard table sugar as well. the only change with these brews was using the spray maly instead of the dextrose, and the cool weather for carbonation. I will pull them out of the fridge for a week and see what happens. thanks for the advice