On Mar 5, 7:40 am, "Walter Venables" <wvenab...@charter.net> wrote:[color=blue]
> I want recipes not rude opinions. I am not interested in what you think of
> these beers. So please do not reply in this manner.[/color]

Ahhh hahaha I was waiting for this. I've been toying around with
American lager recipes for awhile and can say information on the web
is riddled with a poor attitude towards the style and those that drink
it. If you had gone through the archives (through groups.google.com
for example) you'd find this trend.

.... anyways ...

I don't have a recipe that could approximate Molson or Labatt. I
never really drank either. However, Tecate is rather close to my
heart, so I've been taking nibbles towards that here or there. I can
share my experiences in trying to do American lagers. So far, I have
done roughly 4 attempts.

General thoughts:
1. 50/50 6-row/adjunct creates a beer too light in body and color. I
had done a recipe awhile back that was basically Sprite. I had thrown
in the acid malt which gave it a fruity character. With a little
haze, I could have made a Belgian Wit with that (and may attempt it
yet).
2. Adding an ever-so-slight specialty grain seems to be the way to
go. I recommend a 50/50 split with a specialty grain on top of that
to give color and some malt character. Granted, 3oz of crystal isn't
going to go too far, but it takes an otherwise single-dimension beer
and makes it... wider? Claiming that makes it two-dimensional might
be too strong. However, it does help cover up what little flaws you
have, and even these light beers have that slightest hint of some kind
of malt.
3. I have been using the White Labs Czech Budejovice yeast, but
recently decided it just wasn't doing what I wanted. On the positive
side, their Mexican Pilsener yeast recently became an all-year
strand. I haven't finished fermenting the current attempt, but it had
a slightly more sulphurous character during fermentation. For a
Mexican beer, I find this desireable.
4. I think the adjunct of choice for Bud is rice, but use corn for the
rest.

So I know you're aiming for extract, but I don't have much experience
doing this style with anything but all grain. If I were to BS
something:

For 5 gallons post-boil:

3# Extra-light DME
2# corn sugar (or rice syrup if your adjunct of choice will be rice)
2oz 6-row
2oz Crystal 60L

I gave up on the tap water here for all-grain on these; I cut it with
distilled water. I don't know if you need to go that far though.
However, my clearest results have come from other water sources. That
included my first attempt, which *did* use extract.

Consider a yeast nutrient--follow its directions. It's a lot of
sugars without the good stuff yeast need for healthy bones, happy
minds, and strong libido.

Steep the grains at 142F (as if it really matters for that quantity,
but you want the simple sugars anyways)

Hop an ounce of vintage saaz pellets as a bitter addition (60 minutes)
and nothing else. The bittering levels for these beers are very
slight so the safe way is to use an aged hop just for preservative
effects.

(I found Tradition pellets at ~1/3 each at 60, 20, and 5 gives a hop
characteristic like Sapparo, FYI)

Use Irish moss in the last 15 minutes.

Ferment with a very clean, aggressive lagering yeast. You're planning
to lager, right? If not, it's just a risk, but just use WLP001 since
it's a rather clean (boring?) yeast. Every day in primary, you will
want to swirl the yeast around, and monitor the temperature of the
fermenting beer often. The rousing makes sure the beer finishes dry,
and you definately don't want off-flavors from a warm fermentation
here. On the other hand, you don't want it to get too cold or the
beer will be too sweet.

Make a starter (get extra extract). Do a diacetyl rest at the end of
primary fermentation.

Consider secondary clarifiers like KC Finings. Of all styles, you
want this beer to be clear since your drinkers likely expect it.

And for everybody else reading the thread, ignore all that and
chuckle:
How to make an American lager:
1. Pee in bottle
2. Cap it

There, so I don't have to be the pariah. ;p