Wilkos Hoppy Copper

Would you believe it, this bottle has been conditioning for only 1 week and I am thoroughly impressed. Time will only make it better.

Don't get me wrong, it's no Woodfords Wherry but if you want a cheap 40pints for £7.50 (In the sale) you won't be disappointed with this one.
Lovely bitter notes, I dry hopped it so I'm getting the hoppy flavours coming through.
I wasn't expecting much from what I have previously read but I will certainly pick these up again.

[Joe1002]

Looks good considering it's so young.

What did you dry hop with?

It's actually still in the secondary, I drew off a 330ml bottle to test while transferring.

I made a hop tea with Hersbruker pellets for the primary, and now i've dry hopped with Perle in the secondary. Got them cheap.

So it should be much more hoppy when I finally bottle it.

I just bought this kit and 2 x 500gram packets of Wilcos medium spray malt.

I was thinking of brewing this short to 20L to get as much body as possible. Does it really need a hop tea to bring out the hoppiness? I've not done one of those before.

it won't be hoppy, just bitter. cheapo kits contain bittering hops and nothing else, so if you want some flavour or aroma, you'll need to put it in yourself!

it won't be hoppy, just bitter. cheapo kits contain bittering hops and nothing else, so if you want some flavour or aroma, you'll need to put it in yourself!

What would you recommend?

Either dry hop or a hop tea.. all instructions for these are in the How-To section

flavour - boil hops for 15 minutes in a few litres of water. it'll also add bitterness, which will be okay if you're adding DME instead of sugar.
raw hop flavour and aroma - hop tea. just pour a few litres of water over the hops and add it when you make the kit up
aroma - dry hop

depends what you want, you can dry hop with basically anything. 30g goldings or fuggles will make it a nice hoppy english. 50g-100g cascade, centennial, citra etc will push it closer to an american citrus finish. use noble hops like tettnang or saaz and the hops will taste more like those you find in hoppy lagers. it's all very easy and will increase the flavour, but if you're not confident just brew it up anyway and enjoy it!

I made this today with 30grams of Amarillo hops boiled for 10 minutes, 500grams of DME and 1kg of white sugar. Smelt amazing. Should come out to be around 4.4% ABV when done.

i will be brewin this next weekend with dark 500 grams of DME and 30 grams fuggles and 750 grams of sugar

I been out of the loop for a bit with various time issues, but this was one of the last ones I brewed... I have around 30 Coopers bottles-worth of it left that's been sitting there for around... ooh, gotta be going on 18 months.

It's not too bad if you can leave it that long

I been out of the loop for a bit with various time issues, but this was one of the last ones I brewed... I have around 30 Coopers bottles-worth of it left that's been sitting there for around... ooh, gotta be going on 18 months.

It's not too bad if you can leave it that long

LOL. 18 months. I think I might be lucky to leave it a month.

This has turned out much better then I thought it would do. It has benefited hugely by the hop additions. Well worth it. The Amarillo is coming through strong.



I'll definitely be brewing this again.

I thought this one was okay, but not particularly hoppy.

I brewed it short to 20l with 500g DME and 500g sugar, and it's quite drinkable. I'd agree that the addition of some additional hops would improve it, but as a cheap kit it's reasonable value.

but as a cheap kit it's reasonable value.

I think as a cheap kit it's excellent. I'm very pleased with mine. With the hop additions I think I prefer it to the Wherry.

I will be bottling some of this on Friday. 1Kg sugar 500g DME brewed to 21l and 100g dry hops (don't remember the variety, might be Glacier).

I will be bottling some of this on Friday. 1Kg sugar 500g DME brewed to 21l and 100g dry hops (don't remember the variety, might be Glacier).

Should taste fab. I was really impressed with this single can kit. It's a great base for hopping. Let's us know how the bottling sample taste.

Well to me it tastes rather nice, exactly what I would expect if I walked into a pub and asked for a "pint of best" (can you still do that anywhere, lol). Very drinkable, nothing wrong with it, but no outstanding characteristics either.

Well to me it tastes rather nice, exactly what I would expect if I walked into a pub and asked for a "pint of best" (can you still do that anywhere, lol). Very drinkable, nothing wrong with it, but no outstanding characteristics either.

Yes. A very pleasant brew especially when you add extra hops and some dme. I think it might taste a bit thin if brewed as directed with no additions and 1Kg of white sugar.

brewed the wilkos copper beer for the first time and had problems with it bubbling due to it giving off very little gas but the hydrometer stated all was good hoping it would turn out I bottled it after around seven days warm stored for two days refrigerated for a further two days that's eleven days from start and tried a bottle today, I was very impressed with how clear it was in such short time and the carbonation along with taste was pretty good for a cheap £7.50 kit, I hope to hold on too it for Christmas around a months time but really can't see it last that long, I brewed this kit as it was from the tin with wilkos brew sugar and tap water no hops or fining of any kind I just wanted the basic batch and will be returning to wilkos shortly for a few more, to sum up in two words <very impresed>

I copied Cyberheater's brew of this with 30gms Amarillo boiled then short brewed to 20ltrs. Started last Sat. 1.046 It's already at 1.012. Did any of you find it fermented out this quickly too? I'm interested to know as it's only my second brew, the first was Wherry which took over 2 weeks before I could bottle it.

Cyberheater, glad to hear you got on well!

I copied Cyberheater's brew of this with 30gms Amarillo boiled then short brewed to 20ltrs. Started last Sat. 1.046 It's already at 1.012. Did any of you find it fermented out this quickly too? I'm interested to know as it's only my second brew, the first was Wherry which took over 2 weeks before I could bottle it.

Yes. It's a quick brew. I think it will eventually drop to 1.008.

Cyberheater, glad to hear you got on well!

Thanks Rob.

I found a bottle of this that somehow remained hidden on a garage shelf. What a nice surprise. It's really nice now. Nice and mellow with a soft malty taste. You can still taste the added hops but they have died back a bit. It seems quite balanced.

just ordered this myself. I've got fuggles, citra and mosaic in the freezer. Anyone care to suggest which one to dry hop with?