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HOMEBREW Digest #0953
This file received at Sierra.Stanford.EDU 92/08/24 00:37:44
HOMEBREW Digest #953 Mon 24 August 1992
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
Chillers and Bernoulli (SSIEGLER)
Re: All Grain Help (Jeff Benjamin)
Grandfather techniques (doug)
Finishing Hops (Thomas D. Feller)
Re: gyle (Richard Stueven)
Extraction rate (was Re: All Grain Help) (Douglas DeMers)
Re: Chillers and Labels (Larry Barello)
Label the bottlecaps instead (Dances with Workstations)
Making yeast nutrient (Pat Lasswell)
laserwriter and photocopied labels (TAYLOR)
Bringing beer back from Europe (Brian Davis)
Old Time Instructions (ZLPAJGN)
Questions on cooling with ice and sparging. ("C. Lyons")
Plastic hose for bath chiller? (Jacob Galley)
FREE! software for searching Homebrew Digests (Rick Larson)
YOU'RE DOING FINE (Jack Schmidling)
Dogs/Brewing- Puppy Porter (SLK6P)
Cajun Cooker Propane Tanks (pmiller)
Re: K. Bloss going to Germany (Jeff Mizener)
Yeast nutrient is not yeast extract (Andy Phillips)
Dry Hopping and Clearing (Ruth Mazo Karras)
Hops and philosophy (SCHREMPP_MIKE/HP4200_42)
B-Brite (Bob Gorman)
fest beers--ingredients & recipe suggestions (Tony Babinec)
Yes, more about yeast (eurquhar)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 11:46 EST
From: SSIEGLER@LANDO.HNS.COM
Subject: Chillers and Bernoulli
I have been reading with interest (and awe) the discussions on
chillers, but may have missed the following, if discussed (or
dismissed).
It seems that most of the discussion centers on increasing the
amount of water thru the wort with larger and larger tubes. This
seems in contradiction to Bernoulli's Principle.
As I understand it, as air is forced thru increasing smaller tubes
the rate of flow increases, and the temperature drops.
This is important for the pilot because as the air is forced thru
the carb, the temperature of the air decreases and the the carb
develops ice (under certian circumstances: humid,cool air)
even when the outside air temp is above freezing. You can see this
by sucking air into your mouth thru a straw (try different size straws)
I would think that forcing water thru the tube instead of air
would yield similar results.
If you were to replace the one large tube, with multiple smaller
(ie, capillary (sp?) type) tubes, I would expect a greater cooling
rate, even though there was less surface area per tube.
Sorry, I dont have any formulas to back up this hypothesis. If this is
wrong (or dumb [how would you bend capillary copper tubing?]),
please tell me where I went wrong.
-Stuart Siegler
"Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there aren't people out to get you"
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 10:04:46 MDT
From: Jeff Benjamin <benji@hpfcbug.fc.hp.com>
Subject: Re: All Grain Help
Just a few comments on some folks posting about moving to all-grain
brewing.
smanastasi@mmm.com outlines a 10-step procedure for all-grain brewing.
It looks right on (at least, it's darn close to what I do :-). My
only confusion is on step 4:
> 4. Begin draining cooler into brew pot. One can recycle the wort by
> slowly draining the cooler until 7 gallons of wort have been
> collected. This is the sparge process.
It should probably read "Begin draining cooler into brew pot *while
sprinkling 175F water over the mash*". Pretty important, otherwise
you'll never end up with 7 gallons of sweet wort. My rule of thumb is
to use about 1/2 gallon of water per pound of grain. Also, I very
rarely collect as much as 7 gallons after my sparge; more like 5.5-6
gallons for a 5 gallon batch of beer. You can always add more water
during the boil if you need to lower your gravity, without the risk of
extracting unwanted flavors from the grain husks by oversparging.
thomasf@deschutes.ico.tek.com (Thomas D. Feller) tried his first all-
grain batch the other day, and complained of low extraction. I don't
you he really got a low extraction -- you just weren't using enough
grain for the amount of beer you were trying to make.
The amount of grain ("3 lbs of 2 row malt and 3.5 american wheat") is
low for a 5 gal batch. A pound of grain is *not* equal to a pound
of malt extract. For a beer with O.G. 1.045, I'd use about 8 pounds of
grain. You said you followed a recipe from a fruit beer. Well, a lot
of fuit-beer bases are intentionally very light, to let the fruit
flavors come through, and because the fruit itself adds lots of
fermentable sugars.
Also, a half-gallon of liquid will change your gravity by 3-5 points,
depending on what that gravity is (lower-gravity wort won't change as
much as higher-gravity wort). So if your gravity comes out too low,
boil a little longer and settle for less wort of the correct gravity.
If you'd boiled all the way down to 5 gallons, you'd at least have been
up over 1.030.
To answer your specific questions: you don't need more two-row, I make
50/50 barley/wheat beers all the time; I've never worried about pH (no
flames, please); your mash was plenty long; a longer sparge might help
some, but not to the tune of 20 points; an easy way to check your
hydrometer -- it should read 1.000 in plain water; and no, you aren't
lame.
Good luck on the next batch.
- ----
Jeff Benjamin benji@hpfcla.fc.hp.com
Hewlett Packard Co. Fort Collins, Colorado
"Midnight shakes the memory as a madman shakes a dead geranium."
- T.S. Eliot
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 12:04:26 EDT
From: doug <doug@metabolism.bitstream.com>
Subject: Grandfather techniques
I could not agree more with Neil Mager's review of Wally Blume's
article on his granfathers brewing techniques. I would love to hear
about how things have changed in homebrewing over the years.
I don't contribute much to this board, but do enjoy reading
and extracting the terrific information. It is certainly sad that
the flaming has reached a point where people like Wally are
hesitant to post what could be a very interesting article...
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
Doug Connolly Bitstream, Inc. (617) 497-6222
uunet!huxley!doug 215 First St. X618
doug@bitstream.com Cambridge, MA 02142
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 09:36:27 PDT
From: thomasf@deschutes.ico.tek.com (Thomas D. Feller)
Subject: Finishing Hops
Thanks to everyone for the replies to my all grain problems,
Everyone seems to think Dave Miller numbers of 1.045 for 6.5 lbs of grain
are high and my extraction rate of about 23 pts/lb/gal are not to bad for
a first all grain brew.
Now to another question about Dave Miller's book, _Brewing the Worlds Great
Beers_. I would say over 70% of his recipe call for no finishing hops. As
a NW hophead I have always added finish hops to every brew. Now I am not
worrying about it, I like my beers but I bought is book to get some ideas
about brewing different styles. So here the question are addingfinish hops
as unsual as this book implies?
Oh, I am sorry about the "lame" comment, we do need to move on.
Tom Feller
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 09:56:23 PDT
From: gak@wrs.com (Richard Stueven)
Subject: Re: gyle
>There has been some talk of using gyle to prime. How
>does one keep gyle until it is needed? Does it need to
>be boiled before it is used?
Mark,
I use a sanitized one-liter swing-top bottle to store the gyle. I
chill all the wort after the boil as usual, then when I rack to the
fermenter, I simply divert the first liter or so into the bottle. The
bottle goes into the refrigerator until it's needed.
Kraeusened beers take a little longer to develop their carbonation, but
I think they taste much better than beers primed with corn sugar or
even malt extract. Give it a go!
have fun
gak
107/H/3&4
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 09:56 PDT
From: dougd@uts.amdahl.com (Douglas DeMers)
Subject: Extraction rate (was Re: All Grain Help)
In HOMEBREW Digest #951 thomasf@deschutes.ico.tek.com (Thomas D.
Feller) writes regarding his first all-grain brew (congratulations,
BTW):
>To the point or rather the problem, very very low extraction. I used
>3 lbs of 2 row malt and 3.5 american wheat. [... process elided ...]
>the sparge was too fast, about 25 min. I sparged until the run-off not longer
>tasted sweet, this was about 1.008, I then added water to make my 7 gal.,
>stirred and took a SG reading, 1.020. [...]
I've never seen it stated for all-grain brewing, but it is my
understanding that the gravity readings given in Miller for example,
and others are _after_ the boil. And when Miller says something along
the lines of expecting 33 points per pound of malt per gallon - I
believe that is _after_ the boil and not after the sparge. If this is
incorrect, then _I've_ got a real problem with _my_ extraction rate.
On my first couple all-grain sessions I was a little concerned with low
extraction rates when checking the gravity after sparge, but the
gravity after boil was reasonable and the beers turned out just fine.
A pre-boil starting gravity of 20 does seem a little low, but you are
starting with only 6.5# of malt and you diluted it even further by
adding water. My last stout had ~10# malt with an after-sparge gravity
of in the 25-30's, but an after _boil_ gravity of 48.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 10:01:22 PDT
From: polstra!larryba@uunet.UU.NET (Larry Barello)
Subject: Re: Chillers and Labels
Paul D'Armond writes about modifying his immersion chiller, Asking
whether to make it longer or to parallel the existing coils. He also
said he uses ~60gal of water to chill a five gallon batch of beer.
Regarding the modifications: if the outlet water is not boiling
hot, then you need to make the chiller longer. Parallel is another way
of making it effectively longer: it reduces the flow rate in each tube
so there is more (relative to the fluid going through the tubes) heat
transfer. Which way you go is probably going to be determined by what
is easiest for you to fabricate. From my experiences with immersion
chillers, the biggest problem is keeping the hot wort stirred up. I have
seen a very effective immersion chiller that is two coils, an inner and an
out one. The coils are spaced out about 1" by some cross pieces soldered
on. The inner coil is centered in the outer one with other cross pieces.
The whole contraption is agitated in the wort continuously until
chilling is done.
I use a 25' 3/8"od counterflow chiller, I get various amounts of cold break
in my carboy but usually, if I am careful and don't suck over hot break
the amount is very small - less than a 1/4" on the bottom of a 5.5 gal
batch. The amount is even smaller when you consider that the bottom of
a carboy is domed. In anycase, The yeast crop dominates the volume of crud
by the end of fermentation. The following are typical numbers from my
chiller:
Wort in: 195f
Wort out: 73f
Coolent in: 66f
Coolent out: 90f
Flow rate: 2 gal/min
Chill time: 13 minutes (26 gal).
In the winter the coolent is 5-8 deg cooler (tap water, of course) with
a corresponding decrease in outlet temp; I usually throttle down the flow
rate for an exit temp of 70f (ales) or as low as I can get (lagers).
If I slow down the coolent flow rate, the outlet temp goes quite a bit
higher. I suspect a 40' chiller would be more efficientd
- --
Larry Barello uunet!polstra!larryba
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 13:30:22 EDT
From: Dances with Workstations <buchman@marva1.ENET.dec.com>
Subject: Label the bottlecaps instead
> David Clump asks what other people are using for labels. I'm xeroxing
> three labels per letter-size (8 1/2" x 11") sheet. 8 1/2" will wrap
> nicely around a long-neck bottle. I've tried all sorts of adhesives:
> mucilage, Elmer's, rubber cement, and glue sticks. I like the glue sticks
> best. It is not messy, soaks off easily, and is easy to use.
Something that works well for home use: label the bottlecaps, not the bottles.
We use the little adhesive dots that you put on a diskette to show its
density; or you can get stars, etc. Our last three batches were Spruce
Beer (green star on bottlecap), Raspberry Mead (red star), and Luner Lager
(yellow dot with a half moon on it). Or we just use our batch number.
(my brother frequently requests an old Numba' Seven).
Using this method, you don't have to worry about washing the labels off the
bottle later. Also, it gave my three-year-old niece a way to help out at
a brew session: she was in charge of putting green dots on the bottlecaps.
She took this duty very seriously, and was most thorough; many bottles came
out with four or five green dots, just to insure that you don't forget
what you're drinking.
Cheers,
Jim Buchman
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 10:43:02 PDT
From: Pat Lasswell <patl@microsoft.com>
Subject: Making yeast nutrient
When making soup stock, one boils the stuffing out of scraps and bones to
extract proteins, flavor, etc. Shouldn't the same thing be possible with
yeast? That is, is it possible to make yeast soup for the yeast to feed
one? (Barbaric little cannibals, they are!) Boiling yeast slurry would lyse
the cells to be sure. It also occurs to me that yeast contain autolytic
enzymes, which leads me to wonder if it is possible to do a "yeast mash" to
cause these enzymes to be freed, breaking down the yeast cells. I have
tasted yeast bite and know that it is an awful thing, but I assume that
actively growing live yeast would slurp this stuff up like a (malted) milk-
shake. Lastly, boiling the slurry would sanitize it for the most part, so
nobody would have to worry. :-)
[ This idea sounds a lot like all-grain brewing, so maybe I should include
a lautering step; maybe .... nyah]
Just a thought -- I haven't tried it myself (yet).
Beer me!
Pat Lasswell
PS. I have noticed (and others have as well) that a disproportionate number
of brewers have beards and moustaches; any sociologists out there?
PPS. Thanks Rob...
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 13:54:35 -0400 (EDT)
From: TAYLOR@sbchm1.chem.sunysb.edu
Subject: laserwriter and photocopied labels
This may be a silly concern, but I would think twice about
using photocopied labels because of the nature of the ink used. If
you soak the label off before you clean the bottle, it's not going
to matter.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 08:31:26 pdt
From: Brian Davis <brian%mbf.uucp@ics.uci.edu>
Subject: Bringing beer back from Europe
I need some advice from those of you who have played 'amateur beer importer.'
What's the best way to get a large ( 5-6 cases ) amount of beer back to the
states from Belgium? What is the duty on such stuff?
Any advice on where I can find a good selection of Lambics while I'm there
will be greatly appreciated.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 13:05 CDT
From: ZLPAJGN%LUCCPUA.bitnet@UICVM.UIC.EDU
Subject: Old Time Instructions
Dear brewers,
I'd like to second Neil Mager's motion regarding Walley Blume's
sharing his grandfathers' recipies and methods. Though I'm still
only a novice at this wonderful craft, I think there's something
to be learned from how they brewed before the advent of "Techno-
brewing." Plus, I personally find the prospects of brewing an
old traditional ale or lager quite nostalgic. (I'd love to host
another homebrew party and tell my guests that the beer they're
enjoying was from an old Civil War era recipe, or from the foothills
of the Smokey Mountains during Prohibition! (Those who know of my
present occupation can appreciate the irony in my second example ;-) ))
However, I hope that my being a novice doesn't hinder my experimenting
with these recipies and methods. All of my brewing has been from
extracts, adding a few specialty grains here and there. Most have
been successful batches, but I've also been cited by the EPA for other
batches that have been... Well, lets just say that I named one such
batch, "Chicago Tunnel Water"!
So, Walley, please post (maybe via personal email if you want to avoid
being flamed by the "techno-brewers" and other beer geeks who take OUR
craft too seriously).
Cheers,
John
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 09:21 EDT
From: "C. Lyons" <LYONS@adc1.adc.ray.com>
Subject: Questions on cooling with ice and sparging.
I re-read Charlie's 2nd edition book and have a few questions
that I hope the HBD followers could answer.
1) On page 367 of TNCJOHB, one of Charlie's tips includes:
"Do not add ice to your wort in order to cool it."
In the past I have found the addition o ice quickly brings the
temperature of the wort to yeast pitching temperatures. Could
someone please explain the concern of using ice?
2) Why is it important to use 170F water for sparging? I am
contemplating switching to all-grain, but am fonfused by the
purpose of the sparging step. If the purpose of the sparge is
to rinse the grains and remove the remaining "goodness", then
why can't cold, or boiling, water be used?
Not worring, just concerned!
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 17:16:46 CDT
From: Jacob Galley <gal2@midway.uchicago.edu>
Subject: Plastic hose for bath chiller?
"What's so interdisciplinary about studying lower levels of thought process?"
<-- Jacob Galley / gal2@midway.uchicago.edu
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 15:27:03 -0500
From: melkor!rick@uunet.UU.NET (Rick Larson)
Subject: FREE! software for searching Homebrew Digests
I translated Tom Kaltenbach's thread program from Pascal to C, replaced
all the screen stuff with curses functions, and ported it to various
flavors of UNIX (SunOS, HP-UX, Ultrix, XENIX, ...). Stephen Hansen
put it in the homebrew archives (sierra.stanford.edu in the /pub/homebrew
directory).
The following is Tom's description of thread from Digest 933:
..
Over the past couple of weeks, I've written a PC program that might
be of interest to homebrewers. The program is called THREAD, and its
purpose is to search the back issues of the Homebrew Digest and extract
those messages that follow a certain "thread" of conversation. THREAD
attempts to do this by extracting all messages that contain specified
key words; as a consequence, the program also functions as a general
subject-searching program. For example, if you wanted to search for all
messages related to kegging, you might use "kegging" as a key word (as I
recently did). Logical combinations are also possible; for example, if
you wanted all of the recent references to Jack Schmidling's MALT MILL,
you could search for "malt" AND "mill" NOT "miller" (the NOT "miller"
excludes the many references to Dave Miller's books). The key words are
not limited to a single word, for example, you can search for messages
mentioning "dave miller" OR "dave line". Up to 10 key word specifiers
are allowed.
..
I find it very useful. Maybe you might.
rick
- ---
Rick Larson rick@adc.com, melkor!rick@cs.umn.edu
ADC Telecommunications, Inc. ...!uunet!melkor!rick
Minneapolis, MN 55435 (612) 936-8288
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 21:15 CDT
From: arf@ddsw1.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
Subject: YOU'RE DOING FINE
To: Homebrew Digest
Fm: Jack Schmidling
>From: thomasf@deschutes.ico.tek.com (Thomas D. Feller)
>To the point or rather the problem, very very low extraction. I used
3 lbs of 2 row malt and 3.5 american wheat...
>I recirlculated the run off until clear and the used sparge at about 175
deg.F, the sprage was too fast, about 25 min.
Why was it too fast? It is hard to tell if you mean you blew it or have no
control over the rate.
> I sparged until the run-off not longer tasted sweet, this was about 1.008,
I then added water to make my 7 gal., stirred and took a SG reading, 1.020.
It is hard to understand why you would complain about the low gravity AFTER
adding water. If the gravity is too low, you need to evaporate water not add
it.
> The recipe I was using as a general guide was a fruit ale from Dave Miller
new book, it called for 4 lbs. of two row and 2.5 lbs. of wheat, I followed
the recipe's mashing instructions, the expected SG was 1.045.
One can only presume that the expected gravity of 1.045 was for 5 gallons not
for seven. To get 7 gals of 1.045 from 6.5 lbs of grain would require an
extraction rate of 48 pts/lb/gal.... out of sight.
>Now I am in trouble I could have lived with a SG around 1.032 but 1.020
was not goiog to cut it. So I heated up my 7 gal. of not so sweet wort to
160 deg.F and put it back into my cooler, this raised the mash temp to 153
deg.F. I let this sit for another 45 min. then sparged with the hot wort at
175 deg.F. Well after all this and a boil I ended up with about 5.5 gal.
of wort at a SG of 1.028.
You ended up with an extraction rate of about 24 pts/gal/lb. Nothing to crow
or complain about and possibly what can be expected from the combination of
grain used.
>So what is my problems.
All things considered, I don't think you have any very serious ones. Just
use more grain next time and congratulations on making the plunge.
>I plan on doing another all grain brew on Friday.
I would just double the grain quantity to assure success. You can tweek it
in on later batches.
Instead of running the wort back through the mash, just run more sparge water
through it and boil longer. If you really want 7 gals of beer, you will need
at about 10 gals of sweet wort.
I would never add raw water to a brew. I would always opt for running it
through the mash to get more volume and a bit more beer.
BTW, gravity and extract numbers are based on the boiled wort, ready for
fermenting. But there are so many alternatives that unless you know exactly
how someone else measured it and the accuracy of his measurements, it is
pretty much of a myth anyway.
js
------------------------------
Date: 20 Aug 1992 00:17:07 -0600 (MDT)
From: SLK6P@CC.USU.EDU
Subject: Dogs/Brewing- Puppy Porter
Don't slay the dog, breed it! 8/7/92
I just wanted to relay a rather unorthodox and unusual brewing experience.
A brewer like the "Murph" might want to take this as an example of
extreme "NOT WORRYING"
**Mind you- I do not recommend these methods, nor prefer them myself--
**but hey-- sh#t happens.
Last night I began brewing a darker Porter style beer. I ground my grains
for a 12 gallon batch and began a step mash as I usually do.
As always my two dogs were acting feverishly strange since I was brewing.
(well the fact that one of them was VERY pregnant and due any day might
have explained her strange behavior and heavy panting). Some friends
stopped by, so we chowed a pizza, drank and talked about homebrews(-ing).
After our chow session, they departed as I began sparging. I have one
5 gallon bucket with a mesh net and spigot which I strain through into
a five gallon pot. The thing that caused me trouble was that I got
distracted during the sparge. At a certain point (afterthe first 5 gallons
of wort passes) I have to switch pots and get my 15 gallon pot under the
spigot.
The reason I got distracted was that I realized my pregnant dog had
dropped two puppies in my bedroom during our dinner. (I'll lock the dogs
away from our pizza, but not the beer....) So I stopped to watch the next
one appear in a blitz of slimy goo. What a joyful sight!
So anyway--- then I turned around to realize that at least 1-2 gallon
of sweet thick brown wort had just overflowed my 5 gallon pot onto the floor,
and was collecting in the downhill corner of my kitchen. I couldn't just
mop it up, and throw it away (although proper technique would tell you to!)
So here's where I improvised techniques. A friend had once spilled (well his
kid did it) a large glop of grain on the floor during the sparge. So he just scooped it up and figured he was going to boil it all anyway....
So with this vision (and knowing his beer tasted darn good despite the floor
venture) I grabbed some clean towels (mostly clean- at least they weren't
dirty socks) and mopped up the wort, squeezing it into the brewpot (hateful
thought isn't it- I know at least half of you are groaning painfully at the
thought.) I rinsed the towels and used the rinse water in the sparge.
I thought it would be a good idea to boil this one a little more
vigorously and longer than usual. So I hopped the hell out of it, and
boiled away. It sure smelled good.
I used my (first time) two stage cooling system:
1: Bucket (carboy) of ice water mix runs through 20 ft of
1/4 inch copper tubing immersed in the wort. Ran ~ 8 gallons of cold
water through the tube and collected it in a bucket (for water plants,
garden etc.) This brought the temp down to about 60 deg C. I figured
that the hot wort would sterilize the tubing and the inside didn't touch
the beer, so it wasn't sterile.
2: Then I siphon the wort through 10 ft of 3/8 in copper tubing
immersed in a bucket of ice water. The tubing had a chlorine solution
sipohoned through it, then water, then wort. The ice bath brought it
out at ~30 deg C. The wort never touched the ice solution directly.
So I pitched my starter yeasts and hauled the beer to the basement.
I did see one dog hair in my plastic primary, so I scooped it out.
It almost seemed silly to worry about contamination at this point!
Anyway- It was an interesting adventure. I probably wouldn't have
been quite so carefree if I hadn't been tapping the keg all afternoon
as I ground grains in the basement. But for all you worriers out there,
you may not want to go to the extreme of relaxation I enjoyed in this
brew adventure, but don't be too paranoid. I feel confident (based on
MANY past beers) that I will have a full bodied yummy product in a
couple of weeks, despite all the mishaps.
I decided to call this one
"HAIR OF THE DOG" (any northern exposure fans out there?)
or "PUPPY PORTER" (by the way it was 3 boys, 3 girls- American Eskimos)
So by the end of this brew night I had 8 dogs in the vacinity.
What a night! Brew on, and don't worry ya'll.
__________________________________________________________________________
Hoppy Brewing. J. Wyllie (The Coyote)
SLK6P@cc.usu.edu
"You're not my mom. My mommy had 6 nipples and licked my belly" Buck Bundy
___________________________________________________________________________
*FOLLOWUP: The beer brewed well. It was a good ferment. I've kegged the
first half, and it is not yummy and filling our tummies. The second half gained some honey in the secondary and is still fermenting before bottling
time arrives.
CONCLUSION: Despite all the mishaps and adventures of the night, I had
fun brewing, my dog had pups while I brewed, I goofed majorly, but
recovered- w/o worrying to an extreme, yet arrived with a healthy happy
brew in the end (and 6 happy sleepy pups).
P.S. I havent' noticed any hairs in any beers yet- so maybe I'll go
with PUPPY PORTERfor the name, besides it's leaves a more palatable image.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 10:00:45 CDT
From: pmiller@mmm.com
Subject: Cajun Cooker Propane Tanks
Greetings!
Just a quick question for all you Bunsen-Burner-From-Hell users:
How long can I expect a standard tank of propane to last if I use
a Cajun Cooker type burner to heat my wort for boiling (i.e., rocket
blast mode to bring 5-6 gallons to a boil and then idle mode to
maintain a vigorous boil for 1 1/2 hours)?
Thanks in advance...
Phil Miller
pmiller@mmm.com
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 10:25:57 EDT
From: avalon!jm@siemens.siemens.com (Jeff Mizener)
Subject: Re: K. Bloss going to Germany
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 92 9:08:59 PDT
From: tahoma!dgs1300@bcstec.ca.boeing.com (Don Scheidt)
Subject: K. Bloss going to Germany
In HOMEBREW Digest #949, Karl Bloss asks:
>I'm heading to Germany in about a month. Is there anything I should look
>for there that is not available here?
Where are you going in Germany?? There are more than 1100 brewers, and
they collectively produce over 4500 different beers!
The two best beer guides to the breweries in Franconia (a region in Bavaria
bounded by Nuernberg on the south and Kulmbach on the north and [I think] Bayreuth
on the east) are:
Ein Wanderfuehrer fuer Biertrinker
and
Suffig Almanach.
They are both in German and of course unavailable in the US. But as Don said,
let us know where you're going and we might be able to help. Both of the above
books specialize in small (for lack of a better word) brewpubs
(n., s.: Privatbrauerei) and put a great deal of emphasis on food and atmosphere
in addition to beer. Franconia (Fraenkische Schweitz) has more breweries per
capita than any other region in Germany. And ask to buy a mug, they usually'll
sell one for DM5-DM7, and they make great presents and souvineers.
Tschuess,
Jeff
========================================================
Jeff Mizener / Siemens Energy & Automation / Raleigh NC
jm@sead.siemens.com / Intelligent SwitchGear Systems
========================================================
(reply to this address, not the one in the header!!)
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 17:29 GMT
From: Andy Phillips <PHILLIPSA@LARS.AFRC.AC.UK>
Subject: Yeast nutrient is not yeast extract
As far as I'm aware, yeast nutrient is different from yeast
extract. As the report of Dr. Pasteur's work in Lille described
(HBD 949), all that yeast needs in order to grow is a carbon source (eg
glucose, maltose), a nitrogen source (eg ammonium or nitrate salts),
a phosphorus source (eg phosphate salts) and a supply of mineral
ions (sodium, magnesium, potassium, etc) and trace elements
(coppper, iron, manganese, etc). Unlike humans, yeast can
synthesize all their own complex organic compounds such as amino
acids and vitamins from these basic ingredients (although they
grow faster if provided with amino acids & vitamins).
Fermentables such as grape juice and honey are deficient in
nitrogen and phosphorus and need these supplemented. The yeast nutrient
I buy, therefore, is either simply ammonium
phosphate or mixture of potassium phosphate and ammonium
sulphate. I add this to wines at about 1 tsp per gallon. Malt
extract contains enough of all of the basic ingredients
to support yeast growth: maltose for carbon, amino acids (from
hydrolysed seed protein) for nitrogen, and phosphate salts and
hydrolysed nucleic acids for phosphorus.
Yeast extract, as the name implies, is an extract of yeast used
in microbiological media, for growing bacteria and (somewhat
canniballistically) yeast. At work, I've used YEPD (Yeast Extract
+ Bacto-Peptone + glucose) medium in agar for yeast growth; at
home I would use malt extract in agar as recommended by Jake S;
I guess this also habituates the yeast to the malt constituents.
I wouldn't recommend putting yeast extract into beer or wine as it
smells (and probably tastes) pretty disgusting.
Andy
------------------------------
Date: 20 Aug 92 13:59:00 EST
From: Ruth Mazo Karras <RKARRAS@PENNSAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Dry Hopping and Clearing
I dry hopped a Liberty Ale tastealike (I hope) with 1 oz. of Cascade pellets
in the secondary. The pellets pretty rapidly expanded to form an inch-thick
layer on top of the beer. If I shake the carboy they fall into suspension, but
eventually float to the top again. Now that fermentation activity has slowed
considerably, I think it is about time to bottle, BUT even when the hops are
all at the top of the carboy the beer is very cloudy. Here are the questions:
(i) does dry hopping tend to make beer cloudy, or should I look elsewhere for
my problem and (ii) how do I bottle this beer without getting the hops in the
bottles?
Thanks for any help,
Chris Karras (RKarras@PennSAS.UPenn.edu)
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 11:10:28 pdt
From: SCHREMPP_MIKE/HP4200_42@pollux.svale.hp.com
Subject: Hops and philosophy
I'm a first year hop grower and I've just finished the harvest. Now I've got
observations and questions:
1. When to harvest. The book I have says to wait until the cones are starting
to dry, look inside for lupulin, test the "squeezability", etc. I farted
around, not wanting to pick too soon and ended up picking the first half of
the harvest after many of the cones started to turn brown and were very dry,
even crispy. The second half of the harvest, I picked when the cones were
green and dried them. The new cones are dry and green, the older ones are dry
and partly brown, but they both have the same wonderful hop aroma. So, what's
wrong with letting them dry on the vine? I live in the dry Santa Clara valley
where the chances of rain are nil this time of year.
2. My book said that after picking, my hands would be full of the sticky resins.
This didn't happen at all. In fact, one of the ways I was testing for
"ripeness" was to squish a cone in my hands and roll it around to see if my
hands would get sticky. Any hop pickers out there with sticky fingers?
3. A lot of the cones in the first half of the harvest were HUGE, 1.5 to 2"
long. All the hops I bought for brewing have been about .5-.75" (the size of
the second half of the harvest). Are the little one better, or are the big
ones better?
I also have another data point on Cascade hops. I planted two hop roots
(although they looked more like rooted vines than rhizomes) this year, a
Hallertauer and a Cascade. They are right next to each other (7'). The Cascade
"root" was a dried out wimp but has produced all the cones, while the
Hallertauer looked healthy at the start but has about 12 cones on it. So far, my
haul from the Cascade is 3 dry ounces from the first "half" and 6 dry ounces
from the second "half"(gloat gloat).
Since I'm typing, here's my brewing and posting philosophy:
Every brewer brews for their own reasons and selects the techniques that suit
their needs. Anyone that thinks they have the best method does have the best
method (for them), if it gives them the results they are looking for. So let's
ALL remember this before letting someone else know what a jerk they are
for sharing their opinions of what is "best". Different strokes for different
folks. And so on, and so on, and scoobie doobie doobie...
For myself, I like drinking a good beer. I can afford to buy it, but I really
enjoy brewing. I like orchestrating a pile of grains, hops and yeast into a
symphony of flavors and sensations, then coaxing it into bottles. I love the
sweet smells of the mash and the way the hops prickle my nose before they go
into the boil. And nothing could be more melodious that the gentle rhythm of the
airlock at night. So to those who are looking for the fastest way to get the
most extract to make the cheapest beer to get the best buzz... enjoy your
destination, I'll continue to enjoy my journey (and leave me some pretzels).
Mike Schrempp
"I'll stop brewing when they pry the hydrometer from my cold, clammy hand"
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 16:49:58 EDT
From: bob@rsi.com (Bob Gorman)
Subject: B-Brite
A while ago someone (Stiv Stroud I think) asked if B-Brite
had the same basic active ingredients as non-chlorine bleach.
I don't remember seeing any replies to that post.
Anyhow, while I was farting around my basement last night,
I saw a box of Chlorox non-chlorine bleach. So I decided
to compare lables.
B-Brite contains:
Sodium percarbonate
Sodium silicate
Chlorox NCB contains:
Sodium carbonate
Sodium perborate
Now these aren't the same but look similar. Does anyone know
*anything* about these chemicals?
FWIW, I also read the side of a box of Tide laundry detergent
and it conatined, among other things, two of the above chemicals
but labled as:
Sodium silicate (washing machine protection agent)
Sodium carbonate (water softner)
Any insights?
- -- Bob Gorman
- -- bob@rsi.com
- -- Type fast, take chances.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 16:28:56 CDT
From: tony@spss.com (Tony Babinec)
Subject: fest beers--ingredients & recipe suggestions
The AHA style guidelines for Fest beers tell us the following:
Vienna Marzen/Oktoberfest
SG 1.048 - 1.055 1.052 - 1.064
IBU 22 - 28 22 - 28
color 8 - 12 Lovibond 7 - 14
In practice, there are relatively few commercial Vienna beers. Dos
Equis amber is a good example, as well as Gary Bauer's star-crossed
Ambier, which may or may not be available these days. While the
Marzen style guidelines allow a gravity up to the low 1.060s,
George and Laurie Fix state that most commercial Fest beers are in
the 1.051-1.055 range. Notable commercial examples are Spaten's
and Paulaner's Oktoberfests, available in bottle and sometimes on
draft, at least in Chicago.
Beyond the above "objective" attributes, George and Laurie Fix
maintain that a Fest beer should embody:
- elegance,
- softness,
- complexity,
- balance.
These characteristics are best obtained through the quality and mix
of ingredients as well as attention to process.
As a Fest beer is an amber lager, the question arises as to how to
obtain color. Here, the main alternatives are proportions of
crystal malt versus Munich malt, with perhaps a touch of black malt
thrown in. As the color contribution of crystal malt is more
intense, crystal malt is proportionately less of the grain bill
than Munich malt. Beyond that, there are flavor and body nuances
attributable to the respective grains. Another point is that the
color math of combining amounts and Lovibonds of different malts is
not strictly linear. As a result, try a recipe that puts you in
the ballpark and modify it until you get the right color. Or, see
the appendix of the George and Laurie Fix book for a more technical
discussion of color.
George and Laurie Fix argue that the base malt for the beer should
be the best Pilsner malt. German or Belgian pilsner malt are
fairly widely available. If you are not persuaded that pilsner
malt is necessary, then perhaps U.S. 2-row malt might be
substituted. They go on to say that the quality of available
Vienna and Munich malts is highly variable, and therefore argue for
using the best crystal malts you can find. Their recipes suggest
a blend of "German Light Crystal," "German Dark Crystal," and
"British Crystal Malt." The German Light and German Dark, I
believe, are Ireks German malts with Lovibond ratings of 10L and
60L. I'm not sure about the British crystal malt except that it
has a 120L rating. Maris Otter crystal malt, at least the one
available from Liberty Malting, is a good crystal malt with a color
rating of 80L.
If you have access to good Munich malt, such as the Belgian Munich
mentioned in previous HBDs, you might prefer to use some proportion
of Munich malt in your grain bill to obtain color.
So, here are two recipes that assume 80% extraction efficiency.
"Crystal-Malt Fest" (derived from a George and Laurie Fix recipe)
10 pounds German or Belgian pilsner malt
6 ounces German light crystal malt (10L)
6 ounces German dark crystal malt (60L)
6 ounces English caramel malt (120L)
3/4 ounce Tettnanger (alpha=4) at 45 minutes until end of boil
3/4 ounce Styrian Golding (alpha=5) at 30 minutes until end of
boil
3/4 ounce Saaz (alpha=3) at 15 minutes until end of boil
Wyeast "Munich" or "Bavarian" lager
Starch conversion rest at 150-152F for 90-120 minutes.
Expected SG around 1.060.
The extract brewer can substitute a good German extract for the
pilsner malt.
"Munich Fest" (derived from a Dave Miller recipe)
6 pounds Pilsner malt
3 pounds Munich malt
3/4 pound cara-pils malt
1/4 pound 40L crystal malt
1/4 ounce black malt (for color)
6-7 AAUs of Hallertauer, Tettnang, Perle, or Mt. Hood (following
Fix, in multiple additions with the last addition at 15 minutes
until end of boil).
Wyeast "Munich" or "Bavarian" lager.
Expected SG around 1.054.
The extract brewer can substitute some good extract for the base
malt, but ought to attempt a partial mash given the grain bill.
These recipes are merely starting points, and there is room for
experimentation, including the "homemade" toasting of pale malt in
your oven.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 14:54:31 -0700
From: eurquhar@sfu.ca
Subject: Yes, more about yeast
There has been ALOT OF TIME spent passing information back and
forth recently about the care, feeding and breeding of our favourite
micro-organism, the yeast. Since I am one of those tech-ies who work with
them (biological control of plant disease with various yeast species) and
need to grow up large amounts on a regular basis here is some info to
various questions that have been asked.
Can I use bottle sediment, washed yeast from the primary, or any number of
other sources? YES, of course you can with a few precautions.
If your technique is good and the brew produced was clean with no
apparent bacterial growth and was produced with a clean commercial yeast
culture (dry or liquid) go right ahead. But remember that each succesive
brewing past the original culture means your load of mutant yeast cells,
wild yeast and bacteria will increase as your starter is no longer sterile.
Your brew will likely get "funkier" with every successive culture.
From a bottle, open the bottle carefully and don't touch the lip.
Pour the beer almost out ( enjoy your beer ) but leave some to suspend the
yeast layer in and pour this into sterilized wort and cover. Pour quickly
so that it pours straight out not over the "dirty lip". The same cautions
hold. You may wish to go the the agar plate route as outlined in a recent
posting assuming you know what a beer yeast colony should look like.
However, if a multiple yeast culture was used you probably won't be able to
distinguish between them as the characteristics used for separation of
different strains are based on the effect of biochemical, metabolic (what
carbohydrates can be fermented, alcohol tolerance etc.) and environmental
variables which are not visible. Therefore, the complex character you
expected won't be present if only one strain (one colony) is used.
Keeping cultures pure with no contaminants over the long term is
difficult even when using antibiotics and the best equipment available.
Luckily this isn't necessary for the homebrewer as your culture can be
periodically renewed from a clean source. Solely for your information, the
best medium for maintenance of yeast with least chance of mutation in
fermentation ability is one with glucose as the sole carbon source.
Glucose/peptone/yeast or GPY is the best as mentioned in The yeasts by
Kreger-vanRij(editor) 1984.
YEAST NUTRIENTS
The best yeast nitrogen source is DIFCO yeast nitrogen base and will
allow excellent growth of all yeast species known not only Saccharomyces.
When combined with glucose a complete medium is created. This mixture
contains a nitrogen source (ammonium sulphate 5 grams/litre), vitamins,
trace minerals and growth factors, 28 in all. This medium has no smell when
prepared but is very expensive at about $50 a bottle (enough for 11 litres
of media, buy it with a friend(s)?). Saccharomyces is definitely not a
demanding beast to grow so it's up to you if the price is worth it.
What is yeast extract?
Compressed brewers yeast mixed with water (sometimes a little organic
solvent) which has been heated at 50-55 C for 3 DAYS with ocassional mixing
to explode the cells. Boiled briefly and allowed to cool and then filtered
to remove solid matter. The liquid is then evaporated carefully to
preserve the vitamins, proteins and growth factors present. This product
is relatively cheap and is used at 0.1-4% by weight in media as an
enrichment but be warned it smells disgusting however yeast love it. If
your yeast nutrient is white with little smell it's likely only chemical.
Happy brewing,
Eric Urquhart (eurquhar@sfu.ca)
Centre for Pest Management
Dept. of Biological Sciences
Simon Fraser University
Burnaby , B.C. Canada
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #953, 08/24/92
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