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HOMEBREW Digest #1048
This file received at Sierra.Stanford.EDU 93/01/05 09:00:30
HOMEBREW Digest #1048 Tue 05 January 1993
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
Re: Calculate First, TV and TJHB! (Mike Zentner)
homebrew cop tv (James Baker - Dallas Seismic)
Kegged! (davehyde)
Competition Announcement ("Bob Jones")
Metallic flavors (lambic, etc.) (Joseph Nathan Hall)
water treatments (James Dipalma)
brewing Munich Dunkels (R. Cushing Hamlen)
UV, Zima (SCHREMPP_MIKE/HP4200_42)
COPS & TCJOHB (The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.)
Glo:gg Brew (XLPSJGN)
CO2 Utilization (Jack Schmidling)
Sources of Supplies (Markham R. Elliott)
Homebrewers as fodder for TV cop shows (TAYLOR)
Low OG (Jacob Galley)
Light and the fermentor (Bruce Mueller)
What is Victory Malt? (Paul dArmond)
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Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 07:54:24 -0500
From: zentner@ecn.purdue.edu (Mike Zentner)
Subject: Re: Calculate First, TV and TJHB!
>Strange Things On TV.
The show is Cops on Fox. I saw it too. As they sorted through the
incriminating evidence, I realized I have every piece of the same
equipment (chillers, mash tun, burner, large boiling vessel). If you
watched the whole story, though, the cops, in their planning of the
raid were careful to note that brewing was legal and that they would
have to be careful about this (although I don't think they really knew
what was involved in homebrewing).
As I understood it, they did not find a functioning still, but did
catch this guy homegrowing something else as well. They took him away,
but his face was blurred, which may indicate that he was not found
guilty.
The bad press given to TCJHB was strictly due to the show, like it was
some kind of manual of sorcery or something. The reference to a bad
batch causing health problems was to a bad batch of distilled
liquor...this is true. Looking at the guys house, it's not
unbelievable that he wasn't also distilling liquor...it could be done
with homebrew equipment & slight modifications.
Mike Zentner
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 13:48:05 GMT
From: baker@dfwdsr.SINet.SLB.COM (James Baker - Dallas Seismic)
Subject: homebrew cop tv
Homebrew COP TV:
I saw the episode mentioned in HB 1047. Actually, the guy
was arrested for distilling alcohol and growing marijuana.
In the pre-raid meeting of police, it was stated that brewing
beer was legal, that they were looking for a still.
I assumed that the police grabbed all the evidence that they
thought could be used, thus the carboy and brew book. Better
safe than sorry, eh?
The interviewed cop DID repeatedly refer to the distilled
spirits as being 'brewed'. (e.g. "When you brew that stuff,
the result could blind someone, or in a worse case kill them")
jb
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 09:08:03 EST
From: davehyde@tecnet1.jcte.jcs.mil
Subject: Kegged!
Well, I finally got all my keg stuff straightened out. I kegged 5 gal of
raspberry lager on thursday, and tapped it on Sat. Wow. I don't wanna go back
to bottles again. Thanks to all (all 3 of you) who responded, the advice was
right on.
Dave Hyde
davehyde@tecnet1.jcte.jcs.mil
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 07:05:44 PST
From: "Bob Jones" <bjones@novax.llnl.gov>
Subject: Competition Announcement
************** Competition Announcement - Bay Area Brewoff ***************
This is your last notice for the Bay Area Brewoff hosted by The Draught
Board homebrew club. This is a medium size competition, last year we had
150+ entries. We always have good, experienced judges at this competition.
The competition will be held at Lyons Brewery in Dublin, Ca. The
competition will be held on Jan 23, 1993. Last year we had a Holiday beer
catagory as an experiment. The response was so good, we are going to do it
again.
The entries are to be shipped to arrive the week of Jan 2-9. An entry
consists of two 12 oz bottles. Entry deadline is Jan 9, 1993. The entry fee
is $5.00 per entry. Label each entry with the catagory, your name, address,
phone number and club affilliation, if any. For entries in the Holiday Beer
catagory, specify any spices/herbs/special ingredients used. For entries in
the Mead catagory, specify melomel, cyser, or metheglin as necessary. If
you have any questions, you can call John Pyles (competition coordinator)
at (510) 791-0589.
Entries should be shipped to -
Lyons Brewery Depot
7294 San Ramon Road
Dublin, Ca. 94568
The catagories are as follows -
India Pale Ale
Pale Ale - American & English
Dry Stout
Porter
Barley Wine
Amber Lager (Steam style)
Mead (all types)
Holiday beer
Bob Jones
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 10:07:28 EDT
From: joseph@joebloe.maple-shade.nj.us (Joseph Nathan Hall)
Subject: Metallic flavors (lambic, etc.)
George Fix says:
) While I really enjoy tasting their beers, they consistently
) have a flavor tone which I will oversimplify and call "metallic."
) I do not remember ever tasting anything like this in Europe, although
) I have tasted something like it in selected bottles which were
) imported to the U.S. I, of course, defer to Martin for a final
) judgement on "metallic" gflavors in Lambic.
Interesting. I know that many people, including George, have complained
about the quality of domestic kilned malt. I have made several beers
with 100% domestic "Munich" or "Vienna" and invariably the result
is dry, a little bit tart, has a weird cherry-grape flavor component,
and has a noticeable metallic component. These were all ales ....
I used to attribute this to oxidation, HSA, or what have you. That
may well be, but other beers handled similarly are clean and have
no oxidation-like defects. I wonder if perhaps this grain is at fault.
Is oxidation/HSA a real problem with high proportions of these malts?
Any comments?
================O Fortuna, velut Luna, statu variabilis================
uunet!joebloe!joseph (609) 273-8200 day joseph%joebloe@uunet.uu.net
2102 Ryan's Run East Rt 38 & 41 Maple Shade NJ 08052
Copyright 1992 by Joseph N. Hall. Permission granted to copy and
redistribute freely over USENET and by email. Commercial use prohibited.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 10:30:05 EST
From: dipalma@banshee.sw.stratus.com (James Dipalma)
Subject: water treatments
Hi All,
In HBD #1046, Jim White writes:
>I noted absolutely no mineral precipitation in my boiler after a 1/2 hour
>boil.
Water "hardness" is a measure of carbonate content. Since no carbonate
precipitated out, I'd venture to say that this water is already fairly
soft.
>In any event, it seems I need to acidify.
It may not be necessary to acidify for mashing. When water is added to
grist, it will acidify naturally to some extent.
My water source is a private well, the water is quite hard. After
pre-boiling my mash water, I get a lot of precipitate, but the pH is still
close to 7. Once the water and grist is mixed however, the pH drops to
roughly 5.4-6.0, depending on the type of malt. If I use English pale
malt, the pH drops to 5.4-5.5, and I leave it at that. If I use less
modified pilsner malt, the pH gets to ~6.0, and I use a teaspoon of gypsum
to drop it to 5.4-5.5. My theory is that the degree of kilning accounts
for this difference, as the acidification effect is more pronounced if dark
malts are added to the mash.
Anyway, I'd recommend not acidifying any mash water until after
mashing in the grain, as it may not be necessary.
>...I wonder, though, would a small quantity of
>Orange juice accomplish the acidification w/o making the resultant beer
If your water has a pH of 8 after boiling, you probably should acidify
for sparging. Use a "food grade" acid like citric, lactic, or acidblend,
and be very careful not to overdo it. I use 1/4 *teaspoon* of acidblend to
acidify 4 gallons from ~7 to ~5.5. A little goes a long way, and you
don't want to let the pH of the runoff drop below 5.0.
There was a discussion of sparge water acidification in HBD about two
weeks ago, issues #1033 and 1034 if memory serves. Check the archives.
Cheers,
Jim
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 10:25:46 CST
From: cush@msc.edu (R. Cushing Hamlen)
Subject: brewing Munich Dunkels
This last weekend I tried my hand at brewing a true Munich Dunkel. After
reading Miller, I decided to do so using all Munich malt. My source for
Munich malt states that the malt is enzymatic, with sufficient enzymes
to convert starch without using pale malt.
Well, to make a long story short, I ended up with about three gallons of
starchy barley malt porridge....it did not even begin to convert! The
process was a protein rest at 130F, conversion at 150F for two hours,
another hour at 158F (out of desperation). PH was 5.2. Mash was
9.1 pounds of grain with one quart of water per pound of grain.
So, the question is this: has anyone out there make a Munich Dunkel using
all Munich malt, and had sucess doing so? I am wondering if the 'Munich'
malt we can buy here is simply not a good malt to use to make a dunkel,
or if I happened to get some malt whose enzymes had been inactivated.
This is likely a good topic for open discussion on the HBD, so go ahead and
post any responses.
- --
> Cush Hamlen | cush@msc.edu
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 08:59:18 -0800
From: SCHREMPP_MIKE/HP4200_42@pollux.svale.hp.com
Subject: UV, Zima
One way to block the UV nasties in your fridge... Break the top off a brown
beer bottle and stick it over the bulb. Let the guys that formulated the glass
do the work of figuring out the techie stuff.
ZIMA... a malt beverage. While stuck in the snow all last week at Tahoe I spent
a lot of time in Safeway. I saw and bought a bottle of ZIMA, a "CLEAR malt
beverage". I thought, "Gee, a clear beer". Wrong. It was junk. Don't be fooled
into buying any, it ain't even close to beer. Luckily I was cheap enough that I
only bought one bottle, not a whole six pack.
Mike Schrempp
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 3 Jan 1993 21:33:13 -0500 (EST)
From: HAPANOWICZ@bigvax.alfred.edu (The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.)
Subject: COPS & TCJOHB
The saturday 2/1/92 episode of COPS on the FOX network had an interesting
case that related to homebrewing.
The West Precinct of the Pierce County Sheriff office (Washington State)
obtained a search warrent to look for a still in a guys house.
Deputy Andy Estes was explained in the briefing that they want search the
mans house and find the still. It wasn't clear if a still was all they
were after but a man from the Liquor Board was also present at the briefing.
They had some info on where the still was kept in the house from an
informant. Depty Estes stated that the man had brewing equipment (Homebrewing
is legal) and he had a still (Illegal). He presented the procedure that
they would follow to serve the warrent.
The sheriffs served the warrent and searched the house. They found
the burner (A high BTU burner like we use to boil a large wort) and
stated that it was used for the still. They also found several soda
kegs. They called the company that owned the soda kegs and stated that
they were stolen and asked if they would like them back. Also found was
a wort chiller and other homebrew equipment. The guy had a keg setup
for mashing the grains and the Liquor board guy said thats what was needed
to make the whiskey or grain alcohol.
In the search of the house they found a greenhouse in the closet that he
was using to grow you-know-what, not hops but its second cousin.
They packed the brewing equipment into a van and took him off to jail.
Deputy Estes stated that all this guy needed to do was to make one bad
batch and everyone who drank it would go blind.
Comments:
I don't know if the man involved was selling his product(s), the beer,
the alcohol or the green stuff.
The camera focused on a book in the man's house: Guess what it was
titled. YUP! Papazians "The Complete Joy of Homebrewing."
The Liquor Board guy stated that if copper tubing was found it was
part of a still. I think the guy was brewing beer from grains and the
copper tubing was part of the chiller.
The man in question also had a cooler that had tubing running through
it.
All the equipment that I saw related to homebrewing and it seemed to
be an advanced set-up.
It seemed as if all the legal authorities involved had no clue on the
chemistry or engineering involved with homebrewing beer.
I don't have the name of the Liqour board guy or the man in question.
I can get these names off the video tape if anyone wants to pursue
this further (someone in Pierce County Washington?).
I really have a life, I was waiting for Ren&Stimpy to come on :^) !
Questions:
If you obtained soda kegs via a deposit are you stealing from the
beverage company? His kegs had warning labels on them. What if you
buy refurbished kegs, do these have the names of beverage companies
stamped on them? Mine do. I meant to say that the kegs in the first
sentance were obtained from a redemption center.
What is law on distilling alcohol for personal consumption?
Did anyone else see this show? Comments? Let's write some letters
and set the authorities straight on this. I think that punishment is
in order for his "plant" growing, even though Clinton didn't inhale.
I am willing to send the tape to anyone who wishes to view it as long
as it gets passed around. Note: My VCR is screwed up such that the
tape may be of good quality when viewed on your VCR (Head Problem).
Rick Hapanowicz HAPANOWICZ@CERAMICS.BITNET hapanowicz@bigvax.alfred.edu
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 04 Jan 93 11:53 CST
From: XLPSJGN%LUCCPUA.bitnet@UICVM.UIC.EDU
Subject: Glo:gg Brew
Dear Brewers,
Well, the holidays are over and I thought I'd send a little note
note about the reactions I received from my Glo:gg Ale brewed for the
season. First of all, I want to thank all who offered their advise and
know-how, all were very helpful. Unfortunately, I'm afraid that I
chose the wrong method... Not that the brew was a failure - in fact I
got a great deal of responses that it was quite good... but...
The overall opinion was that it was "interesting" in that it tasted
alot like a cinnamon and rasin roll, moreso than a beer (even a holiday
brew!). Let me recap what I did:
Following Papezian's recipe for 'Elbro Nerkte Brown Ale' I thought I'd
simply add the glogg spices (in essence form - soaked in alcohol) at
bottling. Instead, however, I decided to add them to the secondary
after steeping them in 1 gal of water, much the same way as if I were
steeping specialty grains at the start of a boil. In effect, I added
a 'tea' of glogg to the secondary (spices and all) and let ferment
for 10 days. Then bottled.
My personal reaction to the brew is that it is certainly drinkable,
but perhaps best left for a desert-type beverage. It is heavily
spiced (I presume due to the steeping, rather than simply adding them
as is - dry - to the secondary... or even added to the boil when I
added the finishing hops...). Further, I misread the original recipe
and added 1/2# rather than 1/4# black pattent malt, and that oversight
added a rather dry bitterness to the finish. The carbonation was
almost too good (best yet!).
I think that if I try this one again, I'll go even easier on the black
pattent malt (maybe 1/8#?) and add the spices (sans rasins this time)
with the finishing hops. In all, I'm glad I got the experience, but
next time I'll go for something less extravigant that won't act some-
like prune juice!
Cheers,
John
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 09:40 CST
From: arf@ddsw1.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
Subject: CO2 Utilization
I am getting tired of waiting till my tank runs dry to report back on a
discussion of about a year ago.
Here is what I have gotten thus far out of the last one, filled in Dec 1991:
49 kegs force carbonated and dispensed
Hundreds of bottles counter-pressure filled
There are still a few pounds in the tank and I think it is safe to say that
the CO2 is in the noise, as an expense in the force vs natural carbonating
argument.
I should point out that I always turn off the tank when not dispensing and
thereby eliminate losses from leaks.
js
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 18:56:47 GMT
From: u4imdmre@cpc41.cpc.usace.army.mil (Markham R. Elliott)
Subject: Sources of Supplies
YEE HAA !!
Santa came through this year and brought me a Microbrewery kit (by Billingtons
of Kirklands, WA). Included in the kit is everything a newcomer needs for the
first brew. I'm not sure of _exactly_ what the syrup was I added (my guess is
that is a blended extract of barley, hops and malt) to the water along with the
sugar and yeast, but want to make more when this batch is bottled. Enclosed is
an order form for resupplies. The supplier is Coopers Brewery, (Australian)
handled through Billingtons catalog sales (of Portland, OR).
Being as novice as one can be to the brewers art, I don't want to get into
messing with the actual grains yet, and am content to experiment with the syrupy
extract (exactly what is in the stuff anyway), but I would like to see what else
is available out there through other suppliers. I live in the Jackson, MS metro
area, and there are no HB Supply stores, or other (known) establishments that
stock associated items.
Would someone please be so kind as to send me an address or list of reputable
supply company addresses so I can get catalogs and/or additional info. I found
and quickly perused Miller's book, but as far as suppliers, he merely suggests
joining some association, subscribe to _Zymurgy_, and obtain addresses from the
advertisers.
Thanks in advance. Any and all help appreciated.
M ELLIOTT TELNET u4imdmre@cpc41.cpc.usace.army.mil
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 16:38:06 -0500 (EST)
From: TAYLOR@sbchm1.chem.sunysb.edu
Subject: Homebrewers as fodder for TV cop shows
Did anyone happen to catch the TV show COPS? I walked in on the
middle of a segment from Washington state, where they had taken someone
into custody for running a home still -- where it looked to me that what
he was doing was making home brew.
The numbskulls put up a photo of the cover of THE COMPLETE JOY
OF HOME BREWING just to show what a really dangerous criminal they were
dealing with. There was also a "detective" making comments about people
going blind and so on and so forth.
I bring this up because it will be that much more difficult to get
my friends to try my (quite drinkable) home brew. I am also not thrilled
by the spectre of having to explain that it's not illegal to make home
brew -- no matter what you see on TV.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 15:57:59 CST
From: Jacob Galley <gal2@midway.uchicago.edu>
Subject: Low OG
Last night we whipped up an Ad Hoc Weiz-Steam-Bock from some old
extract and grain that was lying around, and the OG is surprisingly
low. Here's the details:
For 5 gallons, mash at ~165^F:
~3 lbs English 2-row
3 lbs American wheat
.5 lb Barley flakes
Add to:
~10 lbs Munton & Fison LMX
~3/4 oz N. Brewer hop pellets (90+ minute boil)
~1/2 oz Fuggles hop pellets (30 minutes)
~1/2 oz Tettnang hop pellets (2 minutes)
Pitch:
California Lager Wyeast slurry
We had to boil all this for at least 2 hours because we started with
much more water than we should have. I'm talking 10 gal down to 5 gal.
This is also the first time I've used my chiller, which is just 25
feet of copper tubing that lies in my bathtub submerged in cold water.
It works great!
Anyway, this brew produced some amazing cold break. After it settled
overnight, there was about 4-5 inches of trub. While I racked this
off, I measured a gravity of 1037 or so, which seems very low
considering how much extract we put in. Can anyone explain why? Would
the amount of trub be related in any way? Might this have been a poor
reading because it was taken from the top of the carboy (even if this
was a full boil, ie not water on top of wort), ie would the heavier
sugars & stuff settle to the bottom of the carboy overnight?
Another question: We siphoned the wort into the chiller with a J-cane
and generic plastic tubing. We couldn't help but notice that our
J-cane became very limp in the boiling hot wort and is now sort of an
S-cane (or maybe a xi-cane). How nasty/toxic will this make my beer?
Thanks,
Jake.
"JUST DO IT yourself." <------------- Jacob Galley / gal2@midway.uchicago.edu
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 16:51:22 PST
From: Bruce Mueller <mueller@sdd.hp.com>
Subject: Light and the fermentor
In HBD #1046, reference was made to UV light in the 'frig with a 15W bulb
to keep the temperature up a bit in very cold weather. Well, to really
cut the UV down, why not use a higher wattage bulb and dimmer? You know
that 15W of mostly heat is what you need; by shifting the bulb's output
from the visible towards the IR, UV will drop dramatically. If you run
a bulb which only glows a dull red, UV will be virtually nonexistant. In
fact, why not use the built-in (presumably) light socket in the 'frig?
I suppose a screw-in dimmer might be a bit tough to come by.
Bruce Mueller
Chemist and Tinkerer
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 16:47:32 -0800 (PST)
From: Paul dArmond <paulf@henson.cc.wwu.edu>
Subject: What is Victory Malt?
My homebrew shop just started carrying Briess Victory malt. The owner
doesn't know what it is, he just got a sack because the salesman at Great
Western says "It's good to put in Ales." It looks like six-row thats been
toasted. What is this stuff? What sort of beers does it go in? How much
do you use? I said "What the heck!" and put a pound and a half in a
recent porter and reduced the other roast malts slightly. Tastes OK at
bottling. What am I dealing with here?
Paul (narrow bandwidth) deArmond
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #1048, 01/05/93
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