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HOMEBREW Digest #1125
This file received at Sierra.Stanford.EDU 93/04/22 00:17:19
HOMEBREW Digest #1125 Thu 22 April 1993
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
Dupage County Homebrew Club (chris campanelli)
golden ale, dry hopping, fusels (J. Fingerle)
Wort pots (Brew Your Own 21-Apr-1993 0905 -0400)
First and Second Runnings ("Spencer W. Thomas")
Celis beer gossip (Phillip Seitz)
Re: Immersion Chillers (Robert Schultz)
Chiller Thread in Archives (Paul dArmond)
whitbread warning (Laura Conrad)
anodizing my cheap aluminum pot? (Charles Coronella)
SS Pot and Propane Cooker (CHUCKM)
Yeast Propagation ("Anderso_A")
Stinky yeast ("Mark Rich-mpr8a@acadvm1.uottawa.ca")
Honey Beer Recipe (Phil Hultin)
Re: Infection in Plastic Primary (Michael J. Tuciarone)
Dry Hop Sterilization, SS Pots, Temp. Controllers (Mark Garetz)
Stirring and Cakes (Jack Schmidling)
Stirred Immersion Chiller ("Joe Stone")
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 20 Apr 93 21:14 CDT
From: akcs.chrisc@vpnet.chi.il.us (chris campanelli)
Subject: Dupage County Homebrew Club
There's a new homebrew club forming in the western suburbs of
Chicago in Dupage County. The first meeting will be:
Date: Friday, April 30th
Location: My house
Time: 8pm
If you plan to attend, contact myself or Todd for the address.
If the weather is accommodating the meeting will be outside so if
you're a potato you might want to bring a chair. If it's indoors,
those of you who are allergic to cats, beware.
Chris Campanelli akcs.chrisc@vpnet.chi.il.us (708) 833-9059
Todd Williams todd@gold.rtsg.mot.com (708) 971-8692
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 07:41:04 EDT
From: fingerle@NADC.NAVY.MIL (J. Fingerle)
Subject: golden ale, dry hopping, fusels
Anthony Johnston writes:
I just wanted to write in after seeing the messages on skimming out of a
plastic fermenter. My last batch that I brewed (a "Golden" ale that I
placed in a plastic fermenter for the primary fermentation.
Strangely enough, me too.
Anyway after 4 or 5 days I racked to my
glass secondary and after a few days I noticed what looked like large
spots on the surface of the brew but closer inspection showed them to be
composed of tiny bubbles.
Again, strangely enough, me too. Actually a friend pointed out the
spots which, as I suspected, were actually clusters of very
small bubbles. To me, this is nothing more then the evidence
of continued fermentation. I have had them before with no problems.
I popped the airlock off and smelled the
brew, but couldn't detect any off odor. I swirled the contents around
and the bubbles dissipated, but within a day they were back. It just
doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before, and I thought that
once the beer was fermenting and alcoholic that it wouldn't support an
infection. Has anyone had such a problem before?
Yeah, me, but I'm not so sure its a problem. While the alcohol
in the beer will aid in preventing an infection, it is my
understanding that it is not an absolute guarentee. As for what
you are describing, I'd suggest that your batch is ok.
Other topics:
There's been a lot of talk lately about dry-hopping, hop tea, etc.
Are there any guidlines on what quantity of hops to use? A half
ounce, an ounce, what?
Regarding the subject of blowoff and/or skimming the krausen foam-I
generally rack to the secondary after the vigourous fermentation has
slowed, but before the krausen head "de-bubbles" and settles into
the beer. What ends up happening is that the siphon removes the beer
from the middle of the primary, leaving the sediment (bottom) and
krausen (top) behind. Is this sufficent to keep the fusel oils
and off flavors of the krausen out of my beer?
And, finally, a personal thanks to Joe Mulligan for the recent
recipe. Sorry to waste BW, but mail to him keeps bouncing!
- --
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
name: Jimmy I will have a cabinet that
email: fingerle@NADC.NADC.NAVY.MIL "looks like America." -Bill Clinton
-or- fingerle@NADC.NAVY.MIL He does-13 of 18 are lawyers! -Jimmy
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 06:05:35 PDT
From: Brew Your Own 21-Apr-1993 0905 -0400 <ferguson@zendia.enet.dec.com>
Subject: Wort pots
re: Chuck coronellrjds@che.utah.edu
I purchased a stainless steel 20 qt (5 gal) pot at Lechmere's (discount
deptartment store chain in New England) for $25.00. SO far, it has worked
very good. I tend not to boil much more then 3gal worth in there. This is
not one of those heavy-duty resturant types - it is pretty flimsy (read: thin).
Again, it works well, and for $25.00 for stainless steel, I ain't complainin'!
JC Ferguson
Digital Equip. Corp.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 09:49:35 EDT
From: "Spencer W. Thomas" <Spencer.W.Thomas@med.umich.edu>
Subject: First and Second Runnings
Noonan's Scotch Ale book has a discussion of "double mashing" and
getting both high and low gravity beers from one batch of grain.
Pretty good book, he's a little repetitious in spots, but lots of good
info. TONS of recipes!
=S
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 15:22 GMT
From: Phillip Seitz <0004531571@mcimail.com>
Subject: Celis beer gossip
Last night (Tuesday) was the first of three nights of Belgian
beer tastings at the Brickskeller; the same program will be
offered each night. The program included the Celis line (with
Pierre in attendance), the return of Rodenbach Grand Cru, and
Timmerman's Framboise, Scaldis, and Saison Dupont. The F. Boon
beers were originally scheduled in place of these last three, but
they mysteriously disappeared somewhere en route between Belgium
and Washington. (Anybody seen Mike Sharp lately?) Anyway,
here's some information gleaned from the Celis portion of the
program.
General:
1) Hops: all the beers use Willamette and Cascade (!) except for
the Golden, which uses Saaz.
2) Yeast: Pierre uses his own for all but the Golden, which uses
a Czech yeast. Yeast is used once and discarded. (This was
touted as a purity thing, but I suspect the stuff is hard to work
with; I'd heard from a Belgian brewer that the Hoegaarden strain
had become infected about two years ago and had been replaced.
Also Pierre Celis is obviously a knowledgable businessman, and
undoubtely realizes the economies that can come from reuse.)
3) Packaging: all the beers except the white are filtered.
The beers:
1) Golden: a lager. Well, I'll believe it if they say so,
but...you sure could have fooled me! This is a very soft beer
with a wild-honey character. Don't get me wrong--I like the
stuff, but Pierre admitted it was the first lager he'd ever made,
and I suspect he doesn't have a German-style lager bone in his
body.
2) Pale bock. Much to my own discredit, this one had always had
me puzzled, as it sure doesn't taste Belgian, or like a bock beer
either. It turns out to be a.....pale ale. Actually, once this
was mentioned it made immediate sense--has British-style hopping,
good crystal malt color, and caramel flavor. Let it go flat and
it could pass for a glass of Evrard's. The story (subject to
reality checks as mentioned below) is that a beer can't be called
an ale in Texas unless it is a minimum of 5% ABV. This one is
just below that, so they called it something else.
3) The white: Before the tasting I had a bottle of Dentergems
white, and was patting my back for doing so well with my own
white clone. Then we had the fresh, kegged Celis white, and it
was like when they go from black and white to color in the Wizard
of Oz. Back to the drawing board. Yet more proof, if any is
needed, that fresh kegs from a good brewery are unbeatable, while
old bottles from a good brewery most certainly are.
The first thing I'll do, too, is to triple the coriander.
They use a blend of various orange peels--brewable details
were not forthcoming.
4) Grand Cru: No special information was offered.
Pierre is quite talkative, although his English is more
functional than fluent, and very friendly. He does speak French
as well as Flemish, so anybody out there who wants to practice
can get a workout. We conjugated verbs together during the
break.
All said, I'm pretty sure that some of the information we
received had been tailored, embroidered, omitted, or spin
doctored for public distribution. Nothing malicious, but perhaps
devious in a sporting way. For instance, they went into great
detail about the dangers of autolysis, which seems to me to be an
excuse for filtering beers that were never filtered back in
Belgium. There was the bit about the yeast, and they also went
on and on about "Why Austin"? Explanations included the
sunshine, the water, central location, location of his previous
importer (who is now director of marekting at Celis). Well, all
this is probably true, but Pierre's also pretty conservative,
real entrepreneurial with a strong work ethic, and would probably
fit into Texas without too much trouble. He thinks Europe
doesn't have much of a future (he may be right), and prefers a
place where people get rewarded for hard work. At any rate, he
seems to be settling into the U.S. quite comfortably.
Those familiar with Celis' partnership problems and the Interbrew
buyout will be pleased to hear that the new brewery was financed
with the buyout proceeds and that there appear to be no pesky
partners on the horizon.
Phil Seitz
PSEITZ@MCIMAIL.COM
------------------------------
Date: 21 Apr 1993 09:40:21 -0600 (CST)
From: Robert Schultz <SCHULTZ@admin2.usask.ca>
Subject: Re: Immersion Chillers
I made my chiller out of 1/8" id copper tubing (it was the right price -
$4.00 for ~ 20'). I made a couple of connectors to attach it to a garden hose.
It works great, ~30 minutes to take boiling wort to pitching: could have used a
few more feet of tubing... cold water in at the top of the helix to aid in
convection...but I still stir it around a fair bit...
Rob.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1993 10:41:55 -0700 (PDT)
From: Paul dArmond <paulf@henson.cc.wwu.edu>
Subject: Chiller Thread in Archives
The response to the thread from last year on wort chillers was (nearly)
overwhelming. The file is now available via FTP as
/pub/homebrew/docs/wortchillers.Z on Sierra.Stanford.EDU.
Many thanks to Stephen Hansen for all the good work he has done for the
archives.
The current discussion on parallel tube immersion chillers shows that
people have been doing some good thinkin', workin' and drinkin' since last
August. I'm looking forward to hearing Bob and Micah at Portland. In the
meantime...
Paul.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 10:54:15 EDT
From: lconrad@poincare.Prime.COM (Laura Conrad)
Subject: whitbread warning
Donald O'Connor writes:
> Date: Thu, 15 Apr 93
> From: oconnor@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (donald oconnor)
> Subject: whitbread warning, part 3
> There seems to be some confusion regarding the availability of the new
> Whitbread dry yeast. George Fix mistakenly believes Crosby and Baker is
> presently distributing the new Whitbread to homebrew shops. They are
> not but hope to make it available in 2 or 3 months.
If this is true, what's the stuff I've been buying in The Modern
Brewer, Cambridge, Mass?
It wasn't there for a few months, and then about the time the net
started talking about the new stuff being available, it was back, so I
assumed it was the new stuff.
Laura
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 12:16:35 -0600
From: coronell@cadesm35.eng.utah.edu (Charles Coronella)
Subject: anodizing my cheap aluminum pot?
I gotta question for all you metallurgy type folks out there. Can I get my
cheap aluminum pot anodized? A friend of mine, a metallurgist, says probably,
(what a help). She says that many aluminum pots sold in the US are already
anodized, and that local shops can do it for a price, but at what price, she
didn't know. Also, there are apparently different types of anodizing, and I'm
guessing that some would be less toxic than others. Bob Konigsberg,
bobk@NSD.3Com.COM, called a local anodizing shop that told him no way, too
dangerous, FDA won't permit it. So my specific questions are these:
1) Is there a nontoxic (and legal) method of anodizing my cheap Al pot?
2) Can I get it done cheaply, and at what kind of shop?
3) Can I expect that an anodized pot to keep its durability for a long while?
BTW, thanks to everyone who suggested places that sell cheap SS pots. Looks
like I could get a 32 qt SS pot for ~ $100.
Chuck
------------------------------
Date: 21 Apr 93 07:05:26 EDT
From: CHUCKM@PBN73.Prime.COM
Subject: SS Pot and Propane Cooker
Hi everyone,
Here's something I thought I'd pass along.
I was at Pace Warehouse this past saturday. They had an outdoor cooker
for sale which looked perfect for brewing. It is in the same line as a Cajun
Cooker except the stand is about 3 feet high. Also, it comes with a 6 gallon
Stainless Steel pot with strainer basket. Price was $85. All you need supply
is the propane tank. The stand looked strong enough to hold the weight of
6 gallons. Hopefully it is since a 6 gallon pot comes with it. Is anyone
else using one of these?
Chuckm
------------------------------
Date: 21 Apr 93 10:44:32 EST
From: "Anderso_A" <Anderso_A%55W3.CCBRIDGE.SEAE.mrouter@seaa.navsea.navy.mil>
Subject: Yeast Propagation
Message Creation Date was at 21-APR-1993 15:42:00
Greetings,
I was recently told that the yeast used in Seirra
Nevada Pale ale is identical to Wyeast 1056. Is there any
thruth to this?
Also, I was told that Chimay uses only one type of
yeast for a given beer. Supposedly, they do not bottle
ferment with a different yeast strain. If this is true,
I'll attempt to make a Chimay yeast culture. I'd just like
to know if I'm wasting my time, or if I'll get the right
yeast.
Thanks,
Andy A
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 16:06:57 EDT
From: "Mark Rich-mpr8a@acadvm1.uottawa.ca" <MPR8A@acadvm1.uottawa.ca>
Subject: Stinky yeast
Hello hb-ers...
Last weekend, my brew partner and I mixed up an extract recipe as follows..
500g crystal(crushed), 250g choc-malt(crushed), 1kg clover honey, 2kg light-
dry-malt, 1kg dark-dry malt, 100 g halertau hops, 2 pkgs edme dry ale-yeast
(rehydrated in water 30 min before pitch). We use full boil, and cool in the
bathtub with ice-water in a ss 10 gal pot. The resulting wort had an og of
1.078 !! (yikes). Anyhow here's the thing the yeast in the warm water REALLY
smelled, BIG TIME! Being our first experience with Edme... in it went. The
Brew took off like crazy about 4 hours later, and just slowed down this am.
Still has that smell though... Should I worry???
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1993 16:36 EDT
From: Phil Hultin <HULTINP@QUCDN.QUEENSU.CA>
Subject: Honey Beer Recipe
A while ago someone asked about recipes for honey beers.
This is a bit tardy, but perhaps people will find this
of interest.
"La Souriciere" Belgian-style Wheat and Honey Ale
2.5 kg hard red wheat (husked) crushed and put into
12 L of water with 1.5 tsp of gypsum. Heated to boil
over 1 hour with stirring.
1 kg malted wheat (British)
4 kg 6-row pale malted barley (N. American)
0.5 kg Munich malt
0.335 kg Ireks crystal malt
All ground together, put in mash tun. The hot wheat/water
was added along with 5 L warm tapwater, mash stabilized at
65C. Mash continued for 3.25 hours until iodine test showed
starch conversion complete. Decoctions removed periodically
to maintain mash temperature. Mashout by decoction to 83C for
30 min.
Sparged with water at 78-82C to a effluent gravity of 1.010.
Added 500 g buckwheat honey to the boiling pot.
1 oz Saaz plugs (90 min)
1 oz Saaz plugs (60 min)
.5 oz Hallertau flowers (30 min)
2 g coriander seed (15 min)
Irish moss (15 min)
Pitched Wyeast 1214 Belgian Ale starter. OG 1.077 in 21 L of wort.
Fermented at 23C 4 days, racked to secondary. Continued fermentation
at 23C. It was necessary to re-pitch active Wyeast 1214 after 1.5 months
and again after 2.5 months to obtain complete fermentation.
FG 1.021. Primed with 2/3 cup glucose.
COMMENTS: The hopping schedule doesn't really make much sense, and
in retrospect, I would not add the hops so soon. The brew is perhaps
a bit too bitter for the style, and not aromatic enough. I would
have preferred to use Styrian Goldings rather than Hallertau.
The honey character required the long fermentation and aging to
smooth out, but the buckwheat gives a rich smooth taste to the brew.
This stuff is potent, and seems to have an effect beyond what one
would expect from the alcohol content.
The re-pitching is probably due to inadequate aeration in the
primary, but active fermentation was obtained after each addition.
Anyhow, hope this is of interest to the honey/wheat beer fans out
there. P.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 13:58:58 PDT
From: tooch@auspex.com (Michael J. Tuciarone)
Subject: Re: Infection in Plastic Primary
"Anthony Johnston" <anthony@chemsun.chem.umn.edu> writes:
> I popped the airlock off and smelled the
> brew, but couldn't detect any off odor. I swirled the contents around
> and the bubbles dissipated, but within a day they were back. It just
> doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before, and I thought that
> once the beer was fermenting and alcoholic that it wouldn't support an
> infection. Has anyone had such a problem before?
There are plenty of strains of bacteria, mold, and yeast that can and will
live in fully-fermented beer. This is a prime cause of the infamous
"bottle gushers" since bacteria or wild yeast keep eating (so-called)
unfermentable sugars after the lager or ale yeast has given out, producing
more CO2, resulting in pfft when you open the bottle.
HOWEVER,
this does not necessarily mean your beer is infected. You've sniffed it:
that's a good first test. Now sterilize a glass turkey baster and draw
off a couple ounces of beer, and taste it. Does it taste OK? Then
at this point it *is* OK.
Keep an eye on it, especially after you bottle. Prime it lightly, and
sample it after a week and every few days thereafter. If it shows signs
of gushing then you have to decide what to do. If at any point it
starts tasting bad, then you've definitely got a bad batch.
Until then, relax.
- ---
Mike Tuciarone
Auspex Systems, Santa Clara, CA 94043; 408-492-0900 vox -0566 fax
Y'all wanna get this party started *quickly*
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1993 15:08:25
From: garetz@brahms.amd.com (Mark Garetz)
Subject: Dry Hop Sterilization, SS Pots, Temp. Controllers
Bob Santore asks:
>Anyone out there have a way of sanitizing hops without destroying the
>aroma?
Firstly, I doubt that the hops were the source of the contamination,
assuming they were handled correctly. There has been some published
research done at UC Davis that showed there was no contamination risk from
dry hopping, and beers such as Liberty Ale and Sam Adams Lager (both dry
hopped) would have infection problems.
Anyway, if you are really concerned and want to "sterilize" the hops first
without destroying the aroma and/or putting something nasty in your beer, I
would suggest soaking them for a few minutes in some Everclear or 100 proof
vodka. Strain the alcohol, or add it, your choice. If you strain, don't
throw it away. It makes a tasty drink on ice, cut with some water.
Chuck Coronella asks about a source for cheap SS pots. High grade Vollrath
SS pots (with aluminum clad bottoms) are available from Superior Products, a
restaurant supply, for $90 plus $24.50 for the lid for the 38 qt model. 24
qt is $69 plus $18.50. Superior is nation-wide. 800-328-9800 for a catalog
and the location near you. They also have the best prices on CO2 regulators
($37 for twin gauge, $30.50 for single) and other beer stuff like thick wall
beer line, taps, etc.
Andy asks about a source for temperature controllers. I am using the Hunter
Air-Stat that homebrew suppliers sell from $30 up. I got mine at the local
hardware super store (Home Base, but Home Depot also has 'em) for $19.50.
Mark Garetz
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 21:45 CDT
From: arf@genesis.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
Subject: Stirring and Cakes
>From: "Bob Jones" <bjones@novax.llnl.gov>
>In the last digest Richard Childers suggested an immersion chiller that
might be stirred and parallel cooling chillers....
One of the most significant advantages of the immersion chiller is that by
the time the wort is chilled, the trub has settled out and is left behind
when the wort is run off.
Why on earth would you want to keep it all stirred up? You will either have
to wait the additional time to settle after chilling or run the suspended
trub out into the fermenter. It will take some heavy science to convince me
that chilling in 10 minutes vs 20 minutes will have a detectable effect on
the end product.
>From: Ulick Stafford <ulick@bizet.helios.nd.edu>
>Subject: Fleishman's yeast
>In 1123 js spoke of a beer he made with plated out Fleischman's. A pale
bock I made by adding adding a number of cakes to the wort won a ribbon in a
competition.
Two comments here. First of all, putting cakes in beer seems a bit of a
reach and if the judge happend to be a chocolate freak... but then, you
didn't really tell us what kind of cakes they were.
> Last competition I am entering. It is disgracful to enter a contest paying
someone money to drink your beer and not even getting a qualified judgement.
You should stick to cake beer. Everybody knows what good cake tastes like.
>Anyway, I suggest that Jack's plated out yeast was one of the contaminent
yeasts rather than the predominant one.
The procedure I use makes that very unlikely but I will not deny the
possibility. However, it seems far more likely that your success with cakes
was based on such a fluke.
>Fleischmans is not pure culture, but it is probably no worse than good dried
yeasts.
I am not sure how you can know that with such certainty. I would concede
that it is probably no worse than dried Red Star but I already stated that.
The preponderance of evidence is that good dry yeast makes good beer far more
often than not and possibly always for many. The small sample of inputs from
those intrepid experimenters who have tried bread yeast, is exactly the
opposite.
Finally, I make no claims for all bread yeast nor for "cakes". The yeast I
used was from a small packet of Fleishman's dried baker's yeast. It was pure
cultured to assure that the dominant yeast was cultured and bacteria left
behind.
Those who have been around here for awhile, no doubt note that even old
cranks can learn new tricks. I have always been a firm believer in the
notion that when lightening strikes 3 or 4 times, it's time to rethink my
position.
js
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 93 21:20:55 PDT
From: "Joe Stone" <JSTONE@SJEVM5.VNET.IBM.COM>
Subject: Stirred Immersion Chiller
Speaking of home-grown, hair-brained ideas, I have had an ice cream maker
motor and paddle sitting on my workbench for three months. The ice cream
maker is of the plastic bucket variety. The motor is actually intended to
turn an aluminum can of cream surrounded by ice in the plastic bucket.
The plastic paddle is intended to remain stationary and the aluminum can
turns around it. The hair-brained idea was to attach the paddle to the
motor so that it would turn inside my double-helix immersion chiller. As
I said, the parts are still sitting on my workbench, but all this chiller
talk has got me fired up ...
Maybe I'll get to it this weekend, wife permitting.
Joe
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #1125, 04/22/93
*************************************
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