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HOMEBREW Digest #1139
This file received at Sierra.Stanford.EDU 93/05/12 00:22:44
HOMEBREW Digest #1139 Wed 12 May 1993
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
FX Matts (Karl A. Sweitzer)
Going Blind, Egg Drop Soup, Worms (Jack Schmidling)
Koch, GABF, and Ancient History ("Marlene Spears")
Fast fermentation - is this a problem? (David Hinz)
Honey & Contests ("Anderso_A")
Chang ("/R=FDACB/R=A1/U=RIDGELY/O=HFM-400/TN=FTS 402-1521/FFN=Bill Ridgely/")
sugars/belgian beer brewing (Tony Babinec 312 329-3570)
beer color in Fix&Fix VMO (Frank Tutzauer)
review of THREAD v2.1 (Frank Tutzauer)
Anchor Steam practices: a compilation (Frank Tutzauer)
Sam Adams (esonn1)
Possible problems with Wyeast 1028 (Al Richer)
Re: All grain instructions - how's this look? (Drew Lynch)
Re:canned Guinness & other beers (Jim Busch)
Hefe Weissbier advice (mgg)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 08:54:19 EDT
From: envkas@sn370.utica.ge.com (Karl A. Sweitzer)
Subject: FX Matts
The FX Matt Brewing Co is now supporting the homebrew community too. They
have the been the gracious sponsor of the Mohawk Valley Friends of Beer for
about two years now. They converted a room in the back of their "Brewery
Shop" into a test kitchen where we have taught homebrew classes and where
we hold our meetings. They now also sell homebrew supplies.
Their Associate Brew Master, Jim Kuhr, is also a homebrewer. He has made
5 gal batches right in their lab! He and the Senior Brew Master Norm
Grisewood are also studying for the BJCP exam. Pam Kuhr runs the homebrew
shop. All of the people at the brewery have been very open about
information and techniques, but don't try to ask about recipes.
Our homebrew club has had the luxury of going on private tours with the
brew masters. Other homebrew clubs have also arranged tours with the
brewery. Their address is 811 Edward St, Utica, NY 13502
To answer Kirk Anderson's questions, they do use high kraeusen wort to
prime their lager beers. They also recycle the CO2 that is produced in
fermentation for use later for purging empty storage vessels, etc..
Karl Sweitzer
envkas@sn370.utica.ge.com
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 08:04 CDT
From: arf@genesis.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
Subject: Going Blind, Egg Drop Soup, Worms
>From: Steve Dempsey <steved@longs.lance.colostate.edu>
>Subject: Re: Methanol (aka wood alcohol)
>Methanol production requires:
1) the proper yeast (wild yeasts)
2) unique fermentables (cellulose == wood, grain husks)
The "going blind" momily has nothing to do with making beer or even with
distilling white lightn'n.
It has to do with the fact that, in the good old days, unscrupulous
producers, middlemen and even a well meaning friend would add commercial
alcohol to booz to streatch his fermented/distilled mash. If he used the
wrong kind of alcohol, either methanol or denatured ethanol, the result was
poison and one of the symptoms could be blindness. There is no way you can
make anything that will cause blindlness by mashing, fermenting and
distilling the kind of stuff normally used in beer and whiskey.
...............
While on momilies, let's talk about the rolling boil and "great hot-break"
momily.
I have always been a bit disappointed with the sleazy little bits of
coagulated protein in my brew kettle. I boil on my aluminum melting furnace
for at least 90 minutes in a 16 gal kettle. I can bring 10 gal to a furious
boil in about 15 minutes.
Several weeks ago, I did a batch on my kitchen stove with an EASYMASHER
installed in an 8 gal kettle just to prove that it can be done without any
fancy burners.
The result was a "boil" that I would describe more as a circulation and I do
not recall seeing a single bubble break the surface.
In spite of this, I evaporated the six gallons down to 5 and had coagulated
protein floating around that I could have made lasagna with.
So it would seem that if one wants "great hot-break", ease up on the heat.
I also made believe I didn't own a wort chiller and let it cool naturally to
pitching temp and, after cleaning and sterilizing the kettle, did the primary
ferment in it.
It is now clearing nicely in a carboy and last night's sample would indicate
that it is not significantly different from any other ale I have made with
the same ingredients and far more bother.
I wait with BATED* breath.
* It has been pointed out to me that "baited breath" results
from having a mouth full of worms.
js
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 09:54:58 EDT
From: "Marlene Spears" <hopfen!marlene@uunet.UU.NET>
Subject: Koch, GABF, and Ancient History
Being a senior citizen of the Kochpeace foundation, I thought I'd
recollect for the young whippersnappers on HBD and flame a little
to warm the hearts of the gray haired set.
For you reference hounds, Summer 1987 issue of American Brewer
magazine, page 15, Vince Cottone's article: "Beer & Loathing in
Denver: The Great American Beer Festival 1986"; and Fall 1987 issue AB,
page 26, Vince Cottone continues: "Movement in the Right Direction:
The Great American Beer Festival".
Koch introduced the "sex even sells contract beers" slant at the 1985
GABF. Until he came along, the popularity contest actually had something
to do with the taste of the beer. But he added freebies (baseball caps
and tee shirts?) and had solicitous servers working the crowd. He won
that year. The next year, he had some competition (Pennsylvania Pils
had a nice Blonde urging you to try "the beer with body"), but his freebies
turned the Trick again.
In 1987, however, Koch had some strong competition in the ballot stuffing
category. He almost lost to Boulder Brewing, but he managed to pass out
hundreds of free GABF tickets through his "assistants", with the
only string being "vote for my beer". So he won again. BTW, it was
Lightship that year, not the Boston Lager, which never won three years
in a row. His advertising is kinda like saying George Bush won
the Presidential election three times in a row (1980/1984/1988).
Get the picture? No? Well, in 1988 Koch wasn't ALLOWED to compete
in the GABF "Best Beer in America" contest. So the GABF organizers
belatedly got the picture. By then, though, they'd lost
a lot of support from the sensible Northwest folk who had set up their
own Oregon Brewers' Festival and didn't invite Smadams, even though it
was indeed being produced under contract by H. Weinhard's.
But enough of history. Get back to your brew kettles!
- --
- --------------
marlene@hopfen.rsi.com
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 09:07:19 CDT
From: hinz@memphis.med.ge.com (David Hinz)
Subject: Fast fermentation - is this a problem?
<Insert standard greeting of your choice here>
I've done about a half-dozen batches, including my first all-grainer last
weekend, and each of them have something in common - they all ferment out
quicker than Papazian says they will. I don't know if this is a problem,
a good sign, or what, so here's the details.....
For my last batch ("Silver Dollar Porter", all-grain) I used Wyeast
"British Ale" (1098????), pitched into a quart of starter wort a day
ahead of time. There was a bit of foam on the surface of the starter
but no krausen to speak of. (foam was maybe 1/8" thick). I pitched it
anyway because the wort was ready for it. I chilled the wort to 75(F).
The next morning, I got up, the wort was fermenting wildly, I needed to
use a blow-off tube in a 6.5 gallon carboy. That's another thing Papazian
says you'll never need to do, but I've done it on two batches. The strange
thing is the temperature of the wort was up to 82(F), even though it was
cool in the house that night.
I started the batch on Saturday, and this morning the bubble rate was down
to once every 30 seconds or so, which to me means time for the secondary,
and/or wait until saturday or sunday and bottle. It seems that that is the
pattern, I brew one saturday and bottle the next. From what I've read,
however, it's usually several to many weeks between cooking & bottling.
I can see a couple of possibilities here. 1> I'm just getting a good start
with my yeast, and I'm worrying, 2> I'm not letting it finish (probably not
the case, I bottle when the gravity stops moving for a couple of days and the
bubbles are once/90 seconds), or 3> I should pitch at a lower temperature.
So, what's the deal? or is it 4> (insert reason here)?
Thanks for any info you can help with.
Dave Hinz
P.S. The many responses I got about going all-grain were fantastic, thanks
to anyone who I might not have written to personally. The advice, hints,
and "Don't forget"s were quite helpful!
------------------------------
Date: 11 May 93 05:05:11 EST
From: "Anderso_A" <Anderso_A%55W3.CCBRIDGE.SEAE.mrouter@seaa.navsea.navy.mil>
Subject: Honey & Contests
Message Creation Date was at 11-MAY-1993 09:35:00
Greetings,
I've a couple of questions I'd like to raise:
1. I just bottled a honey-beer. Honey contributed
approximately 40% of the fermentable sugars. The OG was
1.060 and the FG was 1.007. I used Wyeast 1056, so I
expected from 70 to 75% attenuation and an FG of around
1.016. I also had the beer spend 2 weeks in primary and 2
weeks in secondary.
a. Does honey ferment to a greater attenuation?
b. Did the long time in the fermenters combined with
the use of honey cuase it to ferment to so low an
FG?
c. When I sampled a small portion during bottling the
beer seemed to be full bodied. Am I worrying about
nothing?
2. I just received the results from the two beers I entered
in the "Nations Capital Spirit of Free Beer Competion". I'm
not complaining about the results, but rather I'm not
certain as to the purpose. I was told that I would be able
to get helpful feed-back on my entries. In some caes I did,
in other cases there would be no comments and just a number
(lower than the maximum score). For feed-back purposes that
sucks. However, if the purpose of the competion is simply
to pick the best beer in each category, then I guess that is
acceptable. Please inform me - just what is the purpose of
these competitions?
Thanks
Andy Anderson
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 10:12:00 EST
From: "/R=FDACB/R=A1/U=RIDGELY/O=HFM-400/TN=FTS 402-1521/FFN=Bill Ridgely/"@mr.cber.fda.gov
Subject: Chang
In HBD #1138, Mark Elliott writes:
>I have a question for you beer scholars out there. This past
weekend my father-in-law and I were quaffing a couple, and he asked
me if anyone on the network had ever mentioned "Chang".
>At any rate, he said it is a brewed beverage, consumed during
social and sometimes at ceremonial gatherings (sometimes spelled
as "Chan" by those in Tibet). Said it was quite strong, and (given
the altitude) would really 'do a number on you'. He wants to know
if anyone out there in HBD Land knows a full history and recipe.
Well, since my colleague Wendy Aaronson and I will be giving a
presentation on chang at this year's AHA Conference, I suppose this puts
us in good position to help with your question.
Chang is one of many names given to the indigenous grain beers brewed
throughout the Indian subcontinent and the Himalayas. The Indians call
the beer pachwai and brew it mostly from rice. Nepali chang is brewed
from rice, millet, barley, and occasionally corn. In Tibet, the beer
(usually spelled "chung") is brewed almost exclusively from barley.
The key ingredient, however, is not the grain but the yeast cake known
variously as bakhar (India), marcha (Nepal), or phap (Tibet).
Preparation of yeast cake is a cottage industry throughout the region,
and there is considerable pride taken in the quality of the various
cakes produced regionally. Consensus among the Tibetans in our area is
that yeast cakes from Darjeeling make the finest chang.
The yeast cakes contain a combination of Saccharomyces and other fungi,
primarily Aspergillus and Mucor. The various microflora work in
combination to convert the starch in the unmalted grains to sugars and
then ferment them. The resulting beer is fairly low in alcohol initially
but has potential to become quite strong if left to ferment for an
extended period.
Preparation of chang is fairly simple. The grains (approximately 1/4
kilo per liter or roughly 2 lbs per gallon of finished chang) are
washed, boiled until soft, then drained and spread out on a nampo or
shallow basket. The yeast cake is crushed, mixed with a little flour or
tsampa (Tibetan barley malt powder), then worked thoroughly into the
cooled grain. The whole mass is then covered (traditionally with banana
leaves) and left to ferment. After several days, much of the mass is
liquified and converted to young chang. At this stage, it can be
consumed as a thick gruel, or the remaining grain can be strained out,
making a true beverage chang. As mentioned earlier, the beer can be left
to ferment further and will become stronger over time.
Chang is consumed regularly in the home as well as at weddings,
funerals, and other ceremonial occasions. A large body of tradition (and
music) has been built over the centuries to accompany the ceremonial
consumption of both young and old chang.
Anyone interested in these indigenous beers may want to attend our
presentation at this year's conference. Wendy and I will be serving our
own interpretations of chang as well as chicha (the ancient corn beer
of the Andes). It should be a lot of fun, and we look forward to meeting
many of the regular HBD contributors.
Nemaste!
Bill Ridgely
ridgely@cber.cber.fda.gov
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 09:47:58 -0500 (CDT)
From: tony@spss.com (Tony Babinec 312 329-3570)
Subject: sugars/belgian beer brewing
William Kitch had some comments on sugars in the last hbd. Here are
some comments on his comments.
Brown sugar (in USA) is refined white sugar with added molasses.
Molasses is any of various thick syrups produced in refining sugars.
There are two or three distillations, of which the thickest is
blackstrap molasses. As blackstrap molasses is strongly flavored,
look for mild molasses.
Treacle is found in England, and is similar to molasses.
Whether or not there are any differences in process or end result, what
I can find as demerara or turbinado sugar appears to be the same thing.
It is rocky and light amber in color, and is only partly refined. Various
forms of this sugar are widely available. Turbinado sugar can be found
in health food and natural food stores. I recently saw a 5 pound bag
at GNC for about $6. Raw Sugar and Sugar in the Raw are available at
commercial grocery stores. Sucanat(tm) can be found in 1 pound cans.
Does anyone have any domestic sources for candi sugar? I recently got
my hands on some from Belgium. The sugar is either light -- kind of
frosty white, not glassy clear like rock candy -- or dark (brownish
or dark amber). It also comes in two sizes -- small and large. I
think Rajotte says somewhere that the simple sugar mix in candi sugar
is desirable. Also, he says that sugars are used for coloring. A pound
of the dark candi sugar added to a beer made with only pale malts would
result in an amber-to-brown beer. The other reason to add sugar is to
produce a high-gravity beer that is not all malt, because at high gravities
an all-malt beer can be quite weighty and palate-satiating. In a similar
vein, homemade brown malt (say oven-toast pale malt for 40 minutes at
400 degrees F) or Special-B (200 - 220L) malt used in small amounts
will provide coloring without adding much of a flavor contribution.
Note that Rajotte's recipes avoid highly-roasted grains (chocolate malt,
black malt, roasted barley) and also avoid large additions of crystal malt.
Honeys should be experimented with in brewing. Light honeys, such as
clover honey, alfalfa honey, thistle honey, or even orange blosssom
honey, could be used in light-colored beers, while darker honey,
such as buckwheat or autumn wildflower honey, could be used in amber
to dark beers. One of the Mad Brewer's beers -- is it Oerbier? -- uses
some honey.
Finally, isn't invert sugar directly assimilable by the yeast? Other sugars
must first be inverted or otherwise broken down by the yeast.
------------------------------
Date: 11 May 1993 11:44:28 -0400 (EDT)
From: Frank Tutzauer <COMFRANK@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu>
Subject: beer color in Fix&Fix VMO
All right, the semester's finally over, and I've got time to catch up on my
digests. I've got quite a few questions and tidbits that have been
accumulating, and now that activity on the digest has slowed somewhat, coupled
with my new found time, it's time to post.
First, let's start with Vienna, Marzen, Oktoberfest by George and Laurie Fix.
I just recently purchased this book and it's dynamite, although, as usual,
Brewers Publications has done a sloppy job of printing. One of the first
things I did was dig up the errata sheet posted by Laurie Fix way back in HBD
859. I seem to have the first printing, and I don't know if a second printing
is yet out, but I did catch an error not listed on the correction sheet. In
particular, on pg. 88 they are discussing the calculation of beer color. The
example they are using has 7.5 lbs of 1.8L malt and 9/16 lbs of 20L malt,
which gives a Lovibond rating of 7.5(1.8) + (9/16)(20) = 13.5 + 11.25 = 24.75.
But when they normalize to 5 gallons, they calculate 25.75/5 = 5.15, which is
a mathematically true statement, but has the wrong numerator (25.75, instead
of 24.75). I believe the correct equation should be 24.75/5 = 4.95.
Relatedly, concerning the nifty graph on p. 91 showing Lovibond as a function
of dilution water added to a 20ml sample of 17L Michelob dark: I fit an
exponential decay model to the data in the graph, and thought those of you who
program or otherwise need the equation would be interested. The model is:
y = a + b*exp(-c*x)
where y is the Lovibond to be calculated, x is the dilution in ml, and the
constants are
a = 1.6545419
b = 15.354601
c = 1/65.709196.
The fit of the model is excellent (R2 = .999996), but only use it in the range
17L to 2L. The reason is because, as Darryl Richman points out in HBD 854,
the curve flattens past 17L. The exponential decay, of course, does not, so
extrapolating beyond 17L will give you major bad numbers.
------------------------------
Date: 11 May 1993 11:44:53 -0400 (EDT)
From: Frank Tutzauer <COMFRANK@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu>
Subject: review of THREAD v2.1
Those of you who search back digests with Tom Kaltenbach's THREAD program for
the IBM PC will be happy to know that Tom has released a new version, THREAD
2.1, which introduces a few improvements over version 1.2. (See Tom's
announcement in HBD 1127 and HBD 1131 for archive info, etc.) For those of you
who have never used it, THREAD allows the user to input one or more search
strings which the program then searches for in specified HomeBrew Digests.
Because it is tailor made for the HBD, THREAD is much faster than generic
text-search programs, and easily allows the user to follow a discussion
thread, locate a specific article, or gather all articles on any subject of
interest.
NEW FEATURES
The enhancements of version 2.1 that I particularly like are:
1. Overwrite protection. When the user specifies an existing file for
output, THREAD 2.1 gives the user the choice of overwriting, appending, or
aborting.
2. Numerical-order searches. Version 1.2 searched the digests in the order
in which they appeared, whereas 2.1 searches them in numerical order.
This is convenient if you want to interrupt the search midway through, so
that when you return you can easily pick up the search where it left off.
3. Keyword highlighting. When an article is displayed on the screen, all
occurences of the keyword(s) are highlighted, making it easier to discern
the context within which the keyword is used.
4. Improved cursor movement. The user can use the up and down arrow keys and
PageUp and PageDown to move through the found article.
5. Naive multitasking. In version 1.2, THREAD would search for a message,
display it, and then continue the search after the user had read the
message and decided whether or not to keep it. In version 2.1, the
program continues searching *while* the user is reading the previously
found message, thus greatly decreasing the apparent search time.
6. Search statistics. When in automatic mode, THREAD displays a count of the
number of files and messages searched, the number of matches found, and
the number of matches written to the output file. The file count, in
particular, is useful inasmuch as it gives you an idea of how much
progress has been made if you are searching a really huge number of
digests.
PERFORMANCE
Being the geek that I am, I decided to do some comparative speed tests between
the old and new versions. I happened to have 82 digests in a directory, so I
used these to compare version 1.2 to 2.1. The machine I used is a very old
8086, so we're talking sloooow. I began by conducting a very broad search. I
simply searched for "beer" in the 82 digests, and put the programs into
automatic search mode (in the interactive mode, there really *is* no
comparison--because of the naive multitasking, THREAD 2.1 wins hands down).
THREAD 1.2 completed the search in 6 minutes and 20 seconds. THREAD 2.1 took
6 minutes and 58 seconds--slightly slower. I don't know why--maybe because of
the search statistics. Next, I wanted to do a search that required a lot of
gyrating because of a complicated boolean search, so I had the programs search
for "malt and mill or maltmill but not miller". After I input this search
criterion, I realized what a doofus I was since if the program found
"malt" and "mill" it would also find "maltmill"--still, since the program
evaluates the string anyway, the search criterion still meets my standard of
being a (needlessly) complicated search. Anyway, THREAD 1.2 took 12 minutes
and 17 seconds, whereas THREAD 2.1 finished in 12 minutes flat. Finally, I
wanted to see how the programs would fare on a faster machine, so I copied
the 82 digests to my 80486 (33 MHz) and reran the the above
"malt ... not miller" search. THREAD 1.2 finished in 1 minute and 2
seconds, and THREAD 2.1 completed in a mere 43 seconds.
WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO SEE IN FUTURE VERSIONS
Only two things. The first is rather picky: When in automatic mode, while
the program is updating the search statistics, the cursor jumps around the
screen in an annoying fashion. This wasn't a problem in the previous version,
because there weren't any search statistics. A list of files searched
scrolled up the screen, so the cursor wasn't a problem. In the new version,
although I *like* the search stats, I just wish the cursor didn't jump around.
(I told you it was picky.)
The second enhancement I would like to see, though, is more substantive.
Currently, when input strings are connected with logical operators, the
program parses the input by simply resolving the operations left to right. I
would like the ability to use parentheses to control the parsing. For
example, someone wanting to read articles about the beer color in
Vienna, Marzen, Oktoberfest (sound familiar?) might reasonably want to
conduct a search for (George or Laurie or Fix) and (SRM or Lovibond).
Currently, the only way to do so would be to conduct *two* searches. One
for "George or Laurie or Fix and SRM" and another for "George or Laurie
or Fix and Lovibond". This works, but a single search would be nicer.
Unfortunately, my guess is that it would take quite a substantial revision of
the logic of the program to allow parenthetic input. Even as it is, however,
Tom's THREAD program is a gem. Before I got it, I would use Magellan or
WordPerfect or something, and it took *hours* to search my HBD collection.
Now I can finish it in minutes. Thanks, Tom!
- --frank
p.s. In addition to being a good programmer, Tom must be a pretty fair
brewer, too. He took first place in the porter category at the recent
Upstate NY Homebrewers Assoc. annual competition. Congratulations.
------------------------------
Date: 11 May 1993 11:45:28 -0400 (EDT)
From: Frank Tutzauer <COMFRANK@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu>
Subject: Anchor Steam practices: a compilation
Now that I mash, I thought I would try again to mimic Anchor Steam. My
extract version was pretty decent, but it missed in a few key respects that I
thought I might be able to rectify by mashing. In anticipation of brewing an
Anchor Steam clone, I went through all my back digests as well as other
materials I had lying around, and collected every scrap of information I could
find. I have compiled it in a collection of notes, which I have printed
below.
My purpose is two-fold. First, discussions of Anchor Steam come up every so
often, but always in little bits and pieces. I thought it would be a good
idea to have everything in one place. Second, of course, I want to *brew*
this beer, so I thought by publishing this in the digest you could tell me
what I've got right, what I've got wrong, and what I've got missing.
I cite my references by number in square brackets. A lot of the things I say
below I say as though they are undisputed facts, when, in reality, they are
opinions and guesses (we are back-engineering, after all). So, when I say
something like "Anchor Steam is brewed with an upward infusion mash [1]" what
I really mean is: "ACCORDING TO REFERENCE 1, Anchor Steam is brewed with an
upward infusion mash." *I* don't have any first hand knowledge of the
material below. Of all the references, number 1 is the most trustworty (it's
Fritz Maytag's article in the Beer Styles issue of Zymurgy).
Finally, I want to express my thanks to everyone on the digest who contributed
the information I am summarizing, and also to Tom Kaltenbach for THREAD
version 2.1, without which I would not have been able to compile these
comments.
Ok, here we go:
GRAIN BILL
Anchor Steam is all-malt [1,5] made from 2-row pale malt [1,3,5,6,7] and
crystal (caramel) malt [1,3,7]. No one has reported the proportion of pale to
crystal, but this ratio will be in large part influenced (but not completely
determined) by the gravity of the wort and color of the finished beer. See
SPECS below.
MASH AND SPARGE
Anchor Steam is brewed with an upward infusion mash [1] that varies according
to the particular malt varieties [1]. A typical (common?) mash schedule
consists of 3 different temperatures [3], with a mash out of 160F [2] and, I
believe, a protein rest of 125-126F. My evidence for the protein rest is an
inference on my part from reference [6]. My copy of reference [6] is actually
a reprint from BREWERS DIGEST, and on the cover of the reprint is a great big
color photograph of Fritz Maytag standing next to what is very clearly the
mash tun. An easy-to-read temperature dial on the tun reads 52C, which is
125.6F (unless I've miscalculated). I suppose it's possible that they were
actually heating or cooling the tun at the time of the photograph, and the
temperature was on the way up or down, with the photo being snapped at the
moment that it was 52C. I find it easier to believe, however, that they were
at a *rest* point, which says "protein rest" to me.
In any event, they conduct a 2-hour sparge [3] with 160F water [2].
BOILING AND HOPPING
Anchor boils for one and a half hours [3] with whole hops [5,6] added
throughout the boil [3]. They use "a significant amount" of Northern Brewer
hops [1], and bitter at a level of 33 IBUs [1], although others have claimed
the rate is 40 IBUs [4]. I am inclined to believe the lower figure since it
comes from Fritz himself. The quantity of hops used is approximately 1 pound
per barrel [6], which (if I am correct that a barrel is about 31 US gallons),
amounts to a shade over 2 and 1/2 ounces per 5-gallon batch.
Although most agree that Anchor uses only Northern Brewer hops in its steam
beer [e.g., 7], one occasionally sees other hops mentioned, for example,
Hersbrucker [4] or Galena [7].
With regard to dry hopping, the common wisdom is that Liberty Ale is the only
regular Anchor product to be dry hopped, although there is indirect evidence
to the contrary. In particular, reference [5] is promotional material that I
received from the Anchor reps at the 1992 Buffalo Beer Fest. (Actually, they
were probably representatives of the local distributor of Anchor Steam).
Although the section on Anchor's steam beer does not *explicitly* state that
it is dry hopped, the Liberty Ale entry says: "Hops are added [to Liberty
Ale] during aging (a process called dry-hopping) [to] further heighten the
aroma. This is one of the secrets behind the notable bouquets of *all* Anchor
Brewing's beers." Parentheses are theirs, brackets are mine, and the emphasis
on *all* is mine. This sentence would seem to imply that Anchor Steam is
dry-hopped. I asked one of the Anchor reps if my understanding of the
sentence was correct. He was clue free, and I commented (jokingly and
good-naturedly), "Gee they sent the wrong guy down here." A while later (when
I went back for seconds), the rep had obviously checked it out, because he
made a point of dragging me over to the side to tell me that, "Yes, they do
double-hop it." Double-hop?!? Well, I figured he meant dry hop.
In any event, take this dry-hopping information with a grain of salt. It is
based on inference and the remarks of a local distributor, rather than someone
who actually worked in the brewery. Just from taste, I personally believe
Anchor Steam is *not* dry-hopped.
FERMENTATION
A bottom-fermenting yeast is pitched at 60F [1]. Most everyone suggests using
Wyeast California Lager, but I have also had good success with Wyeast American
Lager. The fermentation is conducted at 60F [3], and the peak temperature is
limited "very carefully" [1]. The fermenters are shallow copper pans. Anchor
typically conducts a 3-day primary and a 3-week secondary [7]. The beer is
lagered at 50F [3].
CONDITIONING
Anchor Steam is kraeusened [1,7] to give 2.8 volumes of CO2 [1]. It is
conditioned in the low 50s (degrees F) [1], and the carbonation takes place in
sealed stainless-steel containers over several weeks time [6]. It is flash-
pasteurized at 170F and bottled so as to have extremely low levels of oxygen,
with only CO2 in the headspace [7].
SPECS
O.G. = 1.049 - 1.050 [1]
F.G. = approx. 1.013 [1]
IBU = 33 [1]
SRM = 11-13 [1]
Alcohol = 3.9% (weight) [7]
4.7% (volume) [1]
REFERENCES
1. Maytag, Fritz (1991). California common beer. ZYMURGY, 14, 50-52. [This
is Fritz's article on Anchor Steam look alikes for the Traditional Beer Styles
special issue.]
2. Fix, George J. (Jan. 15, 1992). Sparge temperatures. HomeBrew Digest
#1068. [George is citing Mark Carpenter of Anchor Brewing.]
3. Sassen, Tim. (April 13, 1993). Tips gleaned from Anchor brewing tour.
HomeBrew Digest #1132.
4. Dipalma, Jim. (Dec. 1, 1992). Re: Wyeast 2112, counter pressure
bottling. HomeBrew Digest #1028. [Jim is recalling a tour report posted
"some time ago" in the Digest. He says his IBU figure is from Eckhardt.]
5. No author. (Aug. 1984). Going against the grain. TWA AMBASSADOR, pp.
36-38. [This is promotional material I received from Anchor at the Buffalo
Beer Fest.]
6. Kellett, Ann H. (June 1988). The first little national brewery. BREWERS
DIGEST, reprint. [Again, promotional material. I don't know if the
photograph of Fritz appears in the actual journal, or just on the reprint.]
7. Dunn, Dick. (Dec. 5, 1991). Notes from a tour of Anchor. HomeBrew
Digest #777.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 11:58:08 -0400
From: esonn1@cc.swarthmore.edu
Subject: Sam Adams
As Steve Stroud says, some of Sam Adams is brewed in the Jamaica Plain
section of Boston (which actually used to be the center of brewing in
Boston because of its better than average water quality) but when I went on
a tour there, they said 5% of their beer is brewed there. The rest is
contract brewed all over the country and at a place in Germany. The reason
they cited should sit will with all of you HBDers: freshness. Just as
Anchor's beer is either unavailable or scarce on the east coast, because
Sam Adams says it's concerned about it beer traveling over long distances
and thus delivering a less fresh product to the consumer. I guess the way
they justify calling it a micro-brewer is that it brews in smaller batches
than AB or Miller and each brewery serves a specific area. Decide for
yourself.
One other interesting note on SA is that even though they say they are so
concerned with freshness, they pasteurize all their bottled beer because
"we're worried a distributer will not take care of it properly and the
consumer will blame us for a lousy product." So if you want to judge SA
you should find it on tap.
Eugene Sonn
esonn1@cc.swarthmore.edu
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 12:47:03 EDT
From: richer@desi.HQ.Ileaf.COM (Al Richer)
Subject: Possible problems with Wyeast 1028
I don't know if anybody else is going to be there, but I am going to be in
Atlanta in early June for the DECUS Symposium. If anybody else is there,
feel like getting together to talk a little homebrewing, and drink a little
beer?
But now on to brewing stuff...
Recently I made a generic stout using Wyeast London Ale yeast, rather
than my usual Irish Ale yeast. The recipe is (from memory) as follows:
9 pounds klages
1/2 pound chocolate malt
1/2 pound roast barley
1 pound 80L crystal
3/4 stick brewers licorice
2 ozs. fuggles (hazy on this...)
1 pound brown sugar
I used my standard infusion mash @ 152F, boiled for 90 min. with 3 hops
additions, force-chilled and pitched. The yeast (a 1-qt starter) took 36
hours to take off, then pumped up to a nice krauesen. This is all well
and good. Now comes the funny bit...
It fermented for 4 weeks...
I have never had a situation like this happen with any of my beers. It
seemed like the yeast went super-attenuative, as the FG stopped at around
1.008. The stuff it produced is drinkable, but hellaciously alcoholic and
with a pronounced particulate haze that seems to be yeast.
There are two possibilities here. The first is that I am just not used to
using domestic malts (I've used Brirish malts up till now). The second is
that the 1028 did something wierd.
I consider the second a possibility, as I split the pack and made slants
when I brewed this batch. The slants look really wierd in comparison to the
slants of 1084 that I usually have. Anybody think it'd be worth the effort
to send one of these to the Lodgsons at Wyeast?
* When I say the cultures looked odd, I mean that, instead of forming a white
layer on the surface of the agar, they formed a slimy white layer, replete
with bubbles from the CO2 they were everting. It looked lie yeast, but really
odd. I don't think it was a contamination problem, either, as all 12 of the
slants came out exactly the same, with no other wilds or bacteria.
Yours,
Al Richer
- --
Alan J. Richer | Interleaf, Inc. | Waltham, Ma., U.S.A.
Mail: richer@hq.ileaf.com All Std. Disclaimers Apply
The Klingon Army knife. Don't leave home without it.
- Klueless the Scavenger
- --
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 09:19:46 -0700
From: Drew Lynch <drew@chronologic.com>
Subject: Re: All grain instructions - how's this look?
> >Select recipe & obtain ingredients.
>
> >Start Yeast pack (2-3 days before brewing)
In practice, the Wyeast package is usually swollen nearly to bursting
in one day. Give it two or three only if it is several months old.
> >Add yeast to quart of starter wort (~12 hours before brewing)
Good idea.
> >Preboil 10 gallons of "brewing water", put in carboys when cool. (night
> before brewing)
You only need to do this for extract brewing. All the water you use
for all grain will end up being boiled in the brewkettle.
> >Bring 1.33 qt H2O per pound of grist to 130 degrees (f) in mash kettle.
>
> >Add above water to grist, protein rest for (60?) minutes at 122 deg.
> >Adjust pH to about 5.3 if needed
A protein rest is only necessary for undermodified malted barley. If you
still wish to do a protein rest, about 20 minutes is sufficient.
> >Start sparge water in cooker kettle, bring to 170(?) degrees. How
> >much?
I usually sparge with 5-7 gallons 170-180F water.
> >Raise mash temp to 155 deg, hold at this temp until conversion is done.
> (Can I do this with boiling water? How much do I use?)
> >Adjust pH if needed
> >Test for conversion with Tincture of Iodine
If you skip the protein rest, adding 171F water to room temperature
grain will usually net you about 155F with about 1+ qt per lb of
grain. The rule of thumb (for the temperature range desired) is that
1 lb of room temp grain will drop the temp of 1 qt of water 16-18
degrees. I heat some extra, as the mash tun will usually absorb some
heat. For 1 10lb mash, I heat 12-14qts water to 173 for my desired
155 mash temp. When you are off a couple of degrees, add a *LITTLE*
hot or cold water, stir, and check temp.
> >Raise temp of mash to 175 deg, for (20?) minutes, to mash-out.
I don't think you need to hold the mash out temp at this stage, as it
will be at this temp all during sparge.
> >Pour mash into lauter tun, let it compact, recirculate runoff
> >until clear.
Avoid compaction. It seriously slows sparge rate.
> >Put sparge water into sparging vessel, start the sprinkler. Keep the
> liquid level right around the top of the grain bed by regulating flow in
> and out of lauter tun. Collect this wort in the cooker.
Keep about 1"-2" of water above the grain bed. This will help prevent
compaction. Regulate your in/out flow to get about 1 gallon of sweet
wort in about 10 minutes.
> >Plug in cooker, bring to boil, add hops per schedule, boil per recipe.
>
> >Immersion chill, rack, pitch, shake, ferment, rack, settle, rack, prime,
> bottle, keep in kitchen for a week, put it in the basement, wait, wait,
> wait, drink, MMMMmmmmmmmmmm.
>
> ---
>
>
> Note that some of the times may be inaccurate, I'm doing this from memory,
> 30 miles away from my books. Those, obviously, will be adjusted as needed.
>
> Please e-mail or post if you can suggest improvements. I can't read R.C.B,
> so posts to the HBD would be better.
>
>
> Thanks for any input,
> Dave Hinz
Looks Good. Have fun
Drew
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 15:04:06 EDT
From: Jim Busch <busch@daacdev1.stx.com>
Subject: Re:canned Guinness & other beers
In the last digest Jack comments on several beers:
<Date: Mon, 10 May 93 08:00 CDT
<From: arf@genesis.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
<Subject: Musings on Commercial Beer
< My C-P bottler is down for re-design so I bought a bunch of commercial stuff
< to take to a party. Always wanting to turn a beer drink into a learning
< experience, I bought some things I have wanted to try/compare.
And I thought you could just pull the tap and decarbonate the beer into a
bottle! Wait a minute, didnt you follow the "how to build a CP filler" that
I sent you :-)
< Draft Guinness in the can is not only lousy beer but the nitrogen gizzmo is
< just plain silly. I thought the beer had a metalic taste and was lacking in
< anything worth mentioning.
Utter nonsense! I live in the Washington DC area where the canned Guiness was
test marketed, and I can attest to absolutely GREAT canned Guinness. There
is nothing silly about a device that works, and works well. The nitrogen has
nowhere to go until the can is opened, then it gradually rises through the beer
much the way a good draught version does. I have always enjoyed extra stout,
even in my *shudder* Bud days. The differences in the draught vs extra are
well documented. I have always loved draught stout and this device actually
results in a very good version of canned draught beer. I do believe it is the
best canned beer I have ever had.
< Bass ale was about as bland as the Guinness but lacked the metalic taste and
< just about any other, for that matter.
No comment on Bass.
< Take the coloring out of Beck's Dark and you have Beck's regular. It seems a
< bit more beerish but hardly in line with the color.
This is a bit harsh, no? There are dark malt notes in Becks, albeit not like a
Munchner Dunkles. In defense of Becks, it is an all malt beer now, even if it
was not in the past. It often manifests the metallic flavor that can occur in
many beers, especially some German beers made with Tettang hops.
< The good news (strike me dead) was Miller Reserve Pale Ale. I tried the "all
< barley" larger a few months ago and it seemed a farce but this stuff is real
< ale. It's fruity and wonderful. It has a very marvey aroma and the taste
< that follows is exactly was you expect from the aroma. By far the best beer
< to come out of the biggies in decades. No doubt they found the right
< combination of chemicals to do the trick but at least it tastes like beer.
< It does not taste like my ales but rather like most of the ales I taste at
< club meetings and the experts tell me that is what it is supposed to taste
< like.
<
Havnt had it. Good report from a quality local brewmaster, though. Still gotta
wonder about "all barley". Sure doesnt sound like "all malt" to me.
< Needless to say, I wait with baited breath to hear what others think of it.
I bit. Probably lots of others too.
Good brewing,
Jim Busch
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 11 May 93 16:00 EDT
From: mgg@usl.com
Subject: Hefe Weissbier advice
I've been fortunate enough to experience a variety of true bavarian
Weissbiers (mit Hefe) in Bavaria and now I want to make the real McCoy.
I'm using the Papazian "lovebite weizenbier" recipe. I brewed on Sunday
and the fermentation is going well. My question is that earlier in the
book (pg 147) he described the general weizenbier method as "Traditionally,
the special top-fermenting yeast is filtered out before bottling or
kegging, at which time a more flocculant (better settling) lager yeast
is added for natural bottle conditioning." The recipe doesn't call for
this. This is my first attempt at Weissbier and would like to know if
the addition of lager yeast is recommended. I don't do any filtering
when racking the beer (other than leaving the sediment in the fermenting
pail), so I believe some yeast would end up in the bottling pail.
A response to HBD or email will be greatly appreciated. I'll summarize
email if thats what I recieve.
By the way, southern Germany makes for a great vacation as well as beer
tour. (I suspect you're not suprised by this. :-)) I say this since
the major and minor tourist towns all had at least one local brewery
which always had several great beers. (The only mediocre beer I had was an
export beer I had at the airport on the way home.) Prague Czech. also
falls into this category.
In response to:
From: greenbay@vnet.IBM.COM
Subject: Hops/2 Liter Bottles
2) I heard a customer at a homebrew store saying that homebrew could
safely bottled in 2 liter bottles. Does anybody have any information
on this?
Bob Crowley
While bottling my first batch I ran out of beer bottles. In desperation
I began using anything vaguely resembling a beer bottle (various juice
bottles and one 2 liter soda bottle). I was making a porter which
prescribed 5 weeks aging in the bottle. In general I don't recommend
these bottles since it didn't seem like I was getting a good seal.
Thanks to tolerance from the beer gods all turned out pretty well.
I did add plastic wrap between the bottle and cap to increase the
seal. The juice bottled beer had limited carbonation/head. However the
beer in the 2 liter soda bottle had almost the same amount of carbonation
as true beer bottles. So if you're ever in a desperate situation,
don't look a gift bottle in the mouth. :-)
Mark Gintner
mgg@usl.com
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #1139, 05/12/93
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