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HOMEBREW Digest #1212
This file received at Sierra.Stanford.EDU 93/08/26 00:47:28
HOMEBREW Digest #1212 Thu 26 August 1993
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
Tun size and cheepness (David Hyde)
WORT AERATION & Sierra Nevada ( Neil Mager )
Liberty Ale Clone (Lee=A.=Menegoni)
PU, Honey, AERATION (Jack Schmidling)
Blueberry Beer (Michael L. Hall)
Victoria Microbrewers Festival (Philip Atkinson 356-0269)
press rel ("Philip Atkinson")
Bottle labels? (Gretchen Brannaman 250-8384)
Please add me to mailing list! (Frame)
pico-Brewery (MRS1)
aeration (Bob Devine)
Free software (Domenick Venezia)
Warm Temp Aging? (ROB WILSON)
Blueberries/Calcium chloride (Kinney Baughman)
Chlorine, Yeast and My Septic Tank (CCAMDEN)
RE: Irvine Brewpubs (Brad Roach)
carboy handles (Dick Dunn)
yeast (Todd Gierman)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 93 10:28:55 -0400
From: dd853@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (David Hyde)
Subject: Tun size and cheepness
HBD was a great source of help for keggin info a year or so ago,
so I'm back with more questions. With the time I save by
kegging instead of bottling, I figure I can go all-grain and
still not spend much more time than I used to. I'm acquiring
stuff bit by bit to start and have run into problems finding
a suitable mash tun. I'd planned on using a cylindrical "picnic
cooler", but haven't been able to find the larger ones. Not
true...I did find a large (10 gal?) one at an "exclusive"
outdoor shop, but I didn't have the kind of money they wanted.
I've found 5 gal ones at plenty of places, but that's the
largest around here.
So...three questions:
1. Would a 5 gal cooler make an adequate mash/lauter tun for
5 gal batches with an average amount of grain?
2. If not, is there a relatively cheap source for large
coolers?
3. Can a rectangular cooler make a suitable tun? I like
the idea of a smaller grain surface area, but could sacrifice
that for economy.
Understand, I'm deep in Southern Maryland, far from
civilization :), but close to DC and Baltimore for supplies.
By the way, I'm currenty using a propane hot water heater
element as a burner. They're pretty poular around here as
crab cookers, and will boil something like 100 gal of water in
15 sec. At least that's how hot they feel leaning over one on
a summer day :) (That's a joke, but they do work well.)
They're cheap and easy to find around here, and I expect
they would be elsewhere.
Thanks in advance.
Dave Hyde
DD853.cleveland.freenet.edu
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 93 11:07:42 EDT
From: neilm@juliet.ll.mit.edu ( Neil Mager )
Subject: WORT AERATION & Sierra Nevada
America Online has an online, live Brewing discussion the 2nd Thursday
of every month. Participants include knowledgeable folks from
Sierra Nevada. I believe in July, the discussion turned to Wort
aeration. One of the participants from SN said they like to achieve
as high an oxygen saturation as they can - 100% if possible.
They use something called a fishtail which is basically a pipe
with a flattened end which they use to spray the wort into the
fermenters.
- -- Neil
===============================================================================
Neil M. Mager
MIT Lincoln Laboratory Lexington, MA
Weather Radar - Group 43
Voice (617) 981-4803 (W)
Internet neilm@juliet.ll.mit.edu
America On Line neilmm@aol.com
===============================================================================
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 93 10:37:51 EDT
From: Lee=A.=Menegoni@nectech.com
Subject: Liberty Ale Clone
I just got some fresh homegrown Cascade hops. Does any one have an all
grain recipe for a Libery Ale clone?
If yes please post or send to: my address gets mangled in a post
lmenegon@necis.ma.nec.com
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 93 11:23 CDT
From: arf@genesis.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
Subject: PU, Honey, AERATION
>From: darrylri@microsoft.com
>Subject: PU yeast
>In my report on the Pilsner Urquell brewery, I noted that they
were using three yeasts identified as D, H, and W... I have speculated on
this before; I believe that there is only one strain in use, but it has a
tendency to mutate. In order to avoid problems, the PU brewery grows up a
pitching slurry and labels it with a letter (for example, 'A'). They brew
beer from this yeast and attempt to maintain it as if it were a separate
strain in the brewery during successive repitchings.
I guess I missed this but if it was in the article, I probably mentally
voided the information because it sort of cancels out in a practical sense.
It would be futile for us to compare notes on "strains" considering that the
brewery is pretty much throwing darts.
Thank you for clearing this up.
>From: korz@iepubj.att.com
>Subject: Re: Cream Stout
>I'm not sure if all cream stouts or all sweet stouts have lactose in them,
but since I've recently done a semi-sweet (demi-sec?) stout that turned out
quite nicely, I can offer a bit of advice.
Having tasted this and several other sweet stouts at a CBS sponsored Stout
Seminar, I rather liked the beer and made one up for a party.
However, not wanting to add another odd ingredient to my collection of never
to use again stuff, I sweetened mine with honey and the result was just what
I expected.
My thinking was that honey ferments very slowly in the first place and with
ale yeast and in a cold fridge, it probably never will ferment out.
Prior to kegging the stout, I poured two cups of honey (boiled to sterilize)
into the keg and filled and carbonated as usual.
If I were to do it again, I would only use one cup of honey as it is a bit
too sweet for general consumption. The first few sips are a taste explosion
but a little goes a long way. It was made in May and I still have a couple
gallons left and it is as sweet as the day I keggged it.
>From: Jim Cave <CAVE@PSC.ORG>
>Subject: WORT AERATION
> The dialogue concerning Jack Schmidling's wort aeration
experiment continues on the digest. I have E-mailed Jack directly
concerning his experiment. However I feel that misconceptions
continue regarding the experiment so I feel compelled to bring my
concerns up on the digest.
My only concern is the misconception of the objective of the experiment but I
did learn a great deal from the objective discussions both private and public
and thank those who contributed.
I apologize for whatever share I may have had in the unpleasantness that
developed but simply offer it as a warning of what happens when personal
garbage is brought to a public forum. It is all too easy to attack the
messenger and never get around to the message or so fog it that little else
is accomplished.
>There are two ways to alter this experiment The first and
most obvious is to make four full-scale batches (5-10 gallons?).
The valid assumption can then be made that the experiment mimics
the situation in the (home) brewery.
Considering the objective, viz., the wonders of the airstone, I guess I will
fall back on anecdotal evidence. There are only two variables, airstone and
whatever else one normally does to make good beer. Anyone who has been
making good beer and tries the airstone, soon comes to a very practical
resolution. If it improves things, he keeps doing it, if not he quits. The
mail and posted comments indicate that most people quit. So much for
science.
js
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 93 10:28:57 MDT
From: mlh@cygnus.ta52.lanl.gov (Michael L. Hall)
Subject: Blueberry Beer
Dave (drose@husc.harvard.edu) asks for recommendations for blueberry beers.
Since I made a blueberry beer recently, I thought I would respond. It had no
blueberry color and very little blueberry flavor. My recommendations:
Make a *very light* base beer. Mine was way too dark/heavy. A light
wheat beer might be nice. Even then the color will probably not come
through (but the flavor might). Blueberries tend to have a reddish
color in solution, and I think that will be the best you can hope
for.
Use lots of blueberries. I only used 5 lbs. of frozen blueberries in
5 gallons and it wasn't nearly enough. I would use about 2-3 lbs. per
gallon.
Add fruit only to the secondary, so that flavors and aromas don't get
scrubbed out by the vigorous fermentation. I did this, and it started
a pretty good second fermentation due to the sugars in the
blueberries.
Using hand-picked blueberries, I would pasteurize them first, by
heating to 165 F for 20 minutes.
You may hate to do this, since you have nice fresh-picked blueberries
and you would like the beer to have natural flavor, but you will
probably be able to get a better blueberry flavor by using an
extract. There are various ones on the market; some are probably
better than others.
Actually, my final recommendation would be to use a different fruit.
I don't think that blueberries have that strong of a flavor, and it
gets swamped by all the beer flavors.
Making a good blueberry beer *can* be done: I had a very good one put out by
some microbrewery that I tried at a recent GABF (Great American Beer Festival).
It had a straw color (not blue), but lots of blueberry flavor. My guess is
that they used an extract.
Good luck, I hope it comes out well...
Mike Hall
Los Alamos Atom Mashers
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 09:27:00 -0700 (PDT)
From: Philip Atkinson 356-0269 <PATKINSON@galaxy.gov.bc.ca>
Subject: Victoria Microbrewers Festival
- --Boundary (ID WGjX09Nv1BEbI5SJSFwkHQ)
Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
- --Boundary (ID WGjX09Nv1BEbI5SJSFwkHQ)
Content-type: MESSAGE/RFC822
Date: Mon, 12 Jul 1993 11:50:00 PDT
From: "Philip Atkinson"@mr.gov.bc.ca
Subject: press rel
Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
Posting-date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 00:00:00 PDT
A1-type: DOCUMENT
1993 Victoria Microbrewery Festival
Presented by the
Campaign for Real Ale Society of British Columbia,
Victoria Branch (CAMRA Victoria)
Victoria Conference Centre, Victoria, B.C.
12-8pm, October 23, 1993
Admission: $5.00 per person, includes souvenir tasting glass
and Festival programme.
Beer tickets: $1.00 each, exchanged for a 4oz. taster.
Lots of different beers and ciders from registered breweries
including:
Granville Island Brewing Horseshoe Bay Brewery
Nelson Brewing Okanagan Spring Brewing
Shaftebury Brewing Spinnakers Brewpub
Swan's Brewpub Vancouver Island Brewing
Whistler Brewing Big Rock Brewery
Red Hook San Juan Brewing Co.
Sleeman's Portland Brewing
Merridale Cider Works Wyder's Cider
... and we're still working on it!
Prices are in Canadian funds. With the current exchange rate,
it works out to a $4.00 US admission fee and about 75 cents
per taster. AHA home brew competition is on the morning of
the Festival. Enquiries for both to:
Phil Atkinson, editor, What's Brewing, 1250 Denman St.,
Victoria BC, V8T 1L8 (604)386-2818
INTERNET ID: patkinson@galaxy.gov.bc.ca
- --Boundary (ID WGjX09Nv1BEbI5SJSFwkHQ)--
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 17:00:00 EST
From: Gretchen Brannaman 250-8384 <BRANNAGJB@A1.GVLTEC.EDU>
Subject: Bottle labels?
Hello all,
Does anyone out there know of any clever ways that I can label my beer and
mead bottles? I'd like to design them on my computer, but they need to be
easy to remove (peel or soak) so I wont add more to the headache of preparing
bottles for the next batch.
Thanks in advance,
Gretchen Brannaman
brannagjb@a1.gvltec.edu
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 28 Jul 93 13:09:01 EDT
From: frame@msys.com (Frame)
Subject: Please add me to mailing list!
I look forward to hearing from you.
Kind regards,
Donald Terepka
frame@msys.com
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 93 11:01:59 PDT
From: MRS1%CRPTech%DCPP@cts27.comp.pge.com
Subject: pico-Brewery
As a neophyte brewer, I'm about to take the step to all grain brewing.
Several friends and I are considering going in together on a 3 kettle system
from pico-Brewing Systems, Inc. Since this involves a moderate investment of
capitol I was hoping someone out there may have some knowledge of or experience
with their products. Thanks for any input you may have.
Marty Sanders
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 11:34:11 -0700
From: Bob Devine <devine@postgres.Berkeley.EDU>
Subject: aeration
"William A Kitch" <kitchwa@bongo.cc.utexas.edu> wrote:
> 3) 100% air saturation is about 20% oxygen saturation. (Lucky for
us--or maybe it's not luck! Could it be Devine intervention?)
Timothy J. Dalton <dalton@mtl.mit.edu> replied in HBD 1211:
| In general, neglecting minor components, air is about
| 79% Nitrogen and 21% Oxygen. No devine intervention here.
While I do get around, I can honestly say that I haven't been
changing the atmosphere lately (well, at least not on a global scale).
I suspect you meant to write "divine intervention". :-)
Bob Devine
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 12:49:05 -0700 (PDT)
From: Domenick Venezia <venezia@zgi.com>
Subject: Free software
After all the talk about extraction efficiency, and the at times
impolite ferver over pts*gals/lb vs. pts/lb/gal, and the fact that
I've just brewed my first all grain brew, I have written a simple
program to calculate the extraction efficiency of a mash/sparge.
It is cleverly called EXTRACTF and is available free. I have
executables for DOS, SGI Irix, and SunOS. There is a short document
and an ASCII data file based on Bob Sweeney's post to HBD, sans Miller's
entries. Sorry, no source.
Maybe someone who is really willing to try it can contact me, then
tell the general HBD audience if it's worth the hassle of acquisition.
Domenick Venezia
ZymoGenetics, Inc.
venezia@zgi.com
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 17:02:41 -0500 (CDT)
From: ROB WILSON <WILSONRS@VAX2.Winona.MSUS.EDU>
Subject: Warm Temp Aging?
I just finished bottling a batch of beer. I have it sitting in my basement
primming. My question is can I leave it at this warm a temp (68-72) to age?
What are some of the possible problems, and will it age at all at this temp
? It is in a dark place so light is no problem. Thanks in advance to all
who help.
Rob Wilson
wilsonrs@vax2.winona.msus.edu
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 18:18:44 -0400 (EDT)
From: Kinney Baughman <BAUGHMANKR@conrad.appstate.edu>
Subject: Blueberries/Calcium chloride
Mr. Rose asks how to make beer with those blueberries.
I'll tell you what I do with mine. Up here in the NC Mountains we have
plenty of them and I pick them every year to make liqueur. Nothing better than
a nice snifter of blueberry liqueur in the dead of winter! I've found liqueurs
one of the best ways to preserve fresh fruit flavors, be they blackberries,
strawberries, raspberries, whatever.
Dennis Lewis is looking for Calcium Chloride.
Isn't common Lite Salt made of Calcium Chloride? I've always thought
of using it as a source but was never sure about proportions.
Anyone tried it?
Cheers!
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kinney Baughman | Beer is my business and
baughmankr@conrad.appstate.edu | I'm late for work.
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 19:07:58 -0400 (EDT)
From: CCAMDEN@delphi.com
Subject: Chlorine, Yeast and My Septic Tank
Hey Everyone;
While this is not a brewing question in the strictist sense, it _is_
related. All the various discussions about sanitizing have got me wondering.
We just bought a house that has a septic tank, and that is a first for us.
We are sanitizing everything with a weak bleach solution. For most things,
I use 1 to 2 oz of bleach to 5 gallons of water. For a few things (cleaning
old bottles) the solution is stronger. Is all this bleach going down the
drain going to harm whatever magic occurs in the septic tank? Could it be
offset by pouring the sediment from the first and secondary fermentations
down the drain, too? (I think is was Heloise that had a hint once about
putting yeast in your septic tank occasionally.) I have considered dumping
the bleach water in the washing machine as it is on a separate drain line
from the septic tank. Do I need to (gasp) worry?
Thanks for any and all help. Answers by email or here in the HBD are
appreciated.
Cary Camden, Huntsville, AL
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 93 17:10:30 PDT
From: b_roach@emulex.com (Brad Roach)
Subject: RE: Irvine Brewpubs
Irvine doesn't have any brew pubs, but in Huntington Beach there is one
worth mentioning. The pub is called Huntington Beach Brewing and it is
located on Main St. about 2 blocks from the pier. The best way to get to
the pub is to drive into Newport Beach and take Pacific Coast Hwy north
to Huntington Beach and make a right turn on Main St.
Cheers,
__
/_/ / QLogic Corporation
/ \ /_ __ __/ Costa Mesa, Calif
/___/_/ (_(_<_(_/ b_roach@emulex.com
------------------------------
Date: 25 Aug 93 00:29:37 MDT (Wed)
From: rcd@raven.eklektix.com (Dick Dunn)
Subject: carboy handles
Can anyone report an actual incident of a carboy handle causing a carboy to
break? I know there are many cautions about using the carboy handles (the
plastic-coated metal loop handles) to lift full carboys, and I can imagine
that you could induce enough force, through careless use, to crack the neck
of the carboy. But I've never heard of an actual failure, so I'm curious
what the actual level of risk might be.
Note: I'm not interested in "might be" or "obviously one can see that..."
or stress analyses or whatever. Those are separate topics; I'm looking
for (preferably) first-hand or (at worst) second-hand reports of actual
failures, and any notable circumstances under which the failures occurred.
---
Dick Dunn rcd@eklektix.com -or- raven!rcd Boulder, Colorado USA
...Simpler is better.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1993 22:32:16 -0500
From: tmgierma@raphael.acpub.duke.edu (Todd Gierman)
Subject: yeast
I like Darryl Richman's line of reasoning concerning the question of the
number of strains used by the Pilsner Urquell Brewery. It seems in line
with what one might expect for conducting "low tech", low cost passage of a
brewing strain. In support of this notion, an article by C. Rainbow of
Bass Charrington Ltd. (c. 1970) indicates that it is common practice, at
least in England, for brewers to limit the number of pitches (of a yeast
culture) to five. He indicates that this is to limit contamination, which
is inevitable in the brewing environment, and to avoid what brewers
apparently refer to as "yeast weakness" (loss of desired properties
coinciding with an increase of mutants in the population. So, it would
seem likely that the folks at PU hedge their bets a little to avoid costly
down time.
A quick comment on this posting:
>Date: Tue, 24 Aug 93 11:17 CDT
>From: arf@genesis.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
>Subject: AERATION
>
>
> >From: sc@vcc.com (Steve Casselman)
>
> > When the O2 runs out yeast go into anaerobic fermentation. During
> this time they consume sugars and water and produce CO2 and alcohols.
> At this time they stop reproducing and start budding which produces
> a long heavy chain of cells which start to drop due to their weight,
> this is called floculation.
This seems logical. I also thought so until further investigation has
shown me that this isn't so. Actually, the yeast don't go into respiration
mode until the amount of assimilable sugars runs out. Yeast are constantly
in fermentation mode and the presence of glucose actually inhibits
respiration even when oxygen is present. Jack's comment on the
reproduction mode is essentially correct. Some yeast do reproduce via
fission, but you probably won't find this kind in your beer, maybe your
cider though. Also, I don't think that this description of flocculation is
correct. Anyway, I'm not sure why one really needs to aerate, though
apparently one does (?) I think George Fix has said that it is required
for some process other than metabolism.
One final note, let's take a quick market survey concerning those desiring
Weihenstephan, before we push this thing further. Who wants it? Can you
culture? and what would be your mailing address. I will compile the
results so that they can be e-mailed to the people who would be culturing
it. This would save some time and trouble and we could, presumably,
by-pass HBD postings.
Todd Gierman
Dept. of Microbiology
Duke University Medical Center
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #1212, 08/26/93
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