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HOMEBREW Digest #3697
HOMEBREW Digest #3697 Wed 01 August 2001
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Digest Janitor: janitor@hbd.org
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Contents:
More St. Arnold... ("Bev D. Blackwood II")
Kegging vs bottling (Denis Bekaert)
Plague (wayne.aldrich)
St. Arnold, plague, etc (Pat Babcock)
Cologne Kolsch Info. ("Bob Hall")
black death /beer ("Micah Millspaw")
Where is Burley (Dave Burley)
The Homemade Beer Book ("Kensler, Paul")
Beer and Plague and Water ("Patrick Livingood")
A good use for generic American beer!! ("Wilson, Brian")
Re: RIMS thermostat + electric brewing (Tony Verhulst)
Annual Boston Pub Crawl (Ken Jucks)
Phosphorous (AJ)
Festibiere (Tom Riddle)
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Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 00:10:59 -0500
From: "Bev D. Blackwood II" <bdb2@bdb2.com>
Subject: More St. Arnold...
Just FYI, the local micro in Houston (now the oldest in Texas by
attrition... sigh) calls itself St. Arnold and they preach that St.
Arnold told his parish to drink beer rather than water since it was
more healthy. They name their fermenters after beer/brewing saints
and are doing passably well, so they have *someone's* blessing!
However, I have been told by no less than Fritz Maytag that St.
Nicholas (of Myra) is in fact the patron saint of brewers... That's
who Anchor has hung on the wall of their brewhouse!
- --
-BDB2
Bev D. Blackwood II
http://www.bdb2.com/
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2001 22:24:51 -0700 (PDT)
From: Denis Bekaert <Denis-B@rocketmail.com>
Subject: Kegging vs bottling
Last week I kegged my second beer after bottling for
two years and at the time I thought the process was
rather quick and easy, although I must admit fraught
with fears of blowing my head off with compressed gas
or driving a fitting through my thick skull...but, no,
it really was easy.
So what? Well, tonight I bottled a five gallon batch
because I wanted to give it to my Dad since he really
loves a wheat beer. Gad, I now realize why kegging is
so beloved by homebrewers. When I routinely bottled,
I didn't realize just how much extra effort I was
spending putting up my precious brews.
The moral of the story is this: if you have ever
thought that kegging your beer was too big a step,
think again...its easy and it will save you an amazing
amount of time and effort, which can be better spent
dreaming up new brewing projects and sampling your
work.
Oh, yeah, then there is the extreme pleasure of
filling a glass (or two) of your brew right out of a
keg...just like being in the local pub except you have
no closing hours and your brew is just SO much better
than the commercial stuff....
Denis in Beechgrove, Tennessee where Moonshine is our
history, but homebrewing is our passion.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 03:33:56 -0400
From: wayne.aldrich@dtra.mil
Subject: Plague
The plague is an enzootic infection of rodents(rats, rabbits)
and their fleas. It is spread primarily by bites from the infected fleas.
Direct contact with infected rodents and domestic animals can
also result in infection. The only other source for infection is
via direct contact with the infected droplets from infected humans or
animals. So I suppose the boiling of beer wort would kill the
bacteria that could have infected the water. A more likely
fatal waterborne bacterium that would be eliminated through the
brewing process is cholera.
Wayne Aldrich
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 07:16:14 -0400 (EDT)
From: Pat Babcock <pbabcock@hbd.org>
Subject: St. Arnold, plague, etc
Greetings, Beerlings! Take me to your lager...
First: I am not a doctor, epidemiologist or historian. Nor do I play any
one of these on radio or television. I am, however, interested in both the
saints and in the "black death". Here is a slight rewrite from that which
I provided Ant via private mail Friday...
The bubonic plague is primarily transmitted by fleas which have fed on
infected rats. This was the attributed cause of the infamous black death
in the 14th century. Sanitation in that era consisted of dumping your
garbage wherever available, fostering a huge rat population. A particular
species of rat, a black something-or-other rat usually found in forests,
carries the bubonic plague. It is thought that a drought at the time drove
these rats into the cities to infect the rat population there. Since the
city rats were not immune, they eventually died, forcing the fleas they
picked up from their country cousins to find new warm-blooded animals to
feed on - people. A mild winter then allowed the plague to rage where it
would normally have been diminished by the cold.
There are other plagues that are primarily pneumonic and septic,
but bubonic is primarily pest-borne.
Per any reference to substitutes for water, the people of the time had the
habit of throwing human waste and whatever other garbage they had laying
about into the gutter, or whereever convenient. Recycling, greenhouse
effect, the ozone layer and other ecological fears were unknown. Due to
this cavalier attitude toward their environment, their trash would get
into the rivers and streams and contaminate their water supply - quite
different than the plague, but a major contributor to the high mortality
rate of the era. Primary result was "dysentery", which was quite deadly at
the time. Immodium AD, Donegal, Pepto-Bismal, Kao-pectate are all rather
modern remedies to prevent the dehydration that would otherwise result
from this condition.
Also note that the St. Arnold who is the one accepted as a patron of
brewers (St. Arnulf of Metz) lived c580 to c640. The plague was in the
14th century (~1347). It's unlikely that St. Arnold had any physical
impact on that event
There are many patron saints of brewing, including: Amand, Arnold,
Augustine of Hippo, Barbara, Boniface, Florian, Lawrence, Luke the
Apostle, Medard, Nicholas of Myra, and Wenceslas. (Note the lack of any
"Gambrinus" - though, like St. Arnold, perhaps that is simply another name
for a particular aint.) Places to search: for saints:
http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/indexsnt.htm
http://saints.catholic.org/index.shtml
The Catholic-forum site also has a "by topic" index, which is helpful.
St. Arnold:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01752b.htm
Plague:
historical: http://www.humanities.ccny.cuny.edu/history/plague/
technical: http://www.byu.edu/ipt/projects/middleages/LifeTimes/Plague.html
http://www2.itexas.net/~jburks/plague.htm
tour: http://www.discovery.com/stories/history/blackdeath/instructions.html
- --
-
See ya!
Pat Babcock in SE Michigan pbabcock@hbd.org
Home Brew Digest Janitor janitor@hbd.org
HBD Web Site http://hbd.org
The Home Brew Page http://hbd.org/pbabcock
"The monster's back, isn't it?" - Kim Babcock after I emerged
from my yeast lab Saturday
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 07:53:32 -0400
From: "Bob Hall" <rallenhall@hotmail.com>
Subject: Cologne Kolsch Info.
We hope to be heading to Europe this fall to attend a festival in the Czech
town where my wife taught for a year (check out the local brew at
www.rebelbeer.com ... has anyone seen it in the US?), then off to visit
friends in Germany. One of my goals is to learn more about Kolsch-style
brewing while in Cologne. Can anyone recommend an English language brewery
tour or other local resource that might be helpful? Also, any recommended
brands that are unfiltered/unpasturized that could be "imported" as
starters?
Many thanks,
Bob Hall
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 07:37:45 -0500
From: "Micah Millspaw" <MMillspa@silganmfg.com>
Subject: black death /beer
I was thinking that the 'black death' was caused
by ergot poisoning. Ergot being a fungus that is
found on rye. I recall that it was supposed to
cause dementia and a loss of blood circulation
in the extremities, resulting the effected areas turning
black and rotting off, hence the 'black death'.
My beer related question is, did brewing with the ergot
infected rye stop the spread of ergot poisoning?
I guess that the dementia could be a pleasant side
effect [ for a while]
Micah Millspaw - brewer at large
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 09:56:27 -0400
From: Dave Burley <Dave_Burley@compuserve.com>
Subject: Where is Burley
Brewsters:
Bill in malty Golden Colorado asks "where is burley". Burley is trying to
spend what time is available getting to pick his first crop of winegrapes (
the Chardonnay are ripe, the Viognier are riper and .....) when he is not
in the hospital. Just got out. PITA. Too complicated to explain it here
but lots of MDs are eating lobster and steak on my behalf. But thanks to
them I'm able to move again and a nasty resudual infection may at last be
gone. I'm listening but no time to respond. Thanks for asking.
Keep on Brewin'
Dave Burley
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 10:50:19 -0400
From: "Kensler, Paul" <PKensler@cyberstar.com>
Subject: The Homemade Beer Book
For anyone that's interested in the reprint of the prohibition-era homebrew
book that Mark Tumarkin posted about, I found copies of The Homemade Beer
Book at www.bibliofind.com <http://www.bibliofind.com> (there's one less
available now, as I grabbed one for myself!). That was the first place I
tried - I'm sure a search of the web will turn up other used book dealers
and used book search engines on the web.
Hope this helps,
Paul Kensler
Gaithersburg, MD
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 10:49:28 -0400
From: "Patrick Livingood" <patrickl@umich.edu>
Subject: Beer and Plague and Water
Not to keep this off-topic thread going for too much longer, but this is a
topic I have been doing some reading on lately. And I get back on topic at the
Fleas who entered Europe on Black rats carried a bacterium called Yersina
pestis. When one of these fleas bit a person, they could develop one of three
forms of the plague. Most developed bubonic plague, where the lymph nodes
swell up to the size of a baseball or a softball and death follows after about
a week for 25% to 75% of the victims. A very few people had a liver or spleen
that couldn't cope and developed septisemic plague and died after a few hours
of high blood toxicity levels. A few other people, who got pneumonic plague,
had the bacterium attack their lungs instead of their lymph nodes. They
essentially drowned in the fluids that the infected lung produced. And
unfortunately for their neighbors, these fluids they were coughing up were
extremely contagious. As far as I can tell, if someone then contracted the
bacterium from a person with pneumonic plague, they too developed pneumonic
plague. And in some of the pandemics, the mortality rate for those infected
with the pneumonic form of the disease was close to 100%.
So to answer the first email, beer would have had no effect on reducing the
infection during a plague epidemic. It only really helps with water-borne
illnesses.
But, back on topic, since there are so many beer historians on the list.
Alcoholic beverages (wine or beer) were common in all pre-Industrial urban
areas of the world that I can think of. Presumably some of its success comes
from the fact that it makes the water safe to drink. It would seem to me that
if you are making beer with the primary intent of making potable water, you
would want a low alcohol content beer. Just enough alcohol to kill the
nasties, but not too much because the body has to use some water to capture and
expel the alcohol.
I am wondering if anyone has information on the typical alcohol content of
early European beers? And I am wondering if anyone has information on how much
water is used to remove alcohol from the body. In short, how much water gain
or loss is there with 12 oz. of a 2% alc. beer or a 4% beer, etc? Where is the
break-even point?
- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
Patrick Livingood Phone: 734-764-7274
University of Michigan Fax: 734-763-7783
Museum of Anthropology E-mail: patrickl@umich.edu
Rm. 4009 Museums Building
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1109
- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 11:23:51 -0400
From: "Wilson, Brian" <BWilson@mail.dos.state.fl.us>
Subject: A good use for generic American beer!!
At last! A good use for generic American beer!
Beer offered to clean Tar Creek
By OMER GILLHAM Tulsa World Staff Writer
7/30/01
Tom Harris is stone cold sober when he talks about using stale beer to
cleanse the iron-contaminated waters of Tar Creek.
Harris, a University of Tulsa chemistry professor, has conducted laboratory
experiments that show that a beer-treated wetland would be far more
effective in removing heavy metals from runoff water than an untreated
wetland.
When Harris eventually takes his idea to the orange-hued waters of Tar Creek
near Picher, Oklahoma he hopes a local beer distributor will donate its
expired lager to the project. The distributor, who wishes to remain
anonymous, destroys about $200,000 a year in beer that has not been sold by
its expiration date. That is hundreds of gallons of old grog going into the
Tulsa sewer works each month, said a distributor spokesman.
"The idea kind of fell in my lap at a (cocktail) party," said Harris. "I was
talking about using molasses as a (remediation) agent when a friend
suggested beer. It struck me as being a remarkable idea."
Harris said the sugar-like molecules in beer promote the growth of a
"friendly" bacteria that would have a party on the zinc and lead, flowing
into a wetland along Tar Creek -- one of the most urgent EPA Superfund sites
in the United States.
Sulfide, the bacteria's byproduct, is a key player in the remediation
effort. Harris said the element would latch onto heavy metals and bond them
to a wetland's muddy floor thus leaving cleaner water to wash downstream.
He said a beer-treated wetland is a possible low-tech, low-cost solution to
just one of the many problems associated with contaminated soil and water
caused by decades of zinc mining. "Our research shows that a (beer) wetland
could be five to 10 times smaller than a regular wetland and produce many
times more of the remediation work," said Harris. However, the strength of
the beer-fed bacteria does fade, which means a beer-treated wetland must be
loaded up with thousands of gallons of beer periodically.
Sent by:
Brian Wilson
Tallahassee, Florida
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 12:27:39 -0400
From: Tony Verhulst <verhulst@zk3.dec.com>
Subject: Re: RIMS thermostat + electric brewing
> Rob Dewhirst posted that the best place for the RIMS thermostat temp. ....
>
> Rob's right. My first RIMS had only one probe located upstream of the
> heater. During one stickly mash, the temp. upstream of the heater reached
> something like 20 degF above the desired mash temp. Also, the lag Rob
> mentions with only an upstream probe will result in the mash temp.
> overshooting the desired rest temp. in roughly inverse proporation to the
> flow. The main disavantage of a downstream probe location is that boost
> times between rests will be much longer. OTOH, one upstream can better
> measure mash temp.
This, to me, is one reason why some of us prefer HERMS like systems over
RIMS. My system, for instance, has an independent (not tied to the HLT)
electric powered heat exchanger. The temperature of the water in the
exchanger IS the mash temperature. My one and only temperature sensor
is in the heat exchanger itself and not in the wort flow. See my web
page at http://www.world.std.com/~verhulst/RIMS/rims.htm. What ever
rings your chimes, I guess.
cheers,
Tony
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 12:54:23 -0400 (EDT)
From: Ken Jucks <jucks@cfa.harvard.edu>
Subject: Annual Boston Pub Crawl
If you live near or are going to be near Boston on August 11,
I encourage you to attend the annual pub crawl of the Boston Wort
Processors. The aim of the crawl is to visit many outstanding
beer bars and brew pubs from lunch to closing time. Some of the pubs
are staples of the crawl and some are lesser known gems with good beer.
Some of the establishments go out of their way to welcome us and have
special beers on tap.
This year's crawl starts at the famous Redbones for lunch, meanders
through Cambridge (including Cambridge Brewing Company), into Boston
(including Commonwealth and Cornwall's) and into Allston (Northeast
and the Sunset Grill). We usually have anywhere from 30 to 50
people in the crowd at any point in time, and many people join the
crawl in progress or leave when they are saturated. We stick to
a tight schedule. We also discourage anyone from driving during or
after the crawl and use the Boston subway system extensively.
The only requirements for attendence are that
you are at least 21, appreciate good beer, and in a cheerful mood.
I assume that most people who read the HBD qualify!!! :^)
The itinerary can be found on the web site of the Wort Processors
(www.wort.org) in the form of a pdf file. We look forward to meeting
some of y'all there!
Ken Jucks
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 17:39:16 +0000
From: AJ <ajdel@mindspring.com>
Subject: Phosphorous
Indeed grains do contain a fair amount of phosphorous - I think perhaps
as much as 2% but don't quote me on that - in the form of salts of
phytin which is usually our friend because it is the reaction of these
phosphates with calcium in the liquor which sets the pH of the mash into
the region we wish it to be. To remove the phosphate one could
conceivably increase the calcium ion content and then raise the pH
causing the phosphate to precipitate but I can't think of any practical
way to do that and then restore the beer to normal pH.
A.J.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 13:14:59 -0400
From: Tom Riddle <ftr@oracom.com>
Subject: Festibiere
Does anyone have the inside scoop on the cancelation of Festibiere -
the beer festival in Chambly, Quebec ? What are the chances of it's
revival next year ?
- --
Tom Riddle
Portsmouth, NH
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #3697, 08/01/01
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