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HOMEBREW Digest #3927
HOMEBREW Digest #3927 Mon 29 April 2002
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
Hot Break Removal ("R. Schaffer-Neitz")
AHA board ("Pete Calinski")
Re: Hot Break Removal (Jeff Renner)
Re; Hot Break Removal ("Bill Frazier")
Hops Brewpubs ("Mike Brennan")
A sour taste developing in beer with Munich malt And how homebewing has changed (Gary M Chumney)
Barley Wine ("John Gubbins")
Defining legal 'Alcohol in Beer' definitions (Bob Sheck)
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Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 07:01:28 -0400
From: "R. Schaffer-Neitz" <rschaff@ptd.net>
Subject: Hot Break Removal
Warren Widmayer asks re: hot break removal.
I only have one data point so far, but was so impressed that I had to put in
my .02. I recently installed one of Zymie's Bazooka screens (no
affiliation, etc.) on my Sankey brewpot. I brewed a batch of Scottish 80
shilling which is now in the bottles carbonating. I used only 1 oz leaf
hops (cascade in a Scottish ale... I don't know what I was thinking.
That's what I get for slavishly following a recipe. I can taste the citrus
in the green beer, but it's still not bad. Next time, fuggles or EKG).
Anyway, when I ran the cooled wort out of the boil pot, I was amazed at the
clarity of the stuff. It was like nothing I'd seen in my (admittedly brief
compared to some) homebrewing career. The leaf hops and screen appear to
form a remarkably effective trub filter. When I racked out of the primary,
the only thing left was a cake of what appeared to be more or less pure
yeast. No other gunk discernable. As I said, only one data point, but I
was impressed.
Cheers,
Bob Schaffer-Neitz
Northumberland, PA
375, 102.6 (apparent)
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Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 10:03:14 -0400
From: "Pete Calinski" <pjcalinski@adelphia.net>
Subject: AHA board
So, how many of the candidates read the HBD? This is a test, if you are a
candidate and see this, how about a post to the HBD saying so. (Jeff Renner,
no need to reply.)
I believe I would tend to favor candidates that at least read the HBD
because they might be more "in tune" with current brewing concerns.
Regular readers, please don't alert candidates that are non-regulars to this
post.
Pete Calinski
East Amherst NY
Near Buffalo NY
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*My goal:
* Go through life and never drink the same beer twice.
* (As long as it doesn't mean I have to skip a beer.)
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Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 11:00:35 -0400
From: Jeff Renner <JeffRenner@comcast.net>
Subject: Re: Hot Break Removal
Warren Widmayer <widmayer@chartermi.net> writes from Chelsea,
Michigan (which he describes as "slightly off center," being about
ten miles west)
>I use a false bottom in
>my brew kettle and a ball valve spigot that pulls from a drain
>beneath it and tend to use whole hops. I have not been doing
>anything special to remove trub other than draining through the hop
>bed after cooling the wort using my immersion chiller. ... My
>question is, are there additional steps I should take to remove
>more of the solids from the wort during or before the drain into the
>primary fermenter?
I have much the same setup, and what I do is use my pump to
recirculate during chilling. This clarifies the wort of hot break
quite well. I get very little trub in my fermenter - only a bit
which I attribute to to fine cold break.
Then, after the temperature drops below about 80F, I crack open the
hose fitting at the outlet so it pulls a stream of bubbles into the
pump, which beats them into very fine bubbles and maximizes the )2
dissolving. Then when I reach fermentation temperature (~65-68F for
ales, 48-50F for lagers), I pitch the yeast and continue to
recirculate for another hour if I have the time. I don't think any
further removal of break material is occurring here, but I believe
the yeast is getting an hour of O2, which it utilizes. I think A. J.
reported an experiment in which yeast removed O2 from saturation to
near zero in something like 12 minutes, so I figure these guys are
sucking it up and probably reproducing a time or two as well. Then I
run the wort into my fermenter.
This procedure gets me nearly clear wort (a bit of haze from cold
break) and really healthy ferments. I get greater attenuation since
adding this oxygenation to my procedure. BTW, this is just outside
air - no filtered or anything. Just what's in my garage winter or
summer. Maybe I'm just lucky.
Of course, this means you need a pump, but I like to use it for
recirculating my wort when I step it up in a step mash using propane
heat.
Hope this helps.
Jeff
- --
***Please note my new address***
Jeff Renner in Ann Arbor, Michigan USA, JeffRenner@comcast.net
"One never knows, do one?" Fats Waller, American Musician, 1904-1943
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2002 09:34:20 -0500
From: "Bill Frazier" <billfrazier@worldnet.att.net>
Subject: Re; Hot Break Removal
Warren Widmayer boils in a kettle with a false bottom, uses whole leaf hops,
cools with an immersion chiller and still has lots of trub in his primary
fermenter.
Warren-I do exactly the same as you. However, I include a step between
cooling and fermenting that you might want to try. I drain cool wort from
the kettle into a large carboy. I aerate the wort by rocking this carboy
for about 4 minutes. Then I let the wort settle for NLT one hour and
usually for 6 hours. In this time 3/4 to one inch of trub will settle to
the bottom of the carboy. This is cold break material. You can see it
start forming shortly after the wort is in the settling carboy. After
settling I pump clear wort to the fermenter and pitch the yeast. The cold
break settling is dramatic in winter when my cooling water is about 45F.
Not such a big thing in summer with cooling water about 60F. If I brew a
lager I settle in a chest freezer and don't pitch yeast until the next
morning when the wort temp has fallen to about 50F. The wort pumped over
for fermentation is essentially clear using this method. Still, once
fermentation takes over you will see material swirling and floating in the
fermentation carboys. This is the yeast and is completely normal.
Best regards,
Bill Frazier
Olathe, Kansas
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 18:37:16 -0500
From: "Mike Brennan" <brewdude@tampabay.rr.com>
Subject: Hops Brewpubs
My two cents is they are the Bennigans with a beer boiler. I had to get
real close to the brewing equipment to see if it was real or maybe just wall
paper. And Yes! They serve their beer in frozen mugs, what does that tell
you. My take is none of their brews are very distinctive. In summary, its
better than the regular Florida bring your own spitoon tavern, but not
really worth going out of your way for.
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 07:39:12 -0400
From: Gary M Chumney <garychumney@juno.com>
Subject: A sour taste developing in beer with Munich malt And how homebewing has changed
I have developed a sour taste in two different beers that contain
a high portion of Munich malt. The beers are a weizenbock and
Oktoberfest. The problem has developed since the beer has been placed in
the keg. It seems that the sourness is noticeable at the back of the
tongue and attaches itself to the caramel flavor of these two beers. The
two beers were kegged on different weeks. Each tasted good at the time
of placing in the keg, the samples were first runnings out of an auto
siphon or out of the drain of the carboy cap. Sanitation was the room
were sprayed with lysol spray then the work area with alcohol spray. The
transfer hoses with star san and anything else with iodophor. The kegs
were given a short cleaning with a caustic solution and then rinsed with
clean water soaked with PBW over night with the liquid tube having PBW
forced into it with CO2, Then before the transfer of beer into the keg
the PBW is drained and filled with star san and flushed the tubes with
this solution. Just before the green beer is transferred I drain the
solution from the keg purge the tubes with CO2. Leaving the CO2 in the
keg I boil the lid with the rubber O ring while the transfer is taking
place.
Presently I have other Kegs of beer that are older in the keg
without this latent flavor profile shift. actually the Munich malt is
from two different suppliers as I support the different home brew shops
in my community. So this is a real problem to me as I like good
Oktoberfest and weizenbock.
When I first found out about home brewed beer I was not even old
enough to shave. One of my Uncles brought some back from a picnic with
his family. It was the old style of a can of Blue Ribbon Extract and
five pounds of sugar. It was cold and wet on a hot summer day and never
been exposed to any alcohol before it was interesting to say the least.
Then in my teenage years I helped make some of these old style home brews
the man I helped actually boiled the wort with an ounce of brick hops.
As I went off to college I tried to make rasin jack wine and some of
these home brewed beers. Needless to say it was a short experiment as
most of it turn out to be a cheap source of alcohol and not very
drinkable.
I should state that I have seen the home brewing scene change
from the early days when it was a source of cheap alcohol for some low
income areas and students. The next change was the flavor changes for
the blue collar workers with some degree of higher education and
experience of traveling out into the world and tasting some of the other
beers rather than the American mega lagers. these were with a larger
selection of kits and a limited supply of hops and grains. Today it
seems that the home brew beer world is being taken over with everyone
having a degree in engineering or a doctor or something. The types of
kits, malts, grains, hops and yeast are hard to comprehend at times. The
information is greater than ever before ND the brewing science is being
exposed to where a home brewer is as professional as many of the master
brewers were only ten to fifteen years ago. Needless to say at time I
think that it might actually scare some of the new brewers off from
brewing beer.
This is for Jeff Renner, I have been brewing a version of the
CAP since about 1982 and it used rice instead of corn. I have made both
styles and they are a great deal of flavor differences in them. I love
them both. Also, off digest I would like to get on the distillers list.
One last request, please, don't flame Comcast cable to much for the
Internet problems; at home was part of excite network that went belly up.
Gary Chumney
Working in Knoxville, TN for Comcast Cable Upgrade Team
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 19:32:57 -0600
From: "John Gubbins" <n0vse@idcomm.com>
Subject: Barley Wine
Well, I bottled the Barley Wine that I talked about last week. I used
corn sugar. Of course I had to taste it. It has a very strong fruity
flavor with a more than a hint of cloves. I used the White Labs High
Gravity yeast.
What causes this clove flavor? I know it has to do with the yeast,
but I don't know why. Can anybody explain it? Also a bit of that
flavor goes a long way. Will it attenuate?
Thanks,
John Gubbins (apparent Rennerian 1117,265.5)
Littleton, Co....
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Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 23:42:47 -0400
From: Bob Sheck <bsheck@skantech.net>
Subject: Defining legal 'Alcohol in Beer' definitions
Probably one of the best things we can do as a collective,
is define what we would like to see as a universal
alcohol description for beers as defined by state ABC legislation.
If we can hammer out a workable set of limits or standards, then
we can work to get all of our state legislatures in line to adopt them.
Some of us have already been doing great work behind the scenes.
We need to agree on some universal definitions and work to those ends.
I will be willing to be the lead on this if the collective is willing to
forward their thoughts or ideas by private email to me. Or someone else,
if they should volunteer. . .
Bob Sheck // DEA - Down East Alers - Greenville, NC
bsheck@skantech.net // [583.2,140.6] Apparent Rennerian
Home Brewing since 1993 // bsheck@skantech.net //
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End of HOMEBREW Digest #3927, 04/29/02
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