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HOMEBREW Digest #4246
HOMEBREW Digest #4246 Thu 15 May 2003
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
Jalapeno Lovers Unite! (somewhere else)/taste in food+beer ("-S")
re: faux decoction ("Steve Alexander")
re: Cascade hops (R.A.)" <rbarrett@ford.com>
More on Cascade hops (Michael Hartsock)
Re: Cascade hops ("Mark Kellums")
z-approximation rule of thumb ("Frank Tutzauer")
Google search (K.M.)" <kmuell18@visteon.com>
Steak and Potato Smoothie ("Tom White")
Cascade-Free Brewing . . . ("Ray Daniels")
Skotrat on Cascade Hops (skotrat)
Re: How popular is Cascade hops? (Matthew Arnold)
Re: bad brew (Brian Dube)
UV v. Blue-Violet light (G C)
Give it a try for me please! ("Royal L. Doss")
You are hot! ("Weldon Alvarado")
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 04:33:08 -0400
From: "-S" <-s@adelphia.net>
Subject: Jalapeno Lovers Unite! (somewhere else)/taste in food+beer
Hi Scott DeWalt suggests of jalapeno beer ...,
> Since when is adding an ingredient a colossal mistake?
USUALLY it's a mistake! Ketchup on lobster; onions on ice cream; basil in
apple pie ... jalapenos in beer - bad flavor matches are far more common
than good ones.
> Try it, you might find life more entertaining outside
>of the box.
Outside the box ? You're totally lost, Scott ! Pepper beer isn't
innovative.
It's a completely predictable Americanism geared toward simple palates. If
you'd like to compound the stupidity why not add some cumin with the chilis
and called it BBQ beer. Until you figure a way to step-mash MacDonald
fries there is no more obvious, stupid, pointless 'hack' beer around.
==== * NB 99.4% opinion follows* ==
I'm sure there must be a book somewhere that discusses flavor from the
subjective POV, but I've never found it. Let me expound my personal
thoughts here a little. Taste in food is individual, but there are clearly
huge
cultural (experience) influence factors involved.
Taste in food is also biological - studies that show that infants, children
lactating women have decidedly different taste in food, tastes which are
appropriate or the biological needs. Infants and young children reject
anything bitter or phenolic as phenolics reduce protein and mineral uptake.
Kids also seek out sweet, starchy and bland foods. In adolescence and
adulthood taste *usually* broadens.
The fast-food industry and a lot of mass-market processed food vendors
survive on the bland sweet starchy foods that children enjoy. I *think*
this and families divorced from their cultural food roots, creates a
subculture of adult N.Americans with completely child-like
taste preferences. Of course these adults with simple palates are not as
restrictive in their food choices - they also find unchallenging and
excessively strong one-dimensional food flavors enjoyable and these
populate the grocery store aisles from jello to the too_hot sauces to the
excessively spiced chili mixes.
Taste ... We know that the tongue provides us with sweet/salty/bitter/sour
flavor sensations and a bit more, but also the tongue and mouth provide us
with texture sensation. Astringency (divorced of bitterness) is really a
texture not a flavor for example. Of course the olfactory sense is much
keener and provides us with a great many more dimensions - beyond discussion
here. Anyway that's the issue - food has texture, has
basic(sweet/sour/bitter/salty/umami/?) tongue flavor and has
multidimensional aroma. Aroma is a loaded term which may mean odor or more
generally olfactory flavor.
Most 'natural' foods can be appreciated for a balance of flavors.
Cherries,
raspberries and banana each have distinct positive flavors which can't be
seen as overly complex. They have strong positive fruitiness and
individual flavor/aroma character and sweetness with varying acidic sourness
and texture. There is also a certain amount of phenolics that provides
freshness and a little bitterness to counterpoint the dominant sweetness.
As simple as these flavors are, they are vastly more interesting than the
one-dimensional artificial flavoring found in cheap hard candies. Somehow
the dominant flavor alone is not nearly as good as the dominant flavor
surrounded by an array of related or contrasting secondary flavors found in
natural fruit. The big flavors NEED balance.
Another type of balance occurs more often in man-made combinations - when
two distinct flavors of similar strength and somehow work well together.
Sometimes these combine into something better than the sum of the two.
Tomato+basil is a common example tho balanced toward tomato, baked
sweet_corn+mature_bell_pepper, baked_rye+caraway(or karnushka) on
pumpernickel or poppyseed+lemon - there are millions of combinations that
work but billions that don't.
Manmade combinations of flavors (like beer, chili, pizza) require
calculated human intention in order to achieve a balance of the sensory
aspects. I'm an amateur at designing this balance, but I know it when I
taste it - clear as day. The balance always takes a common form:
1/ A counterpointing of contrasting flavors,
2/ A cluster of similar flavors which diffuse the simple
one-dimensional effect of the a single dominant flavor,
3/ A pair of distinct competing flavors, well balanced.
Of course texture and basic tongue flavor design require attention too.
====
Dark chocolate is an interesting case. It's strongly bitter yet sweet.
So what else goes with this flavor set ? Bright, sweet but strong mint
works
and so do strong berry flavors like raspberry - by competition. It's hard
to find strong flavors to compete, and it's hard to find complementary
background flavors for chocolate (maybe dark malt flavor !). Some other
strong and sweet flavors - like cinnamon and ginger just don't work - tho' I
can't point to a generalized principle to explain why. It you thin out the
chocolate flavor and bitterness, as in milk chocolate, then more
possibilities exist.
Consider chili as a dish. The best preserved the roasted/sauted beef or
pork flavor while adding flavors from peppers, garlic, onion, cumin, salt
and other spices without overdoing any one. Like all great dishes each
spice adds something without necessarily being individually evident. Bad,
one dimensional chilis are more common. Most lose all the meat flavor
behind a wall of spices dominated by cumin+tomato and either sugar or
hot-chili flavor. The sweet&hot dominant peaks don't create balance.
Why ?
Oh yeah beer.
Beer style is still actively evolving. The addition of hops was a major
step forward in creating a harmonious balance between sweetness and
bitterness with the added complexity of hop aroma.. The creation of
vienna/munich malt too adds to the depth of these complex and harmonious
flavors. I just don't see spicy_hot and vegetal pepper flavor as a
positive addition toward a harmonious whole. I see it is just another
sidetrack toward childish one-dimensional awkward flavor in beer.
I really don't understand why anyone would take the ingredients for a great
ale and mess it up with peppers or other vegetable garden refugees -
!unless! they don't really like ale in the first place.
I first tried chili beer about 10 years ago(Cave Creek) , and have several
times since and I always think it's one step better than a phenolic
infection and one step worse than excess diacetyl. YMMV.
-S
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 05:02:02 -0400
From: "Steve Alexander" <steve-alexander@worldnet.att.net>
Subject: re: faux decoction
Alan Meeker writes about microwave decoction ...
>So, I'm curious as to what folks think of this procedure. Has anyone else
>tried this??
I've conducted numerous mini-step mashes in the microwave but never a
decoction.
I'm convinced that the steps and a microwave boil will extract starch. I'm
not at all certain that the microwave heating will accomplish much Maillard
product formation. It doesn't in carbo-micro-baking (try making toast in
a microwave) and the reason has a lot to do with low surface temps as
evaporation occurs. The same should reduce the decoction flavor impact.
Other flavor product extraction and conversion appears in decoction, but
these are more closely related to dark malt inclusion. There are ways to
get 'browning products' in microwave baking, but these involve changing the
microwave frequency - see the Chorleywood process (an early UK microwave
baking process) for more detail and studies.
You'll get similar extraction as per decoction, but I have serious doubts
that the flavor is the same.
-S
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 08:09:55 -0400
From: "Barrett, Bob (R.A.)" <rbarrett@ford.com>
Subject: re: Cascade hops
Kevin a.k.a. KCSTAR21@aol.com wrote about Rick Gordon's note:
Rick said:
"I was introduced to Sierra Nevada
on tap in Carmel, CA (OK, I understand they use Chinook,
but bear with me)."
And Kevin said:
Actually, I believe SNPA uses Perle for bittering and
Cascade for flavoring.
Actually, Kevin, it depends on which Sierra Nevada Rick is
talking about. Celebration Ale is bittered with Chinook.
As is the Sierra Nevada Stout, for that matter.
You are correct that SNPA is bittered with Perle and
finished with Cascade. But Rick didn't say he was
talking about SNPA only Sierra Nevada.
Big Foot, Celebration, Pale Ale and Stout all have
Cascade for finishing. But the bittering hops are
Nugget, Chinook, Perle and Chinook respectively.
Bob Barrett
Ann Arbor, MI
(2.8, 103.6) rennerian. This guy makes a great cap.
I think he said, "I've got that style nailed!!!!"
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 06:36:05 -0700 (PDT)
From: Michael Hartsock <xd_haze@yahoo.com>
Subject: More on Cascade hops
Ah... it is my turn to belabor this point. Also, I
plan to make it a bit more esoteric debate.
I like cascade hops in some beers, american style
beers. I think that neutral yeast and cascade (or
similiar citrusy hops) in many otherwise traditional
beers makes them markedly american. 'Nuff said about
my opinion on that.
Now on a bit: I think that americans are scared to be
proud about our own brewing traditions. Many if all
nations have a dark period that shouldn't make its
entire history embarrassing. Do I need to mention the
crusades, World War II, and the inqusition?
Americans had prohibition and McCarthyism.
Corn, cascade, and birch (not to mention many other
things) are important to the american brewing
tradtion. While I don't like corn, and others don't
like cascade - these things are all part of the
american tradition.
I think that beer in america is automatically
dismissed as crap and low quality. Frankly, a
particuliar friend of mine from Belfast drinks only
miller lite, and another friend from dublin only likes
zima and similar "malt" liquor crap. Truely sad. My
point is that there is plenty of mass produced import
crap that sucks as bad as american crap. There is
also plenty of good domestic beer.
mike
=====
"May those who love us, love us.
And those that don't love us,
May God turn their hearts.
And if he doesn't turn their hearts,
may he turn their ankles
So we'll know them
by their limping."
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 09:14:00 -0500
From: "Mark Kellums" <infidel@springnet1.com>
Subject: Re: Cascade hops
Hello,
Personally I like Cascades. I use both homegrown and commercially available
forms for my APAs, American Browns, and even my Stouts and Porters. As far
as POR goes it's been a few years since I've used them. All I can recall is
that the bitterness was nicer than what I would have expected.
Gunnar Emilsson writes that no more than 20% Munich malt should be used when
using Cascades. My experience contradicts this. One of my best beers ever
was
100% light Munich malt using only Cascades for bittering flavor and aroma.
It was a very nice beer.
This reminds me of something Marc Sedam mentioned awhile back about not
using sulphate in beers hopped with Cascades. Maybe there something to this?
My last APA was hopped with only Cascade, without the addition of any
sulphate. It was fantastic!
John O'Connell writes:
One thing about Cascade is it is a really robust-growing hop.
Me:
Robust growing for this variety might even be an understatement! It's
probably the most foolproof variety you can grow. Even a first year Cascade
should give you a decent harvest. It's the weed of the hop world!
Mark Kellums
Decatur Il.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 10:41:21 -0400
From: "Frank Tutzauer" <comfrank@buffalo.edu>
Subject: z-approximation rule of thumb
Jonathan mentions an alternative rule of thumb for the
appropriateness of the z-approximation. Actually, the
two rules I'm familiar with are either Np(1-p) > 9, or,
alternatively, that both Np and N(1-p) be greater than
5. The Np(1-p) > 9 rule is more often used. I cited
the other rule simply because with that rule I needed
to refer only to p and not both p and (1-p). The
proportions we're talking about are things like 1/3,
1/4, or 1/8. Hence, Np will be less than N(1-p), and
therefore if Np is greater than five, then so is
N(1-p).
Remember we're talking about the adequacy of an
*approximation* -- how adequate it needs to be is open
to interpretation. We thus have developed "rules of
thumb" -- not laws from on high. Use whatever suits
you.
Approximation??? We don't need no stinking
approximation. Binomial tables coming soon.
Also, I'm pro Cascades, especially with a heavy hand.
Grapefruit always fades.
--frank
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 10:42:05 -0400
From: "Mueller, Kevin (K.M.)" <kmuell18@visteon.com>
Subject: Google search
Thought this was kind of funny.
Last night I bent a rim on my motorcycle when riding over a pot hole. Heard
that MDOT has forms to fill out and you can make a claim to get paid back
for vehicle damage caused by potholes. So I search google "Michigan bent
rims pot hole", and up comes a few links for the HBD!!!
Kevin
Canton, MI
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 12:05:04 -0400
From: "Tom White" <twhite@dminsite.com>
Subject: Steak and Potato Smoothie
> Putting chilis or jalpenos (sic) into beer is to me about as
> sensible as running a grilled steak, a baked potato w/ sour
> cream and a glass of cabernet together in a blender and calling
> it dinner. It's an offensively bad idea.
Steak and Potato Smoothie!!! That's a great idea! Thanks. Though, I think
I'll add green beans.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 11:10:35 -0500
From: "Ray Daniels" <raydan@ameritech.net>
Subject: Cascade-Free Brewing . . .
I had to jump in with a comment on Cascades. First, I love them---there
are obviously a bunch of great beers made that depend on this hop
variety. As a homebrewer trying to recreate those beers, there is no
other way to go. On the other hand, when one goes to innovate, Cascades
are so, I don't know, COMMON, I suppose, that it really seems like the
time to leave them alone.
A number of years ago when I was working (unsuccessfully) to start a
brewery, I resolved that we would NEVER use Cascades in a beer as a
matter of principle. (Why copy what someone else is doing when you are
trying to make a name for yourself?) At the recent Craft Brewers
Conference I had a chance to visit some with Lee Chase, the head brewer
from Stone Brewing Co., makers of Arrogant Bastard Ale and he mentioned
that they follow a "no Cascades" policy in their brewery. No doubt this
same idea has occurred to other commercial brewers who make great beers.
Hmmm . . . might be a topic worthy of an article sometime.
By the way, Arrogant Bastard Ale was #5 in our poll of Zymurgy readers
on the Best Beers in America. Be sure to check out the July-August
issue for full poll results and TONS of clone recipes (both extract and
all-grain)---it'll be out in late June.
Cheers,
Ray Daniels
Editor, Zymurgy & The New Brewer
Director, Brewers Publications
Association of Brewers
ray@aob.org
773-665-1300
For subscriptions and individual copy sales, call 1-888-822-6273.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 16:57:35 +0000
From: skotrat@attbi.com
Subject: Skotrat on Cascade Hops
Hmmm,
I like Cascade hops... I went through 10 pounds of them last year... There are
alot of brewers in the BrewRats and on the Chat that love Cascade hops...
Chances are Little Sh--t Face (Tom Smit) decided to speak for the entire US and
posted in a Aussie forum that Americans dislike C hops... That would be my
guess...
Like Phil Sides though I have been unhappy with the over all quality of
Cascades as of late.
As far as using them... BRING ON THOSE CASCADES AND CENTENNIALS!!! I LOVE EM!
Thank you... Drive through please.
C'ya!
-Scott
=====
"My life is a dark room... One big dark room"
- BeetleJuice
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 12:43:19 -0500
From: Matthew Arnold <marnold@ez-net.com>
Subject: Re: How popular is Cascade hops?
> So I put to this group - what are our thoughts about Cascade hops?
I like 'em in APAs and American IPAs. I want to try an American Amber
Ale with Cascade one of these days. I even use them in my plambics!
Having said that, the Cascades I use in that are whole hops that are
many, many years old. They smell more like swiss cheese than grapefruit.
On the other hand, I would never dream of using them in an Altbier.
Spalt all the way!
Matt
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 13:11:20 -0500
From: Brian Dube <brian.dube@gotgoat.com>
Subject: Re: bad brew
Thanks to everyone who responded to my astringency question. I'm sorry
I didn't respond to your individual replies; I've been ridiculously
busy lately. I've concluded that my cream ale sucks because the
ingredients were 'more expired' than I previously thought.
Thanks,
Brian
- --
Brian Dube
Columbia, Missouri
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 19:19:31 -0700 (PDT)
From: G C <gsd4lyf@yahoo.com>
Subject: UV v. Blue-Violet light
I thought UV light caused skunking, but someone said
that it's the blue-violet region that causes this, and
it's NOT the UV frequency that causes skunking. Is
blue-violet not considered UV? Could someone please
shed some light on the subject and/or point me to some
good sources?
Here's the link about blue-violet light:
http://www.regional.org.au/au/abts/1999/simpsons.htm
Guy
Los Gatos, CA
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 15 May 2003 03:05:43 +0000
From: "Royal L. Doss" <rdoss93@virtualis.com>
Subject: Give it a try for me please!
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------------------------------
Date: Thu, 15 May 2003 03:15:35 +0000
From: "Weldon Alvarado" <weldonalvarado_4@americanfinancecenter.com>
Subject: You are hot!
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------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #4246, 05/15/03
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