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HOMEBREW Digest #4490
HOMEBREW Digest #4490 Wed 03 March 2004
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
Re: Making a beer with 2 kits. (Andrew Calder)
Re: Making a beer with 2 kits. ("Greg 'groggy' Lehey")
Burton Sulfate ("A.J deLange")
Burton waters / 3-tier brewing ("Dave Draper")
Bubbles ("Dave Burley")
Beer in the Austin area ("Alexander Pettit")
Re: Multi-tier infusion mashing system ("Michael O'Donnell")
Re: Culturing German Lager Yeast (Jeff Renner)
Re: Making a beer with 2 kits (Jeff Renner)
Re: molasses used to feed yeast (Derric)
brew sculpture ("Weaver Joseph T MAJ CENTAF-AUAB CAOC\\SG")
CO2 measure (Dean)
brewing oat beers ("Bryan L. Gros")
Alcohol content ("The Mad Brewer")
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Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2004 22:45:16 -0800 (PST)
From: Andrew Calder <arcalder2000 at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Making a beer with 2 kits.
Howdy All,
William Erskine asks about using 2 hopped kits to make
his beer.
William, I had a similar problem and used a hopped kit
from one supplier and an unhopped Liquid Malt Extract
from different supplier. Then added some finishing
hops since I read that hopped kits really only take
the place of the bittering hops.
The beer was a brown ale and it was excellent.
I wouldn't hesitate to use two hopped kits but I would
still recommend a finishing hops addition. (At this
point I must confess to being a hop head and I have
never had a beer that was too bitter to drink!)
Too bad about the DME being suspect as that would
solve the problem nicely.
Have you thought about doing a partial mash to get the
rest of the sugars?
=====
Hope this helps,
Andrew Calder, New Lenox, IL
[218.1,257] Apparent Rennerian
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 17:36:00 +1030
From: "Greg 'groggy' Lehey" <grog at lemis.com>
Subject: Re: Making a beer with 2 kits.
On Monday, 1 March 2004 at 21:24:06 -0500, William Erskine wrote:
> Dear kit brewers,
>
> Does anyone have any experience with making a batch of beer using 2
> Cooper's kits and no other ingredients?
Well, not Coopers, but something similar.
> The instructions say to add the can of extract (from a hopped kit)
> and 1 kg. of dextrose. I've done this and ended up with cidery
> beer. My local homebrew supply doesn't sell Coopers unhopped malt
> extract, even though I've asked.
You'd be surprised how difficult it is to get. They make it just a
few miles from here, and I've only just recently been able to get a
tun of their Extra Light extract, which they don't normally sell at
all in small quantities.
> This is also not something I want to order by mail-order.I am
> suspicious of their dry malt extract. I'm afraid it's 5 years old
> and stale. So while I am acquiring the equipment for all grain
> which I am anxious to start, I thought I might try brewing a batch
> with two kits done to 23 litres of volume. Does this produce a beer
> with two much bitterness? Is it too high in alcohol? Please note:
> I would not be boiling it this time.
What I've done a couple of times is to take a similar Australian kit
("draught"), also intended to make 23 litres, and make 13.5 and then
15 litres out of it. I was also concerned about it being too bitter,
but that didn't eventuate. I used Saflager 34/70 yeast and nothing
else, and it came out surprisingly well. The OG was rather on the low
side (1.036 and 1.032), but that was what I was looking for. If I had
made 23 litres of beer with the 1 kg of sugar they recommend, I would
have come out with an OG of 1.039.
I'd expect similar results from Coopers kits, though I'd certainly not
use the yeast they supply. If you made 23 litres out of two kits, you
should expect something in the order of 1.043.
Greg
- --
Note: I discard all HTML mail unseen.
Finger grog at lemis.com for PGP public key.
See complete headers for address and phone numbers.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 13:22:37 +0000
From: "A.J deLange" <ajdel at cox.net>
Subject: Burton Sulfate
Over the years I have "collected" 6 Burton profiles in which the
sulfate concentration ranges from a low of 450 to a high of 820 mg/L.
Of the 6 only 2 are possible (possible means electrically balanced at
reasonable pH - most published water profiles do not meet this
criterion) and these have, respectively, sulfate contents of 725 and
830 mg/L.
A.J.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2004 07:05:01 -0700
From: "Dave Draper" <david at draper.name>
Subject: Burton waters / 3-tier brewing
Dear Friends,
Jeff responding to Fred's query on Jeff's earlier remark (my
brain hurts!) regarding the composition of Burton-on-Trent
waters gave the range from Foster's text. The brewing water
section on my beer page also lists these two other analyses:
City Ca++ CO3-- Cl- Mg++ Na+ SO4--
Burton 1 268 275 36 62 54 638
Burton 2 270 197 40 60 30 640
Burton 3 295 300 25 45 55 725
1 = Brewing & Malting Science, 1:206, Hough et al.
2 = "Pale Ale", p58, Foster. (I think the same Jeff cited)
3 = Papazian, Homebrewer's Companion.
I find it far easier when making up waters way out in one
corner of composition space to start with deionized and salt it
up. Actually I find it far easier to do that for every water!
*****
Brian Schar asked about designs for 3-tier systems. The best
one I have witnessed personally was built by HBD's own Eric
Schoville, when we both used to live in darkest Dallas-
metroplex. He built my converted-keg masher for me too (as
well as heroically helping me move house from Dallas to
Houston on New Years Day 1999... true friendship in action!)
Eric might be too modest to toot his own horn on this one (or
not!), but his web page showing his system and procedures is
really excellent and educational. You can check it out at:
http://www.schoville.com/brewing.php
Cheers, Dave in ABQ
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
David S. Draper, Institute of Meteoritics, Univ New Mexico
David at Draper dot Name
Beer page: http://www.unm.edu/~draper/beer.html
Life is short, grain is cheap. ---Rich Lenihan
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 09:35:07 -0500
From: "Dave Burley" <Dave_Burley at charter.net>
Subject: Bubbles
Brewsters:
/Fredrik published a site with some equations. Unfortunately, /Fredrik my
same objection still holds.
There is no "saturation equilibrium ratio of CO2 in the solution and the
headspace", since the CO2 is SUPERsaturated, so K2/K3 ratio is undefined and
your equations fall apart as a result. As I have pointed out numerous times,
the CO2 in solution is NOT in equilibrium with the gaseous phase in normal
time ( if you wait a few weeks or months then maybe, but you are in an open
system with your bubbler so the kinetics of this establishment of an
equilibrium far out swamps all other considerations.
Take my advice and run Clinitest in parallel with your experiment so you will
actually know the progress of the fermentation. Then compare this with your
bubble results.
Keep on Brewin'
Dave Burley
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2004 10:00:03 -0500
From: "Alexander Pettit" <hippahoratio at hotmail.com>
Subject: Beer in the Austin area
I'm planning a trip to Austin around the SXSW fest (I'll be there 3/17 -
3/20) and would like some recommendations about the local beer. I was there
several years ago and visited: Bitter End, Draught House, and Ginger Man.
They were all decent and I may revisit but was looking to see what I missed.
Any recommendations on a good place to enjoy some Live Oak? I'll also be
in the New Braunfels area for an afternoon and thought I might drop in on
Faust. Comments? Other suggestions in that area?
Thanks much!
Private replies welcome.
- Alex
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2004 07:09:34 -0800
From: "Michael O'Donnell" <mooseo at stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: Multi-tier infusion mashing system
Brian in Menlo Park is looking for a 3-tier system... I went through the
same thought process not long ago; here are my thoughts.
First, buy the pump. Yes, it is more expensive, but it really makes lots
of things nicer. Plus, it means that you can have a lot fewer things above
your head. I went cheap and bought a March pump that wasn't high-temp
(good to 170F). This is fine for pumping strike water, although it isn't
much good for boiling wort. This might be an option for you as well. I
find that I am starting to cheat and pump hotter stuff, for which I will
eventually pay by killing my pump I suppose. Probably getting plastic in
my beer, too.
Secondly, I decided that I really didn't want a flaming vat of boiling
water 3 tiers above my head. We live in earthquake country, after all
:) It just seems like an invitation for disaster. This argues for the
pump as well.
I heat my strike water in my kettle, pump it to my mash tun, mash, then
drain to my kettle. I have been meaning to buy an igloo that I could fill
with sparge water, but instead I batch sparge with cold water. There are
probably reasons this is bad, but I couldn't find any in the HBD archives
(but others may post them now) and it makes my like easier. I use the pump
to recirculate the wort before sparging, then drain to the kettle. 2
tiers, no lifting.
Just my thoughts.
Mike
Monterey, CA
>1) Buy one of those Wal-Mart turkey fryers as a
>
>2) Use an Igloo cooler as an HLT, and purchase a
>pump such as a March pump.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 10:55:38 -0500
From: Jeff Renner <jeffrenner at comcast.net>
Subject: Re: Culturing German Lager Yeast
Eric Schoville <eric at schoville.com>, who has shown up in Madison,
WI, writes:
>Has anyone successfully cultured a German lager yeast from an import?
>If so, what have your results been and with which beers? I thought it
>might be interesting to try. I get to drink the beer, and use the yeast.
I haven't, and I suspect that most all German lagers have been
filtered and pasteurized. However, Steve Alexander has reported
culturing yeast from a bottle of Michelob, which was also presumably
similarly treated. Probably a lot fresher, though, than most
imports. I'd say you've got a tough task if you decide to do this.
However, you have a brewer of German style lagers, Capital Brewery
http://www.capital-brewery.com/, there in Madison. Well, actually
just down the road in Middleton. I'd suggest asking them for a jar
of fresh yeast. I suspect it's Weihenstephan 34/70, used by many
German breweries, though I don't know for sure.
Jeff
- --
Jeff Renner in Ann Arbor, Michigan USA, JeffRenner at comcast.net
"One never knows, do one?" Fats Waller, American Musician, 1904-1943
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 11:11:59 -0500
From: Jeff Renner <jeffrenner at comcast.net>
Subject: Re: Making a beer with 2 kits
"William Erskine" <werskin at sympatico.ca> writes from London, Ontario
>Does anyone have any experience with making a batch of beer using 2
>Cooper's kits and no other ingredients? <snip>
>I might try brewing a batch with two kits done to 23 litres of volume.
>Does this produce a beer with two much bitterness? Is it too high in
>alcohol?
Back when I still brewed with extracts occasionally in a pinch (15+
years ago), Coopers was a favorite brand of mine, and I did this. It
does not make beer that is too bitter or too alcoholic if you make up
the proper volume. As a matter of fact, I did this to make better
tasting beer with a more pleasing level of bitterness.
I don't remember how much beer I made with two cans, but you can
compute the expected specific gravity based on the weight of liquid
extract and total volume. At four pounds each, and 37 points per
pound per gallon, which is typical, you'd get a gravity of 1.049 in
23 liters.
One potential problem is that these extracts are produced to leave a
fair amount of residual, unfermentable sugars to balance the 100%
fermentable sugar that they expect you to add. A 1.049 wort might
ferment out to only 1.020 or such rather than the more typical 1.012.
I never found it to be a problem.
Jeff
- --
Jeff Renner in Ann Arbor, Michigan USA, JeffRenner at comcast.net
"One never knows, do one?" Fats Waller, American Musician, 1904-1943
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 09:32:38 -0800 (PST)
From: Derric <derric1961 at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: molasses used to feed yeast
> Hello, Does anyone know what type of molasses to
> use to feed yeast to grow a volume?
Sorry, I don't know the direct answer to this, but...
> Sorghum molasses is unprocessed and black strap is
> what's left after sugar refinement?
Well... "molasses" is the left-over after SUGAR CANE
refinement. "Sorghum SYRUP" is made from sweet
sorghum
(ie., NOT sugar cane).
The term "sorghum molasses" is incorrect and
shouldn't be used - but it often is, even by the
people that make and eat it! :)
So, technically speaking, molasses is molasses and
sorghum is sorghum - so IF the yeast people are
accurate in their language, it is molasses that
they use and not sorghum.
((Hmm... the definition of "blackstrap" on
dictionary.com mentions its use in making industrial
alcohol...)).
Also, BTW, the sweet sorghum used for syrup is NOT
the same variety as the grain sorghum that we
often see referenced that is malted and used for
brewing.
Derric
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 20:55:40 +0300
From: "Weaver Joseph T MAJ CENTAF-AUAB CAOC\\SG"
Subject: brew sculpture
Brian asks about building a new stand for brewing. Brian, I am facing the
same dilemma.
For years, I have been brewing with one large 7 Gal SS pot with no spigot,
and using several pots and pans from the kitchen to heat hot liquor and
sparge water. I mash in my pot over the burner giving temperature boosts as
needed, and then scoop over to a 5 Gal Igloo cooler with an eashymasher
screen for sparging after heating to 170F. The benefit..I hold my mash at
168F during the entire sparge. For heat, I run 2 turkey fryer burners with
a splitter off of one propane tank. All in all, lots of lifting and
scooping. Over the past few weeks and with the help of Todd Snyder's
recommendations on fittings, I have purchased some new equipment and hope to
put it to use in a week when I return home.
After lots of web surfing, I finally settled on SABCO kettles. I went with
their homebrew package which consists of one kettle, false bottom,
thermometer, and ball valve. I bought a second universal kettle and ball
valve to use for hot liquor and a boil kettle. I went with Metal Cam and
Grove Hose Couplings (51415K308) from McMaster-Car (aluminum was the most
affordable, barbed for hose and NPT threads for ball valves and pump
threads) for quick disconnects and 1/2" Norprene tubing. That meant that I
had to find a counterflow chiller with 1/2" tubing and the only 1/2" chiller
I could find was the StPat counterflow chiller. I bought a magnetic pump to
transfer hot liquor for step infusion mashing and a throttle valve to
regulate flow.
I hope to be able to brew without having to lift again. I need to mount the
pump and switch (saw an idea on the Bodensatz web site). If all works as
planned, I should be able to leave the kettles on the turkey fryer burners
and easily disconnect hoses and pump fluids around without lifting. It
dawned on me that I had essentially created a RIMS without trying. Can't
wait to get home and put it all together.
Todd in Qatar
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 14:47:45 -0800
From: Dean <dean at deanandadie.net>
Subject: CO2 measure
How about attaching an empty bag or bladder to your carboy and measure the
volume it occupies throughout fermentation. Just capture all the CO2 that
comes out of your fermenter. Think a 45 gallon trash bag will be big enough?
You could even build a container for the bag and measuer the height of the
column to calculate volume. You would need to know the volume of your
connecting tubing and the headspace in your carboy, but I think you could get
an accurate picture of the amount of gas produced. I'd add a lightweight
plunger on the top to get a level reading.
50 | | +-------------+
| | | +---------+ |
40 | | | | +---+ +---+
| | | | / \
30 | | | | /*************\
|\/\/\/\/\| | | | . .. . . |
20 | | | | | MMMM, beer .|
| Bag of | | | |. . .. . .. |
10 | CO2 | | | |... . .. .. .|
| +---+ | \_____________/
+=========+-----+
Yay, ASCII art.
- --Dean - Unscrambler of eggs
- --
Take your time, take your chances
[2045.2, 273.7] Apparent Rennerian (Redwood City, CA)
- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It matters not how strait the gate / How charged with punishment the scroll
I am the master of my fate / I am the captain of my soul. -- Invictus --
-- William E Henley --
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2004 19:46:15 -0800
From: "Bryan L. Gros" <bgros at aggienetwork.com>
Subject: brewing oat beers
Havn't been keeping up with the HBD much recently. Good to know
Jeff Renner is still pushing the envelope!
Chet, I've done wheat beers with 70 - 80% wheat malt. No problem
with conversion.
Jeff, thanks for the notes from Fawcett. They seem to agree with
my experience:
I recently saw the Fawcett oat malt at our local grain supply shop and
decided to buy a sack ($26 or so for 25 kg). The grains look like long
thin barley. I was concerned there would be no "husk", but it seems
that there is.
So, for the first time probably ever, I'm glad I have an adjustable old
Schmidling MaltMill! Moved the rollers down as fine as they would go
and the grain cracked fine.
The specs say the extract (in litre degree/kg ???) is about 14%
less than for the Maris Otter Pale Ale Malt, and the index of
modification is listed as 30-34. Low, but presumably can
convert itself.
Made an oat-malt stout which was pretty so-so, more from recipe
flaws than from the oat. Didn't really tell the oat flavor, but in
hindsight, it did have head problems.
I decided to go for broke and make an oat wine (I call it Old Quaker)
1.095 OG beer with 100% oat malt. (Recipe for three gallons: 18 lb oat
malt, 0.75 lb 35L crystal malt) Mashed around 150F for 90
minutes. Sparge was quite slow, and super cloudy. Would
probably use rice hulls next time.
Boil was fine, but again, super cloudy going into the fermenter.
Pitched on White Labs English Ale yeast from previous batch,
and left it in the carboy probably 3 weeks. Cleared out nicely after
fermentation stopped. Racked to a keg, but SG was still 1.040.
Flavor was clean, a bit grainy perhaps, and quite sweet.
I ended up putting probably half gallon or so of wort from my
wife's very bitter IPA in the keg with a little fresh yeast. Hoping
it ferments down more, and the extra bitterness won't hurt at all.
I have high hopes for this beer now. We'll see for sure in a
couple more weeks. Have it sitting in a 75F water bath now to
try to get it to ferment out. Not sure if the high FG was due to
protein or unfermented sugar.
So that's my experience so far.
On to malted rye.....
Bryan Gros bgros at aggienetwork.com
Oakland, CA
Draught Board Homebrew Club
http://www.draughtboard.org
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 22:09:31 -0600
From: "The Mad Brewer" <seansgroups at mts.net>
Subject: Alcohol content
Thanks, AJ and Fredrik (he posted at The Other Place). The spreadsheet I
tried to use had a minor bug in that it mixed up real attenuation and
apparent attenuation, so it was a dead loss.
My apparent extract was 1.007, which converted to Plato using the highly
precise approach of turning the hydrometer to the next scale comes out to
1.7. The real extract is going to be rough, since a lot of the suspended
solids in the beer coagulated during the boiling step, but I figure it's
about 3.2 or a bit higher.
I tried estimating the OG since it gives me a sanity check on the ABV. I
used 2 lb malt, 2 lb Tef flour (cooked into flatbread) and 2 lb dried dates
in 4.5 USG water. Taking all of that at 36 pt-gal/lb, I get a predicted OG
of 1.048 and estimate the multiplier as 1.2159 based on 60% brewhouse
efficiency. To make a long fudge short, it comes out to 4.2% ABV.
If I apply that number to the apparent extract and read up the potential
alcohol scale, it figures my OG was 1.040! I should get 83% brewhouse
efficiency in regular brewing! I was surprised to find so little residue in
the fermenter from 6 lb of solids, so maybe that's close to correct.
Anyway, it's been interesting. I will have to mess around with the formula
Fredrik gave me, but it's time for bed, so thanks again.
Sean Richens
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #4490, 03/03/04
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