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HOMEBREW Digest #4735
HOMEBREW Digest #4735 Thu 10 March 2005
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Digest Janitor: pbabcock at hbd.org
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Contents:
Not Oxygenating Wort ("Christian Layke")
Re: Where is everybody? And a wort oxygenation question... (Robert Jones)
Night of the Living Ales ("Greg R")
AHA National Homebrew Competition ("Gary Glass")
rice and hops ("Janie Curry")
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Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 09:22:37 -0500
From: "Christian Layke" <clayke at wri.org>
Subject: Not Oxygenating Wort
Dave Burley states:
>A better place to build strong yeast is in a stirred starter ( see HBD
>archives) with a cotton wool or foam plug ( to let air in but keep
bacteria
>and wild yeast out) and then when the starter is fermented out throw
away
>this "beer" by decantation, rinse the yeast with sterile water if you
want to
>and pitch the pure yeast. This will give a lot of oxygen exposure to
the
>growing yeast so they will have good cell walls, yet avoid spoiling
your beer.
I started to use a stir plate recently and have been impressed by the
shortened lag times and vigorous fermentation. As a result, I've
wondered if it is still necessary to oxygenate the wort, especially for
lower-gravity beers. This curiosity has been heightened by references
I've read that state that the Belgian and hefeweizen esters I prize are
improved if the yeasts do their thing in a low-oxygen wort.
On the other hand, commercial breweries must oxygenate their worts in
order to keep the yeast healthy for re-pitching. How do they avoid the
staling reactions?
Dave, can you tell us more about your procedure? How many ml starter
do you deem necessary per 5 gallons of 1.050 wort? And do you provide
supplemental oxygenation for a barleywine or other high-gravity brew?
Thanks,
Christian
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Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 06:36:33 -0800
From: Robert Jones <robert.jones.web at comcast.net>
Subject: Re: Where is everybody? And a wort oxygenation question...
Dan Stedman asks if there is a consensus on wort aeration upon pitching
vs. waiting 12-24 hours.
The short answer is that I aerate at pitching time. Yes, maybe your
wort had lower than 8-15ppm O2, so the yeast need more, but I just think
as a practical matter, aeration at pitching time works, provided you're
not using O2 starved yeast from a previous batch. At 12 hours, my beer
is actively fermenting, evolving CO2, and scrubbing any remaining O2 out
of there. I question how much O2 I'd be able to get back in there using
air. If you want to go the bottled O2 route, then try it. I just don't
think it's worth the trouble. Also, I wouldn't worry about introducing
bacteria through the air while you're aerating. Just make sure your
equipment is clean and sanitized. I suppose if you had a lot of grain
dust (or other types) floating around in the air, bacteria could be a
problem. Maybe keep the vacuum turned off that day. You could have
total sanitation by using bottled O2, but again, my observations and
experience say the spoon swooshing down and through the bucket technique
works.
In a similar thread, and to answer another question about racking off
the beer at the end of the primary fermentation, I've read many
different ideas on when this should be done. (I only brew ales, so
these ideas may not apply to lagers.) I used to rack off after the
krausen fell back into the beer. This often ends up with a longer
ferment, with higher terminal gravities. Those yeast on the bottom are
working for you, let them do their job. I wait until my airlock bubbles
once every 1.5 minutes. This might be a week, it might be 2 weeks.
Then I rack to a secondary. Each beer is different. Like my local
homebrew shop proprietor says - fermenting beers are like children that
you have to listen to and care for, each with individual needs :-) My
beers turn out clean with a good terminal gravity. I think your recipe
and sanitation are much bigger issues for flavor than worrying about
getting the beer off the sediment in the primary.
Robert
Portland, OR
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Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 10:11:20 -0600
From: "Greg R" <gmrbrewer at hotmail.com>
Subject: Night of the Living Ales
Did anyone else attend this event last Saturday? It was sponsored by the
Chicago Beer Society, featuring over 30 cask conditioned ales brewed by
mostly local brewpubs and breweries, held at Goose Island where the Real Ale
Festival used to be held. CBS did an outstanding job putting this together,
with plenty of good food to go with the amazing collection of wonderful self
serve real ales. I managed to taste about a dozen, in spite of my intention
to try them all. I think I tried about every IPA, and really liked my first
ever Imperial Red Ale which I can't remember who brewed. Goose Island and
Rock Bottom are both fairly large entities, but both provided some
outstanding samples of limited production ales. Although smaller than the
RAF, this event was just as enjoyable and exceeded my expectations. No
wonder it was sold out weeks in advance!
Cheers,
Greg
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Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 12:43:56 -0700
From: "Gary Glass" <gary at brewersassociation.org>
Subject: AHA National Homebrew Competition
Hi Everyone,
The American Homebrewers Association's National Homebrew Competition is
rapidly approaching. Don't miss your chance to participate in the world's
largest beer competition! Last year's competition drew over 4400 entries.
Entries due April 4-15.
See www.beertown.org/events/nhc/index.html for competition details including
Rules & Regs, Entry Forms, Entry Locations, judging information, etc.
The first round is judged at ten regional sites around the US and Canada.
First, second, and third place winners in each of the 2004 BJCP Categories as
well as our "New Entrants" category advance to the second round of the
competition held at the AHA National Homebrewers Conference in Baltimore, MD.
(Cider categories are all judged in one round at the Cider site in Red Hook,
NY.)
AHA Homebrewer of the Year, Meadmaker of the Year, Cidermaker of the Year,
Ninkasi Award winner (winningest brewer) and Homebrew Club of the Year will
be announced at the Grand Banquet and Awards Ceremony at the National
Homebrewers Conference. Last year's prize display at the Grand Banquet in
Las Vegas stretched over 50 feet!
For more information on the AHA National Homebrewers Conference in Baltimore,
MD, June 16-18, 2005, see www.ahaconference.org
WE NEED JUDGES!
This is your chance to judge in the largest and most prestigious homebrew
competition in the world. Regional judging will be taking place during the
last two weekends in April (check with local sites for exact judging dates)
in San Diego, Portland, Seattle, Denver, Houston, St. Paul, MN, Libertyville,
IL, Westlake, OH, Rochester, NY, and Regina, SK. Cider judging will be held
in Red Hook, NY.
For the judging contacts in your region, see
www.beertown.org/events/nhc/judging2nd.html.
This competition is AHA Sanctioned and registered with the BJCP.
Thanks to all of our sponsors and the volunteers around the country who make
this great competition possible!
Good Luck in the Competition!
Gary Glass, Project Coordinator
Brewers Association
888-U-CAN-BREW
(303) 447-0816 x 121
gary at brewersassociation.org
www.beertown.org
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Date: Thu, 10 Mar 2005 22:31:34 +0000
From: "Janie Curry" <houndandcalico at hotmail.com>
Subject: rice and hops
First, thanks to Geoff for the most excellent hop spreadsheet. I've been
trying to decide which rhizomes to order and I'd best get to it. Can't put
them in the ground till we move into our new house in July, but I'll get
them started in pots for now.
Also, thanks to all (Lou, John, Chad, Will,Vance, Don and Jeff) who helped
out with my question on rice vs. flaked rice and the need for a cereal mash.
Don shared a recipe for a pumkin beer and I'm looking forward to this
year's harvest.
Dan asks if there is another brewing forum out there. I've been wondering
the same thing. I guess the bloggs are popular. Hope we can keep this
forum alive and well.
This Sunday, we did indeed brew. It was nearly 70F outside in Fort Collins,
so my brew mate set up out back on the patio. It was the first 10 gallon
batch on my friend's system and we both agree that 10 gallons is the way to
go...we may even try party gyle next time.
We double milled 14.7 pounds of pale malt and 3.7 pounds of 40L crystal. I
also crushed 2 pounds of medium grain white rice by running it through the
JSP malt mill...worked like a charm. I added 6 quarts of water (3 quarts
per pound of rice) along with about half a pound of crushed pale ale malt
and held at 152F for about 20 min, then brought to a boil for about half an
hour. In the mean time, my fellow brewer doughed in the remaining grains
into room temp water and boosted to 152F. I added the boiled rice malt
mixture to the mash and nearly overshot the sach rest, but it leveled out at
158F. Mashed out at 170F 90 minutes later and collected about 12 gallons of
wort after sparging. The lauter flowed nicely. No stuck sparge. We added
1 ounce of cluster(substitute for 0.67 ounces of chinook) for bittering for
90 minutes, then a half ounce of northern brewer (substitute for 0.67 ounces
of chinook) for 30 mins for flavor, then a half ounce at 5 minutes for
arroma. I couldn't resist the tempation to add a half pound of brown sugar
to the boil so I did (but I did hold back on adding the entire package).
We tried whirpooling for the first time and man did that work like magic.
All the break formed a big glob right in the middle of the kettle and the
hot wort flowed right through the chiller into the fermentors at 74F.
I had a package of Saflager dry lager yeast in the fridge so we decied to
ferment one 5.5 gallon batch with Saflager and the other with an American
Ale Yeast grown a couple of days in advance on a stir plate using a couple
of spoonfulls of yeast slurry from a mason jar full of yeast kept in the
fridge from the previous batch. The lager was put in a temp controlled
fridge at 52F after sitting at 74F for a few hours. The ale was allowed to
ferment at room temp. Both are fermenting nicely.
My brew mate purchased a refractometer, but after we downed a few beers 3/4
of the way through the session we didn't think to try it out. Matter of
fact, we didn't collect any data, not even a hydrometer reading.
Todd in Fort Collins
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End of HOMEBREW Digest #4735, 03/10/05
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