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HOMEBREW Digest #5355
HOMEBREW Digest #5355 Thu 26 June 2008
FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
Digest Janitor: pbabcock at hbd.org
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Contents:
FFT (Paul Dey)
Goose Island/Siebel ("Chad Stevens")
Stuff (-s)
Re: Campden Tablets (Fred L Johnson)
HBD vs Tech Talk ("A.J deLange")
In defense of the lowly hydrometer ("A.J deLange")
RE: I Miss my HBD (IT)" <stjones@eastman.com>
Cloudy beer (IT)" <stjones@eastman.com>
Brewing Tendencies ("Alexandre Enkerli")
List Traffic ("Alexandre Enkerli")
Re: Plain text (Dion Hollenbeck)
Easy way to create an RSS feed for HBD ("Dave Larsen")
Grain Mills ("Dave Larsen")
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Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:45:10 -0600
From: Paul Dey <beerman at myxmail.net>
Subject: FFT
Steve (-S) invokes the spirit of Dave Burley and the 90's by singing the
praises of Cl*nitest. Actually, not singing but very nicely pointing out
the downsides of a seemingly rational beer test (FFT). I did a few of
these in the late 90's but must agree they are generally not worth the
effort and lost beer. I remember Dave B's ardent pitch to just try the
test (I even looked around the pharmacy once) but frankly I've achieved
20 years of success by paying closest attention to pitching large,
healthy starters and trying to control ferment temperatures without
careful regard to the rates of sugar depreciation. A few have finished
a little high but yeast management is key.
On tap: Foreign Extra Stout, ESB, English IPA, Chiswick Bitter (RIP Sir
Michael Jackson).
As a very long time lurker, there is nothing like Cl*nitest to rouse the
old HBD!
-p
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:30:35 -0700
From: "Chad Stevens" <zuvaruvi at cox.net>
Subject: Goose Island/Siebel
I noticed in a recent article that one of the Goose Island stores was unable
to work out a lease agreement with the landowner. Is this the same store
that Siebel was renting space from? How does this affect Siebel? Kieth
Lemke or others in the Chicago area, any comments?
Chad Stevens
QUAFF
San Diego
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 03:17:02 -0400
From: -s at adelphia.net
Subject: Stuff
AJ asked about fermentation problems wrt camden tabs (X-metabisulfite).
I don't use camdens to remove chloramines (unecessary for my well
water), but when I add metabite to prevent mash oxidation I use the
equivalent of 4 camden tabs in the mash of a ~10gal batch and never had
any noticeable fermentation problem. I've used more than double this
amount too (tho' I wouldn't recommend it for flavor) and had no stalled
fermentation. My recollection is that AJ recommends 1 tab per 20gal
(~2.5ppm SO2) to treat chloramines - while I regularly use ~20ppm and no
problems.
The sulfite ions can slow or even kill yeast but in my winemaking
experience it take a LOT even at lower than wort pH where the sulfite is
far more effective.
My hunch is that your the HB shop customers have other yeast handling
problems that they blame on metabite.
In the interest of fostering a discussion - any microbiologist types out
there who can explain the general action of SO2 on yeasts and bacteria ?
Can anyone explain why Saccharomyces are more immune to SO2 then others ?
===
Long lost Boris posts -
> - be carefull because those little creatures can swim, dive, jump, fly
> and share immunity codex through telecinetics (sp?).
>
Well said. My well water, tho from 35m deep carries a little pond-scum
bacteria that will turn my beers into "berliner weiss" in a hurry if I
let up an inch on sanitation.
===
Hops prices - yow ! Good motivation to grow your own if you have a
sunny garden area. My problem is that I have too few varieties (but
that's inevitable). I have one heck of a time keeping grass and weeds
away from the plants. Last Fall it was very wet resulting in damaged
cones - tho' still usable.
===
Language filter has bitten me fairly hard and often; still I prefer the
filter to the alternative. Another problem is delivery (but I prefer to
blame Time-Warner for that one).
==
I can't speak to AHA TechTalk but any effective brewing forum is
welcome. Having said that I (and a few other of the ancients here)
still recall the days when AHA almost killed HBD through benign
mismanagement - bitter finish from that one.
Strangely I think one of the best things about HBD is it's range of
topics. Of course we veer into mead, wine, whisk[e]y for some obvious
reasons, and even into breadmaking and sauerkraut which is a bit of a
stretch - but then we have things like Alexandre Enkerli's recent post
about using a collection of low quality but high volume 'experience
reports' as opposed to the high quality, low volume journal research ...
or even "beer in space" or starch ethanol as fuel - that's quite a range.
-S
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 06:47:22 -0400
From: Fred L Johnson <FLJohnson52 at nc.rr.com>
Subject: Re: Campden Tablets
A.J. asks if any of us have had problems with our yeast when using
Campden tablets. I've been treating sparge water with sodium or
potassium metabisulfite at the rate of 25 mg per gallon for
chloramine/chlorine removal for years and mash water at the rate of
about 400 mg per gallon. I've had no problems with fermentations. I
once accidentally added sodium metabisulfite to my mash water at the
rate of about 2000 mg per gallon and never had any problem with
fermentation, although I'm not recommending that much.
I'd like to hear A.J.'s and others' opinions on how much is
appropriate for mashing. I don't think I've ever seen any data in
this regard.
There are also those that advocate some addition after fermentation
has completed to prevent staling.
Fred L Johnson
Apex, North Carolina, USA
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 08:14:50 -0400
From: "A.J deLange" <ajdel at cox.net>
Subject: HBD vs Tech Talk
I stopped posting to Tech Talk when I noticed that they were editing my
posts resulting, in at least a couple of cases, in a change of the
meaning of the sentence to the point where it was incorrect. As, IMO,
the important thing is that the brewer who asks the question gets the
information, I will respond off line to questions where I think I can
help but I don't want my words tweaked by someone who does not
understand what I am trying to convey. In annother case they suppressed
a post in which I complained of the antagonistic and jingoistic posting
of someone who disapproved of my use of foreign made brewing equipment.
That I find intolerable. It's their site, of course, and they can,
therefore, impose any rules they want but I much prefer the lack of
"editing" here - even if I can't say Clini****.
A.J.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 08:16:27 -0400
From: "A.J deLange" <ajdel at cox.net>
Subject: In defense of the lowly hydrometer
Steve and I have debated the worth of the hydrometer here before and
anyone interested in all the details can look in the archives so I'll be
brief. I believe a good set of hydrometers properly used (and there is
some art to this) is more than adequate for HB purposes and most
commercial applications as well. Before the days of Anton Paar,
hydrometers and pycnometers (talk about pain) were all there was.
It is clear that the plastic hydrometer that comes with your first
extract brew kit isn't what I am talking about. I am referring to
reduced range hydrometers often sold in sets of three and scaled with
tics 0.1 P apart so you can easily read to that level or maybe half a
digit below that (i.e. 0.05). Many sources are available to tell you how
to read a hydrometer (see the manufacturer's instructions as to whether
to read to the top of the meniscus or it's base). Make sure the
hydrometer (and your hands) are clean and dry, that the beer is at the
temperature for which the hydrometer is designed, that the hydrometer is
calibrated for the surface tension of beer (not water) and so on. Just
as an example the last beer I measured, a Pils (yes, there is life
without Saaz) measures 3.15 P apparent with a hydrometer and 3.09 P with
a digital meter (and if you think degassing is important with hdrometers
watch what happens when the sonics hit the U-tube in a digital meter).
The difference is .06P which corresponds to approximately .06*.421/0.79
= .03% ABV using the Balling formula. Multiply this by sqrt(2) to get
about 0.05% to include the efffects of an error of similar magnitude
when the O.G. was measured.
Error of this magnitude get washed out by other effects when trying to
determine the alcohol content of beer using the Balling or derivative
formulas (and I assume that this, and the desire to tell when
fermentation is over are the goals here). Such things as deviation from
the Balling formula because a particular yeast strain produces more or
less biomass than usual, evaporation in the fermenter and so on can add
up. And what is the original gravity anyway? Is it the OG of the wort
right out of the kettle, or the wort plus starter or wort plus starter
adjusted for the sugar which has been fermented in the starter?
Returning to the example Pils: it measured 13.3P (with a hydrometer) at
the zwickle upon completion of filling of the ferementer. I inject the
starter inline as the wort is entering the fermenter so it should be
well mixed with the wort. We know right off that the effective OG is a
little higher than this because of the alcohol in the starter. This beer
finished, as noted above, at 3.15 (per the hydrometer). The Balling
formula predicts 5.46% ABV in going from 13.3 to 3.15 but this beer
actually measured 5.81%. Back calculating (using the Balling formula in
reverse) I get 13.8P as the effective O.G. Not an unreasonable answer
but the point is that there are uncertainties bigger than 0.1 P which
have nothing to do with the instrument used to measure gravities.
A.J.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:19:47 -0400
From: "Jones, Steve (IT)" <stjones at eastman.com>
Subject: RE: I Miss my HBD
Kudos to Dave Larsen, whose post seems to have kicked off a flurry of
activity not seen in a few years. 8 straight days (Sundays not included)
with anywhere from 5 to 15 posts - great stuff!
Techtalk is definitely getting better, but I agree that a big drawback
is its restriction to AHA members only, and another is that the
technical
level is somewhat lacking. I started reading HBD back around 96 or so
after getting my first email account. I was quite active for several
years, but must admit to being mostly a lurker for the past 3 or 4
years.
I resolve to do better.
I think for the most part the great server crash of May 2004 is what
pushed people elsewhere, and most didn't return. But this latest flurry
shows that many still monitor HBD regularly. Lets keep it going. Rather
than including it in this post, I'm going to follow this up with a post
of my own.
- -------------------------------------
Steve Jones, Johnson City, TN
[421.7, 168.5deg] AR
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 12:04:37 -0400
From: "Jones, Steve (IT)" <stjones at eastman.com>
Subject: Cloudy beer
As I said, it's great to see an active HBD again. Here is my dilemma:
I've been having a problem with cloudy beer for well over a year now
(at least 12 batches) that I can't seem to figure out. I have been
brewing for 13 years, all-grain for 11, and had not had this problem
before. It has occurred to every batch to varying degrees ... some
ales have cleared fairly well without fining but took a few months.
Others have taken several months and are still not acceptable. My
lone lager in that time cleared nicely after lagering for a few
months. My kolsch is 4 months old and still hazy. My IPAs are
horribly hazy even after fining with gelatin. But an APA with us05
cleared real nicely without a long aging process (an IPA with us05
is still cloudy after 4 months). Even my Chiswick bitter using Wy
1968 was cloudy for months - even after fining. It looked like coffee
with cream in the primary after a full month.
I bought several bags of grain (Thomas Fawcett, Weyermann, Bestmalz,
Franco Belges) back in early 2005, and had no problems with any haze
at all until early 2007. I've used at least two different water
sources, and my process hasn't changed much at all. My equipment did
change - I replaced my kettle false bottom (which hops kept getting
under and plugging my pickup tube) with a homemade copy of a 'Hop
Stopper'. I tried changing back to the FB, and then to a SS braid
over a slotted copper tube, but neither one changed the results. I
thought about the malt maybe absorbing moisture in my 40F walk-in,
so I took 100g of malt and kilned it at 200F in the oven for 4 hours.
It weighed 97g, so the MC was right where the specs said it should
be. I use a combination of pellet and whole hops from various
sources - but that isn't any different than the past 10 years.
Next I'll try a batch with new ingredients soon (I'm nearly out of
malt anyway) ... maybe it is just that the malt is too old, tho a
fellow clubmate brewed a batch with 5 yr old CRUSHED malt with no
problems.
Any suggestions?
- -------------------------------------
Steve Jones, Johnson City, TN
[421.7 mi, 168.5 deg] AR
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:09:15 -0400
From: "Alexandre Enkerli" <enkerli at gmail.com>
Subject: Brewing Tendencies
Maybe it's just a coincidence but I keep hearing about Berliner
Weisse, these days. I brewed one (sour mash, fermented with
Lallemand's Munich), mostly as a way to get a nice-drinking summer
session beer. Other MontreAlers have been brewing a Berliner Weisse or
talking about brewing one. Austin's Black Star Coop has a Berliner
Weisse on its "official" lineup. Jeff and Greg at Craft Beer Radio
tasted a couple BWs on-air, recently. AFAICT from the beer tweets,
there was even a BW flight at one of the recent craft beer events. In
other words, while Chris Colby might be right in saying that this
won't be the year of the gruit, it's quite interesting to see a move
toward the Berliner Weisse style.
Again, maybe it's just a coincidence. Or a fad. But there's something
to think about, here.
There have been different periods, in terms of the Craft Beer
Revolution. One recent phase was the "extreme beer" one, especially in
terms of hops and alcohol (fellow social scientists talk about
"conspicuous consumption" for a reason). There have also been some
times when Saison and Farmhouse ales became more common. Or "American
Wild Ales." And, now, we may get into a "tasty session beer" phase. At
least, some of us may be getting into this.
Sure, a Berliner Weisse is still an "extreme beer," in some ways. But
it's also the kind of beer which may connect well with those people
who aren't typically beer drinkers. As many people have found out
(including Jeff and Greg), sour ales are usually appreciated by
exactly those people you wouldn't expect to like craft beer. The
reverse is also true, to some extent: those who love craft beer with a
passion, especially the hopheads among us, typically hate sour ales
with a passion, even if they try to like them. So, a sour ale may not
be a great gateway beer into the more typical "Hop-Centric North
American Craft Beer" taste range, but there's clearly an untapped
market, here.
Something similar may be said about non-sour wheat beers. Most
brewpubs in North America have either a weizen or a wit, and these
tend to sell relatively well. Blue Moon and Rickard's White seem to be
tapping this market. But there's a lot more which can be done with
wheat, even without souring. In Qc, the typical thing is to do a fruit
beer with a wit base. But there's room for experimentation with a
wheat base. Personally, I like to brew wheat beers with other grains
and/or with non-typical flavourings (hyssop, hibiscus flowers, etc.).
Speaking of non-traditional flavourings...
Beer cocktails are typically shunned by North American beergeeks. Yet,
they can also fit in the broader scheme of the beer craft, especially
if they're done with caution. Yes, even syrup can have its place in
beer. Not only to hide off-flavours or to stomach a bland beer. But to
broaden the horizons of beer tastes. And please some people who like
to hang out at brewpubs but would rather have a cocktail than a beer.
Ok... Time to rack my Berliner Weisse.
Ale-X in Laval, Qc
http://enkerli.wordpress.com/
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:23:38 -0400
From: "Alexandre Enkerli" <enkerli at gmail.com>
Subject: List Traffic
Glad to see a higher level of traffic on the list. Like others, I do
find the very restrictive text filters to be enough of a hassle to
make me hesitate before posting. It'd be easier if the algorithm were
to convert characters instead of rejecting posts based on them (like
accented characters or the degree sign). Also, it could strip HTML
code instead of rejecting HTML posts. Some mailreaders and mail
systems make it hard to notice that a message is being sent as HTML or
RTF. Getting a rejection letter is never fun, not even from an
automatic message processor.
Having said this, we might be going back to some increased traffic for
the summer. Some people brew less because of the weather but want to
talk more about brewing. Some people brew more and feel motivated to
share about their experiences. Some beer-related events are allowing
people to "get into the hobby for the first time." And the beer
podcasts have changed a bit for the past few weeks.
(It'd be neat if the beer podcasters were to mention the HBD.)
When I came back to the HBD, a few months ago (after an Austin Zealot
who made me realize that the list was still active and that I was
supposed to get mail), I was giving a lot of thought to what can
happen to the HBD in the future. I still think there's room for the
old HBD to be used as a "repository of brewing knowledge" and for a
"new" HBD to be focused on further discussions about brewing. Not
letting the HBD die. Making it into something even more appropriate to
the current brewing world.
I'd still maintain that there's a strong basis in terms of brewing
knowledge which is widely shared among homebrewers and commercial
craft brewers. There's also a fair bit of "widely held notions" which
have been tested out individually but not corroborated so widely. Some
of these notions need to be challenged while others may only be
appropriate to some brewing situations. It'd be great if we could
discuss all of this without resorting to the debate mode.
I personally think that the technical know-how and scientific bases
behind much of the brewing are stable enough at this point that we
could focus on the "art" of brewing, using imagination, creativity,
intersubjectivity passion, and innovation to be our guides. Instead of
scientist reductionism, strict style guidelines, troubleshooting, and
homemade measurements.
But that might have to be discussed later. ;-)
Cheers!
Ale-X in Laval, Qc
http://enkerli.wordpress.com/
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 13:38:38 -0600
From: Dion Hollenbeck <hollen at woodsprite.com>
Subject: Re: Plain text
>> Michael P Thompson writes:
MPT> On Date: Sat, 21 Jun 2008 18:29:20 -0400 "Spencer W. Thomas" wrote:
MPT> My experience is limited but I use Mailman for a couple of lists, and
MPT> it has a module that strips off multi-part messages and HTML, rather
MPT> than making the user do it. Because virtually all modern e-mail
MPT> programs default to formatted text, it's much more difficult to
MPT> purposely send a plain-text message. Getting the mail server to do it
MPT> has made my moderator job much easier.
I have suggested that Pat convert the digest over to Mailman several
times, but he has never wanted to. In my experience running 7
different lists with Mailman, the interactive participation of the
admin is cut down to nearly zero. And when properly set up, none
of the lists I managed ever got any spam at all. It is amazingly
easy to set up a list to be nearly management free with Mailman.
My understanding is that Pat and the other volunteer janitors and
code whackers have to do a lot to keep the currently used HBD
custom software running, and to filter out messages that are not
supposed to get into the list. None of that would be necessary with
Mailman.
Pat - I have never heard a reason why you are opposed to switching
to Mailman. Are there features of the custom software that just
are lacking in Mailman?
regards,
dion
- --
Dion Hollenbeck Email: hollen at woodsprite.com
Home Page: http://www.woodsprite.com
Brewing Page: http://hbd.org/hollen
'98 4runner '86 4x4 PU
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 16:18:16 -0700
From: "Dave Larsen" <hunahpu at gmail.com>
Subject: Easy way to create an RSS feed for HBD
>
> One thing that would help to modernize the HBD, is providing an RSS
> feed. I read many of my Yahoo Groups, blogs, and other sources of
> brewing information that way. I'm not sure what it would take to do
> that, but I'm sure that that would increase readership, and hopefully,
> participation.
>
I thought of a solution to my own post. Blogger allows an email feed
to post blog posts. If you set up an HBD blog, and an HBD
subscription that goes to the posting address, it will post to the
blog. Blogger then automates the RSS process and people can point
their RSS reader to the blog. It would cost nothing, except the time
to set it up (which would not be that much).
As an added bonus, it would provide a cheap and dirty way to mirror new digests.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:01:41 -0700
From: "Dave Larsen" <hunahpu at gmail.com>
Subject: Grain Mills
So, just for old times sake, I have to ask: What is the best grain
mill out there?
(You know the ol' HBD happenin' when someone asks that question)
:)
------------------------------
End of HOMEBREW Digest #5355, 06/26/08
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