HOMEBREW Digest #586 Wed 27 February 1991

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	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
		Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator


Contents:
  Homebrew Digest #585 (February 26, 1991) (Rick Palmer)
  Re: brew clubs in DC? (John DeCarlo)
  help in getting started (CCL-L) <wboyle at PICA.ARMY.MIL>
  Dry hopping (Gerald Andrew Winters)
  low/non-alcohol beer tasting results (Marty Albini)
  freshness dating on beer ("Ihor W. Slabicky")
  What happened to #583? (MC2331S)
  RE>Homebrew Digest #585 (Rad Equipment)
  RE>Homebrew Digest #585 (Fe (Rad Equipment)
  Re: mashing out (John Polstra)
  Temp, mashing out, extract efficiency ("Eric Roe")
  re: Paulaner Salvator (Darryl Richman)
  Idaho and New England info                                   (DAVIDSOND)
  Mead + light (James Hensley)
  grains and hops (Mary Jane Kelly)

Send submissions to homebrew%hpfcmi at hplabs.hp.com Send requests to homebrew-request%hpfcmi at hplabs.hp.com [Please do not send me requests for back issues] Archives are available from netlib at mthvax.cs.miami.edu
---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 05:16:14 -0500 From: rick at cs.cornell.edu (Rick Palmer) Subject: Homebrew Digest #585 (February 26, 1991) Please desubscribe me. (I'm not so sure I want to send it here, but I have no other place to send it.) ;-) Return to table of contents
Date: Tuesday, 26 Feb 1991 08:51:09 EST From: m14051 at mwvm.mitre.org (John DeCarlo) Subject: Re: brew clubs in DC? >From: shadow!spike at uu.psi.com (Ben Bloom) >Can somebody clue me in on the whereabouts and whoabouts of a >homebrew coop or club in the DC/Northern VA area. There are two home brewers clubs in the Washington DC metropolitan area. 1) BURP (Brewers United for Real Potables) is now entering it's tenth year as a home brew club. I have been consistently impressed with the level of knowledge the members have and have been a member for two years now. Bill Ridgely is past-president and there is a new suite of officers, but his is the only number I have available at the moment. For more information, you can call Bill at 703-971-5744 or write to: BURP 7430 Gene Street Alexandria, VA 22310 2) BANOVA (Brewers Association of Northern Virginia, I think). They have had a couple of meetings and were supposed to be working on bylaws and officers. Have not attended, but am always interested in anything to do with home brewing. Contact Miles Smith at 703-237-8956 for more details. Finally, a minor plug for my BBS at 703-448-0926 (Fidonet 1:109/131). I keep copies of the Homebrew Digest along with some miscellaneous brewing files there. Also there is a Fidonet home brewing conference called ZYMURGY. And there is a message area devoted to information on local brew clubs and their meetings, etc. Internet: jdecarlo at mitre.org Usenet: at ... at !uunet!hadron!blkcat!109!131!John_Decarlo Fidonet: 1:109/131 Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 10:21:57 EST From: William Boyle (CCL-L) <wboyle at PICA.ARMY.MIL> Subject: help in getting started I NEED HELP IN GETTING STARTED IN HOMEBREWING. TO DATE ALL I KNOW IS I LIKE BEER AND WOULD LIKE TO TRY BREWING IT AT HOME. WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO FIND OUT IS THE TITLE OF A GOOD BOOK THAT COULD GIVE ME THE BASICS IN HOMEBREWING, ANY ADVICE FROM "MASTER BREWERS", AND ANY NAMES OF MAIL ORDER CATALOGS OR STORES IN NORTHEAST PENNSYLVANIA THAT WOULD CARRY BREWING APPARATUS. ANY INFORMATION AND HELP IS GREATLY APPRECIATED. BILL BOYLE Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 10:45:52 EST From: gerald at caen.engin.umich.edu (Gerald Andrew Winters) Subject: Dry hopping I am looking for info/experiences anyone has concerning dry hopping. Off and on I'll see a recipe calling for dry hopping and, really, I wouldn't know exactly what to do. Miller and Papaizan only seem to give sketchy details. Miller seems to suggest that hops are dispensed directly from storage into the secondary. But I to wonder as he does if this is a bit risky. I've also heard of people making "hop tea" by boiling the hops and straining, then adding this tea to the secondary. Anyway my questions are when during secondary fermentation is best to dry hop ( a week or so before bottling? When secondary fermentation begins?). And most importantly what is the best method of dry hopping? gerald at caen.engin.umich.edu (Gerald Andrew Winters) Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 8:05:44 PST From: Marty Albini <martya at sdd.hp.com> Subject: low/non-alcohol beer tasting results Curiosity and lack of respect for my taste buds has once again driven me to throw a non-alcohol beer tasting. We tried 16 (that's right, 16) different examples, hoping to find something drinkable. The results are in, and there were some surprises this time. Though none of the beverages sampled really qualified as a good beer, the top three were close enough that they could be confused on a hot and thirsty day. The products sampled were: Wartech Firestone HaakeBeck O'Doul's Clausthaler Sharp's Moussy Germania Kingsbury Paulaner Thomasbrau Texas Select Kaliber Goetz Pale Near Beer Texas Light Dark Maxi Malz Kaiserdom Malz The three best, in order: Thomasbrau was much better than anything else on the list. Slightly sweet, lightly hopped (as almost all of these were), well balanced, medium bodied and pleasantly colored and carbonated. Kaliber was the most heavily hopped beverage on the list, but suffered from less body, balance and aroma than Thomasbrau. Germania suffered only from being too sweet. It has a honey aroma (which it shares with most of the German alkol-frei beers, including Thomasbrau), but too little hops to balance it. Some things learned in this tasting: o Alcohol-free beers tend to sit on the shelf a long time (:^) and the flavor definitely suffers for it. Several of the lighter beverages (especially the American entries) suffered from skunkiness. The Kingsbury smelled so bad no one would taste it! o Most of the German entries tasted like raw wort, as if fermentation were incomplete in a real beer. o The two Malz products (Maxi und Kaiserdom) would be a good substitute for root beer. Very sweet, but rich, flavor and great body. We really regretted not having any ice cream to try a float with them. o Alcohol free beer still isn't close enough to the real thing. Still no breakthroughs, but a pleasant enough evening, and everyone could drive home afterwards. The only product I'm going to try and duplicate is Maxi Malz, for floats and picnics with the kids. - -- ____________________________________________Marty Albini___________ "Thank god for long-necked bottles, the angel's remedy."--Tom Petty phone : (619) 592-4177 UUCP : {hplabs|nosc|hpfcla|ucsd}!hp-sdd!martya Internet : martya at sdd.hp.com CSNET : martya%hp-sdd at hplabs.csnet US mail : Hewlett-Packard Co., 16399 W. Bernardo Drive, San Diego CA 92127-1899 USA Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 10:33:43 -0500 From: "Ihor W. Slabicky" <iws at sgfb.ssd.ray.com> Subject: freshness dating on beer I saw something at my local package store that surprised me - freshness dating on beer. On cans of Peil's Real Draft, the can label says that the best comsumed by date is listed on the bottom of the can, and the bottom of the can has a printed date. Piel's is brewed by Heilman's now. I saw these about a week ago, say February 20, and the date on the bottom was April 1, 1991. I don't know how long the beer has been sitting at the store... I can't wait for the package stores to have shelves set up like the supermarkets do - those shelves where they sell out of date products. Or, as some supermarkets do, they just dump the 'out of date' stuff in a dumpster... :-) But dearest, I have to finish this beer before it goes bad... Ihor Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 10:44 CDT From: MC2331S at ACAD.DRAKE.EDU Subject: What happened to #583? Does HBD #583 exist? I never received that issue, but sometimes our Internet connection is pretty squirrely. I checked the archive and it isn't there (yet). Mark Castleman MC2331S at ACAD.DRAKE.EDU Return to table of contents
Date: 26 Feb 90 08:48:00 From: Rad Equipment <Rad_Equipment at rad-mac1.ucsf.EDU> Subject: RE>Homebrew Digest #585 Reply to: RE>Homebrew Digest #585 Regarding Dry Beer and Randy Tidd's request@ how it is made: Acording to Dr. Michael Lewis at UC Davis, Bud Dry is the same mash formula as regular Bud, except that it is mashed so as to achieve the most fermentables. The mash-in puts the mash at 40 deg. C for 20 minutes then the temp is raised to 55 deg. C for another 20 minutes and then raised again to 70 deg. C for a final 20 minutes. Normally the mash goes directly from the 40 deg. mark to the 70 deg. mark where it sits for 40 minutes. The temp changes occur when the boiling rice is added to the grains. This period of mash at the lower middle temp allows the beta-amylase to work on what starch has gelatinized (Am. barley must be heated to at least 65 deg. C for full gelatinization, however beta-amylase has very low heat tolerance) and convert it to lots of fermentables. The other character to the beer is no aftertase, so very little bittering hops are used (which in the case of Bud, means almost NO HOPS!). I don't think you will be able to reproduce this with extracts since I don't know of any which include rice. Williams in San Leandro, CA offers an extra light which is 27% corn and they have rice extract on its own. So you could try getting the lightest you can find, make a wort of a low gravity (1.035), and pitch a very attenuative yeast (Anheuser-Busch yeast is available from some yeast banks). Be careful not to scorch the wort when you boil in order to keep the caramel down. Russ Wigglesworth <Rad Equipment at RadMac1.ucsf.edu> Return to table of contents
Date: 26 Feb 90 08:57:57 From: Rad Equipment <Rad_Equipment at rad-mac1.ucsf.EDU> Subject: RE>Homebrew Digest #585 (Fe Reply to: RE>Homebrew Digest #585 (Febru Regarding Ken Johnson's request for an explanation of "mash-out": Popular explanation is for deactivation of the enzymes. My understanding is that this really isn't necessary since the boil will do this quite nicely. You do want to keep the wort and sparge as warm as possible to keep the sugar flowing and to assist in disolving them from the grains into solution. 75 deg. C seems to be the optimum sparge temp. as it will achieve the above without beginning to extract tannins and other unwanted character from the grain husks. Russ Wigglesworth <Rad Equipment at RadMac1.ucsf.edu> Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 09:09:07 PST From: polstra!jdp at uunet.UU.NET (John Polstra) Subject: Re: mashing out In HBD #585, kjohnson at argon.berkeley.edu (Ken Johnson) writes: > Could someone please tell me the reason for a mash out. Is it to > deactivate the enzymes? Yes. > To raise the mash to sparging temp.? Yes. > What? Both of those reasons. A common question goes like this: "Once all the starches are converted to sugars and there aren't any left, why does it matter whether the enzymes get deactivated or not?" Well, there are sugars and then there are sugars. You don't always necessarily want conversion to run its full course. Cutting it off a little early can give you more body, and more unfermentable sugars for a sweeter palate. The mash out gives you more control over the character of the final product. Raising the mash to a good sparging temperature is also an important reason for the mash out. To get an efficient sparge, the temperature needs to be right around 168 degrees F. Any colder, and you'll leave too much of the mash product behind in the grains. Any hotter (above 170) and you'll start to get astringent flavors from the husks. If the grains aren't already around 168 degrees when you start the sparge, you'll never get them up to that temperature from the sparge water alone. > confused > kj Nah ... you had it exactly right. You just *thought* you were confused. John Polstra polstra!jdp at uunet.uu.net Polstra & Co., Inc. ...!uunet!polstra!jdp Seattle, Washington USA (206) 932-6482 "Self-knowledge is always bad news." -- John Barth Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 13:17 EST From: "Eric Roe" <KXR11 at PSUVM.PSU.EDU> Subject: Temp, mashing out, extract efficiency In HBD #585, Bill Mayne writes about a fast-starting fermentation. You may want to take your own advice and not fix your procedure. If you're happy with the results, keep doing what you're doing. If, however, you notice cidery flavors in your brew, this might be the result of initial fermentation taking place at too high of temperatures. I use a wort chiller and try to get my batch down to about 60 degrees F before I pitch. The initial fermentation using this method is not so instantaneous. A batch of wheat beer took almost 36 hours to begin active fermentation with Whitbred ale yeast. This weekend I brewed a batch of porter, pitched with Munton & Fison ale yeast, and it took about 18 hours to start active fermentation. So far I haven't had a problem with any infections, even with the long lag times. If you do change your procedure, just remember to keep everything clean, and contamination shouldn't be a worry. Regarding mashing out, Ken Johnson writes: >Could someone please tell me the reason for a mash out. Is it to deactivate >the enzymes? To raise the mash to sparging temp.? What? Mashing out deactivates the enzymes, but it also forces unconverted starch particles into suspension. This aids in their filtration during the sparge, and results in a clearer runoff. You've got be somewhat careful with your temperature here. If you mash out at too high of temperature, the starch will degrade (burst) into sticky proteins and undermodified carbohydrates. These will dissolve and can contribute to cloudy runoff, stuck runoff, and down the line, chill haze. Here's a question for my fellow all-grain brewers out there. What kind of extract efficiencies are you getting? I've been unable to find any references as to what are good percentages, and what percentages aren't so good. The batch of porter I brewed this Sunday (using 10 7/8lbs of grain) ended up with a OG of 1.055 and a volume of 5.25 gallons. Using Noonan's formula for extract efficiency this came to about 59.5%, or about 6 1/6lbs of extract out of 10 7/8lbs of grain. I calculated the total possible efficiency for the malts I was using to be 70.7% (about 7 2/3lbs extract out of 10 7/8lbs of grain). On another note, does anyone have a good recipe for an all-grain raspberry stout. I'm anxious to try making some sort of fruit beer. Eric <kxr11 at psuvm.psu.edu> Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 14:54:55 -0800 From: darryl at ism.isc.com (Darryl Richman) Subject: re: Paulaner Salvator Regarding Paulaner Salvator, you might like to try my recipe in the special issue of Zymurgy this past year. Not a perfect match, but pretty close. I don't recall exactly what the AHA published there, but there is a mistake-- the recipe is for *15* gallons, not 5. I collected almost 20 gallons from the lauter tun and boiled it for over 3 hours. This got both the right volume and the darker color needed. Have fun! --Darryl Richman Return to table of contents
Date: 26 Feb 91 15:57 +0000 From: DAVIDSOND%AC%CSC at CSC.ISU.EDU Subject: Idaho and New England info Two things, briefly: I recently read of a homebrewfest in Idaho (Boise?!?) coming up, but have misplaced that issue of the digest -- If anyone knows or remembers, or perhaps could repost that message to me, I'd gladly name my first=born after them (gender permitting). Also, I'm doing a sort of anti=spring break, going to New England during March 13-26, rather than all that sun-n-sex down south. To make up for missing all of the bacchanalia, I'd appreciate the names of good beer places around Boston and Amherst/Northampton MA, and Burlington VT. I've heard there's one in Northampton... ThxInAdvance DavidsonD at csc.isu.edu (Darryl Davidson -- ID is another 208 232 7770 state of mind) Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 15:15:44 -0800 From: jpaul at lccsd.sd.locus.com (James Hensley) Subject: Mead + light Does light adversely effect mead as it does beer? James Hensley, Locus computing corporation, San Diego (jpaul at locus.com) -- opinions own, not employer's. Return to table of contents
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 18:50:00 -0500 (EST) From: Mary Jane Kelly <mk36+ at andrew.cmu.edu> Subject: grains and hops What is the best way to store left over grains and hops? Can they be stroed? If they can be stored how long will they keep. Should one store them in air tight jars out of the light, in the fridge or in the freezer? Thanks in advance, Pete Return to table of contents
End of HOMEBREW Digest #586, 02/27/91 ************************************* -------
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