---

	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
		Digest Janitor: janitor@hbd.org
		Many thanks to the Observer & Eccentric Newspapers of 
		Livonia, Michigan for sponsoring the Homebrew Digest.
				URL: http://www.oeonline.com


Contents:
  Re: You've Got to Fight for Your Right! (phil sides jr)
  Have you heard from me lately? (Home Brew Digest Webmaster)
  Using Homebrew For Racing ("Phil and Jill Yates")
  KLOB pig roast (fridge)
  HBD Palexperiment - headspace (ALAN KEITH MEEKER)
  Pumpkin Ale (jslusher)
  lager/ale malt ("Nathaniel P. Lansing")
  Re: Soybeans ("Charles T. Major")
  Albany Pump Station ("Russ Hobaugh")
  Princeton ("Spencer W. Thomas")
  Thinning the Wort Post-Pitch ("Dransfield, Michael")
  Re: Soybeans (Jeff Renner)
  measuring volumes in glass carboys ("George De Piro")
  Pumpkin Beers/Stationary(ery) (Eric.Fouch)
  being fair (Jim Liddil)
  Soybeans, Etching a carboy (Dave Burley)
  Celebration Ale (clone) RECIPE (ALAN KEITH MEEKER)
  Ol' Pumpkinhead (Biergiek)
  HSA Again!, Ashburn Malt (RCAYOT)
  Legal Brewing (Paul Gatza)
  Life insurance and homebrew (JazzNball)
  Re: The Brave New Brewery Is Flawed ("Stephen Alexander")
  handling carboys (msnyder)
  Re: BT and Suporting those that Su (Spencer W Thomas)
  Brave New Brewrey II: Judgement Day ("Donald D. Lake")
  Yeast Starter for a Mead??? (Randy Shreve)
  US News & World Report (Dan Listermann)
  Response to HBD and Sophistry 9/7/99 (Biggarmz)
  millenium flame wars (AlannnnT)
  durability of refrigerators or freezers with override thermostats ("Sean Richens")
  Tasmanian Pepperberries (Miguel de Salas)
  Millenium (Tim Anderson)


* Beer is our obsession and we're late for therapy!

* The HBD now hosts eight digests related to this and a few other hobbies.
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----------------------------------------------------------------------


Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 01:00:39 -0400
From: phil sides jr <psides at carl.net>
Subject: Re: You've Got to Fight for Your Right!

>If YOU are a right-thinking American, stand shoulder-to-shoulder with
us --
>mash paddle in hand, spud gun at the ready.  They can only take our
>homebrew from us when they peel our cold, dead fingers from the glass
 ...


>For Freedom,
>Mark in Kalamazoo
>(Still researching edifying quotation for insertion here)

Mark,
You can borrow our New Hampshire motto:
Brew Free Or Die

Phil
- --
In wine there is wisdom, in beer there is strength, in water there is
bacteria. - German Proverb




Return to table of contents


Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 01:29:30 -0400 (EDT)
From: Home Brew Digest Webmaster <webmastr at brew.oeonline.com>
Subject: Have you heard from me lately?


If you are being hosted in any way, shape or form by either the Home Brew
Digest server, or via the Brewery, Karl Lutzen or Pat Babcock, please send
a reply stating so to pbabcock at hbd.org. Include the e-mail address that
you prefer to be contacted at regarding your site and your site url or
directory name.

Thanks!



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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 19:26:42 +1000
From: "Phil and Jill Yates" <yates at flexgate.infoflex.com.au>
Subject: Using Homebrew For Racing

I'll have to take back what I said about Arnold on that scooter of his. He
has just done the fastest lap of the HBD that I have ever seen! Well I
thought Doc Panther was pretty fast arriving and going, but Mr Chickenshorts
surely holds the record. No sooner did he appear on the crest going like a
bat out of hell and zoooom, he's past us down the straight and disappeared
into the never never. I reckon he's running that Lambretta on ethyl
hexanoate! Good luck Arnold at Daytona.

Phil Yates.



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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 07:24:40 -0400
From: fridge at kalamazoo.net
Subject: KLOB pig roast



The Kalamazoo Libation Organization of Brewers wishes to 
announce our SIXTH ANNUAL PIG ROAST!

	SATURDAY SEPTEMBER 18th
	Noon Until Sometime Sunday!

Overnight Camping     Good Food

Fine Libations            Cool Prizes

Live Music by the BUS STOP BULLIES!

$12 Homebrew Club Members   $15 Non-Members

Age 20 & Under $5            Kids 10 &  Under FREE

Please bring a dish to pass!

Tickets available at: 
Bell's General Store -  Kalamazoo   616-382-5712
Music Express      -     Kalamazoo  616-342-1239
The Old Hat Brewery - Lawton        616-624-6445

Out of towners email fridge at kalamazoo.net or
Mark_Ohrstrom/Humphrey_Products at humphreypc.com
to reserve tickets and get directions to the event.

Hope this helps!

Forrest Duddles - FridgeGuy in Kalamazoo
fridge at kalamazoo.net



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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 07:57:21 -0400 (EDT)
From: ALAN KEITH MEEKER <ameeker at welch.jhu.edu>
Subject: HBD Palexperiment - headspace

Louis Bonham replied to my headspace air question:

>>Alan is confusing the headspace *volume* (which is, indeed,
>>usually 10mls or so) with level of headspace *air* -- a term
>>which refers to all the non-CO2 gas in the headspace..."

Ahhhhhh thanks for the clarification. Presumably most of this non-CO2
headspace air is nitrogen no?

 -Alan Meeker




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Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 08:11:13 -0400
From: jslusher <jslusher at flash.net>
Subject: Pumpkin Ale

Bob,

   I have used cooked baking pumpkins (not ordinary pumpkins) in my main
mash for 5 seasonal pumpkin brews (one of which was a Barleywine that is
developing into a really unique brew as it ages) to date...all with
wonderful results.  In the first case I baked a complete 12lb pumpkin (cut
it into 1/8ths and baked 300deg for 1 hr) the night before brewing.  On
brew day, I cut about 6lb (this was a guess, but it worked out perfectly
for the first recipe that I had formulated...I've used between 4-6lbs
depending on the gravity since...increased lbs for higher O.G. brews seems
to work well) into 2in pieces and place it into the mash (the leftover
pieces of pumpkin can be frozen for the next brew without a loss of pumpkin
character) while ramping up to my protein rest at 122deg.  The pumpkin
remains in the mash for the full schedule.  
   The flavor and aroma given off by the real pumpkin in the final product,
tastes and smells more natural than other brews I've sampled made with
canned or ordinary pumpkins in my experience so far.  Spices used and their
quantities are continually in the tweaking stage, but all natural
individual items (whole ground cinn, nutmeg, grated ginger and cardamon)
seem to yield the best results compared to the premade pumpkin spices that
can be found.  Good Luck in your quest for the perfect pumpkin
brew!...Cheers! 

John Slusher
Twilight Brewing Company (yes...it's fictitious...but I can dream can't I?)
jslusher at flash.net
http://www.flash.net/~jslusher/crabs

Bob Sheck wrote:
Subject: RE:pumpkin ale recipe

Date: Wed, 01 Sep 1999 21:00:17 -0600
From: hal <hwarrick at springnet1.com>

Hal- et al:

has anyone tried mashing the cooked pumpkin in with the
main mash? I would think you could get some extra starch
conversion going this-a-ways.

Bob Sheck

bsheck, me-sheck, abednigo! Greenville, NC 
email:bsheck at skantech.net or see us at:
http://www.skantech.net/bsheck/
(252)830-1833



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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 08:52:48 -0400
From: "Nathaniel P. Lansing" <delbrew at compuserve.com>
Subject: lager/ale malt

Paul asked,>>" but then there's
no reason I can think of not to use lager malt to make an ale.... is
there?<<
   Not if you take the higher levels of DMS into consideration and boil
longer to reduce the final levels of DMS, not normally found in and ale.
Using ale malt for a lager wouldn't work as well since you want a 
threshold
level of DMS in the finished lager, A short boil would help but then you
would miss the hop bitterness utilization.

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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 08:13:45 -0500 (Central Daylight Time)
From: "Charles T. Major" <ctmajor at samford.edu>
Subject: Re: Soybeans

Rick Theiner asks, " Does anyone have 
ideas on where I can get my hand on soy, flaked or 
otherwise?"

A recent cooking magazine I saw noted that Asian markets 
often carry frozen soybeans.

Tidmarsh Major, Birmingham, Alabama
The Non Sequitur Brewery: Have a Non Sequitur, because 
Madagascar is a large island off the coast of Africa!



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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 09:22:03 -0400
From: "Russ Hobaugh" <Russ_Hobaugh at erm.com>
Subject: Albany Pump Station



Last week I had the pleasure of visiting the Albany Pump
Station.  I heartily recommend stopping by if you are ever
in the Albany area.  There were 6 beers on tap, and all were
good, and 4 were very good to excellent!  The hefe-weizen
was absolutely perfect--better than ones I've had from Germany.
The Tripel style, stout, and kick-but brown were all outstanding.
I have been in brewpubs were all the beers tasted the same, but
each of these had a distinct flavor--George uses 4 different yeast
strains to achieve this.  And the icing on the cake was
that the food was good--above average for a brewpub, the service
was good, and the building itself was amazing.

The best part about it was meeting George De Piro.  I introduced
myself as a homebrewer, and he treated me like he had known me
for years.  His passion for what he is doing really shows through in
how he works, and the beers he produces.   George, keep up the
excellent work!




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Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 09:32:07 -0400
From: "Spencer W. Thomas" <spencer at umich.edu>
Subject: Princeton

I will be in Princeton, NJ on the evening of Sept 21.  I will probably
have time for a beer or two in the late evening, and am looking for
1) someone to share it with and/or
2) suggestions of another place to go than Triumph (and a ride to it.
:-)

=Spencer Thomas in Ann Arbor, MI



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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 09:35:30 -0400 
From: "Dransfield, Michael" <mdransfi at lehman.com>
Subject: Thinning the Wort Post-Pitch 

Hi all, 

I made a first attempt at a full-boil English bitter on Monday, following Al
K.'s book, but using ingredients from my local brew shop's recipe for an
English bitter: 

6.5 gallons of pre-boiled tap water 
6 lb. light liquid malt extract 
2 lb. 20L crystal malt 
1 oz. Fuggles 4.5% AA ten minutes into boil 
1 oz Fuggles 4.5% AA 55 minutes into the boil (last 15 minutes)
1 oz. Willamette (? AA) 67 minutes into the boil (last three minutes)
Yeast nutrient and Irish moss added with 15 minutes left. 

I steeped the grains at 170 deg F. for 25 minutes in 2 gallons of the
pre-boiled water along with ~1 tbsp. gypsum (came with the recipe); added
the resulting fluid to the other 4.5 gallons of water. Boiled for a total of
70 minutes using a propane burner. This being only my fourth batch, and
first full volume boil, I did a bad job of estimating how much wort was in
the kettle. After chilling down to 80 deg. F. (immersion chiller), and after
siphoning into my 6 gallon plastic fermenter, I took a hydrometer reading --
1.059! I figure that there was only about 4.25 gallons of wort. I didn't
have any reserve water pre-boiled, so I went ahead and pitched the yeast
(White Labs liquid British Ale - no starter). After three hours, there was
some activity in the air lock. 

So, my questions: I really wanted a bitter, not a strong ale that I would
expect from a 1.059 wort. Is it too late (two days after pitching) to add
boiled, cooled water to the fermenter to bring the volume up to 5 gallons?
Should I add water prior to bottling? How much will three or four quarts of
water bring the gravity down? Is my beer ruined? Also, there was no cold
break. I thought that lack of cold break in my prior batches was due to
slower chilling via the cold water bath technique. I thought that my new,
home-made immersion chiller would have produced some, but nooooo.... Does
this result in higher gravity? Will my beer be full of evil proteins? 

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Private e-mail is fine. 

Best Regards,
Michael Dransfield 
Wall Twp., NJ USA
mdransfi at lehman.com 


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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 09:46:25 -0400
From: Jeff Renner <nerenner at umich.edu>
Subject: Re: Soybeans

"Eric R. Theiner" <logic at skantech.com> wrote:

> there is just no
>good soy source in my area.  Does anyone have ideas on where I can get
>my hand on soy, flaked or otherwise?

But Rick, you didn't tell us where "my area" is.  You've violated Renner's
Law #1!  I don't know where skantech is.  Kansas?

I would check a health food store for soy flakes or soy grits.  I've seen
both full oil and low oil grits (I don't know where you get a tiny little
dip stick to check if the oil is low).  Low oil would no doubt be better.

One problem I see in brewing for your celiac cousin is that you'll still
need a starch and enzyme source to replace the barley.  Perhaps you could
malt some corn.

Jeff

 -=-=-=-=-
Jeff Renner in Ann Arbor, Michigan USA, c/o nerenner at umich.edu
"One never knows, do one?"  Fats Waller, American Musician, 1904-1943. 




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Date: Tue, 07 Sep 99 08:51:41 PDT
From: "George De Piro" <gdepiro at fcc.net>
Subject: measuring volumes in glass carboys

Hi all,

Here's a method for measuring the volume in a glass
carboy without using any marks at all:

Calibrate a carboy by pouring in one gallon of water,
meauring the distance from the floor to the water line,
and writing down the measurement.  Repeat until you
have measurements for several volumes (I did 1-5 gallons
in 1 gallon increments).

Perform a linear regression on the numbers you get, where
x = volume and y = the distance from the floor to the liquid
level at each particular volume.  This will give you the slope
(m) and y intercept (b) of a line.  You then use these numbers
to complete the formula for the line (y = mx + b).

Future volume measurements are done by simply measuring
the distance from the bottom of the carboy to the liquid level
(this gives you y in the equation) and solving for x (the volume
of liquid):

x = (y - b)/m

For me it is easier to write the formula for the line in my record book
than to maintain marks on a carboy.  The linearity is good as long
as you only measure volumes between the top and bottom shoulders
of the vessel, and it works for all carboys of simislar size (so you only
have to calibrate one).

Have fun!

George de Piro

C.H. Evans Brewing Co. at the
Albany (NY) Pump Station
(518) 447-9000

Malted Barley Appreciation Society
"Brooklyn's Best Homebrew Club"
http://hbd.org/mbas


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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 08:44:00 -0400
From: Eric.Fouch at steelcase.com
Subject: Pumpkin Beers/Stationary(ery)

Dan says:
>Carl is a retired stationary engineer who had worked at
>various breweries.

If he was a stationary engineer, how did he move around so much?  Or was he a
stationERY engineer, like Mr. Bickley, Mork's downstairs neighbor?

>Date: Sun, 05 Sep 1999 21:24:47 -0400
>From: Bob Sheck <bsheck at skantech.net>
>Subject: RE:pumpkin ale recipe
>
>Date: Wed, 01 Sep 1999 21:00:17 -0600
>From: hal <hwarrick at springnet1.com>
>
>Hal- et al:
>
>has anyone tried mashing the cooked pumpkin in with the
>main mash? I would think you could get some extra starch
>conversion going this-a-ways.

Bob-
Despite some of the recipes and experiences posted here recently, pumpkin MUST
be mashed.  Unbeleivable that I still see recipes published (in books) that
call for adding pumpkin to the boil.  This practice will add starch to the
fermenter.

I usually do one or two pumpkin brews a year.  I usually get a great big
jack-o-lantern, and mash inside it, adding some baked pie pumpkin flesh.  This
weekend, I did a pumpkin lager (Kyle is sooo proud), using 5.4#'s of canned
pumpkin, and 12 pounds of 2-row brewers malt (Pie pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns
aren't in season yet).
Anyway, the only stuck or incredibly slow sparges I have had have been pumpkin
mashes.  It does set up pretty hard.  I sparged 2.5 gallons, and had to reset
the bed to sparge the rest.  I suppose I should do a protien rest, but have
just lived with the slow sparge.


Eric Fouch
Bent Dick YoctoBrewery
Kentwood MI

"I may be paranoid, but they ARE out to get us!"

                                                              -Dave Burley



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Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 11:20:48 -0400
From: Jim Liddil <jliddil at vms.arizona.edu>
Subject: being fair

OK in fairness I guess I should suggest that people look at the discussion
of white labs in the hbd a year ago or so.  Paul Edwards posted some
interesting information about their advertizing claims at the time.  And
again I suggest everyone ask questions about a producers qa/qc procedures.
or better yet call the local FDA agent in each producers city and suggest
they pay them a visit. :-)

Jim Liddil North Haven, CT




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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 12:27:17 -0400
From: Dave Burley <Dave_Burley at compuserve.com>
Subject: Soybeans, Etching a carboy

Brewsters:

Rick Theiner asks for a source of soybeans
in his area.  Try your local Health Food Shop.
Also, ask at your animal feed store for larger
quantities once you find satisfactory results
with the more (very!) expensive health food source.
- --------------------------------
C.D Pritchard suggest etching volumetric
marks on a carboy and then using a marker
to color them in

Likely etching compound will not weaken
a carboy, but don't scratch the carboy to
try to get the same effect as this may
weaken it.

What's wrong with just plain paint?
Fast drying paint in various colors
can be purchased at the hobby shop
or even your 5&dime
( or is it now dollar and 5 dollar?).

Keep on Brewin'


Dave Burley

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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 12:30:54 -0400 (EDT)
From: ALAN KEITH MEEKER <ameeker at welch.jhu.edu>
Subject: Celebration Ale (clone) RECIPE

Greetings. 

I recently posted that I had a clone of Sierra Nevada's Celebration ale. My
mailbox was subsequently FLOODED with requests for this recipe. Seems a lot of
people are fond of Celebration (understandably so). I've written up a detailed
recipe below. I've tried to include as much detail as possible so you'll have
the maximum chance of duplicating this. 

Interestingly, the first few incarnations of this recipe were attempts on my
part to replicate on eof my favorite local beers - Frederick Brewing Co's
"Hopfest" - a delicious hoppy American Brown ale. I never got as close to it
as I wanted but did end up with a very tasty Brown. I was drinking the latest
version of this last year when I also happened to be sampling Celebration and
was struck by  how close the two were - good old serendipity! It is this
version that is outlined below. 

Happy Brewing!

=============================================================================
S.O.B. (Son Of Brown) aka Celebration clone.


Water: 
Our water here in Baltimore County is pretty mild  (50 ppm carbonates, 25 ppm
chloride, 10 ppm sodium, 5 ppm magnesium, 22 ppm calcium, 15 ppm sulfate). 

The night before, I boil 7 gal cold tap water to elliminate chlorine and
drop out some CaCO3. After boiling I added 2 tsp CaCl2. Let cool overnight.

Yeast: 
Wyeast 1056 (Chico, American Ale), 1 gal worth of starter. The spent
starter wort was poured off and the yeast cake resuspended brew day morning in
about two cups of sterile 1.060 wort made from dried malt extract. The yeast
were therefore highly active at the time of pitching.

Materials:

3# Briess 2-row pale
3# Paul's 2-row pale
3# Marris Otter 
1# DWC carapils
1# Briess xtal-40
2/3# flaked wheat
1/4# Paul's chocolate

2 oz Crosby & Baker Crystal pel (2.5% aa)
2 oz J.D.Carlson Centennial pel (10% aa)
Some Cascade whole flower and pellets (I used Hoptech whole and C&B pellets)

1/2 tsp Irish Moss

Lactic acid (for mash/sparge acidification)
Calcium Chloride  (I believe Williams brewing sells this)


Mash-in: 
2 1/2 gal. brew water+1/4 tsp lactic to 80 degC ( 176degF). Add all grains
except chocolate. I mash in a plastic bucket with a plastic false bottom.
Measured temps at mash-in are 62 degC (144 degF) at the top of the bed and 67
degC (153 degF) at the bottom of the bed. Bucket insulated with a blanket, 
mash x 70 min.


Sparge: 
4 1/2 gal. brew water+1 tsp lactic acid at 67 degC (153 degF). Start
sparging. 

Suspend chocolate malt in 1 qt of the sparge water and apply to top
of bed about halfway through the sparge. 

Final pre-boil volume = just over 5 gal  at  1.045, pH = 5.

Hydrate Irish Moss by mixing it in a small glass of water.

Boil:
Begin heating wort. I use a 10 gal ss pot and ring-style propane cooker.
Just before the wort reaches boil (and in the early boil) a thick brownish
"scum" forms on the surface. Skim most of this off during this time and
discard it.

Boil 20 minutes. add 1oz Centennial.

Boil 20 min, add 1/2 oz Centennial, 1/2 oz Crystal. 

Boil 20 minutes, add hydrated irish moss. 

Boil 10 minutes, add 1/2 oz Crystal, 1/2 oz Centennial. 

Boil 10 minutes, add 1/2 oz Crystal, 1/2 oz Cascade whole flower. 

Boil 5 minutes, add 1/2 oz Crystal and turn off heat. Begin chilling with
immersion chiller.

After the wort chills to cold tap water temps let settle one hour.

Pour off to 5 gallon primary glass fermentor, avoid the trub sediments in the
bottom of the pot. (Final volume was about 4 1/2 gallons, I sent 4 gallons 
to the primary. S.G. was about 1.050). 

Pitch yeast.

Primary ferment = 14 degC ( 58 degF) - 17 degC ( 62 degF) X 12 days.
with a blow-off tube attatched for the first few days, airlock for the
remainder of the primary ferment.

After 12 days racked to secondary, add 1/8 oz Crosby & Baker Cascade pellets. 
(S.G. here = 1.015).

Bottled after 5 days in secondary. Final bottling volume is approximately 4
gallons (a bit less), primed with 130 grams dextrose (about 3/4 Cup)
in 2 C pre-boiled water. Boiled then cooled the sugar solution. Stirred
gently into the beer in the botling bucket.  Bottled leaving litle headspace. 
F.G. = 1.011.

Let me know how it comes our if you try it...

 -Alan Meeker
 Baltimore Maryland






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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 12:59:18 EDT
From: Biergiek at aol.com
Subject: Ol' Pumpkinhead

>From: Bob Sheck <bsheck at skantech.net
>Subject: RE:pumpkin ale recipe
>
>has anyone tried mashing the cooked pumpkin in with
>the main mash? I would think you could get some
>extra starch conversion going this-a-ways.


Maybe the award winning vegetable beer brewer Fred
Garvin would like to share his recipe for Ol'
Pumpkinhead which recently took an astonishing 3rd
place at the Michigan State Fair...

Kyle
Bakerfield, CA

P.S. - Anyone know what the Spartan soldiers did
before battle to build camaraderie within their
ranks? Private email is fine.


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Date: 07 Sep 1999 12:23:06 -0400
From: RCAYOT at solutia.com
Subject: HSA Again!, Ashburn Malt

     Jack Schmidling wrote:
     "The only possible reason to believe that it's damning is because a 
     certain expert did some experiments and wrote an article which became 
     gospel."
     
     I think the article Jack is refering to discusses HSA very evenly.  I 
     encourage everyone who is interested, to go back and actually READ the 
     article.  What is said is that HSA can lead to "stalling" which has a 
     fairly distinctive taste, just break out some old homebrew.  What is 
     said is that evidence of stalling, even in beers that have been 
     exposed to HSA, occurs at some time (can't remember) that is 
     particularly LONG on the homebrew timescale!  In other words, the 
     article says that stalling occurs at a time when most homebrew has 
     already been consumed, these experiments that have been posted have 
     done very well in confirming the work done by the author, stalling 
     occurs at a long timescale when talking about homebrew. 
     
     I recieved the following reply from an inquiry to Briess:
     
     "Dear Roger:
     
     Thank you for your e-mail.  Check out our product information sheets 
     at www.briess.com/products.htm.  This will give you some of the 
     general analytical information and suggested uses for all of our 
     products.  
     
     The malt you are talking about started out simply as "Ashburne Malt."  
     We then changed it to "Ashburne Mild Malt," to help people get a 
     better idea as to what kind of malt it is.  However, you never know 
     what the retailers are labeling it once it is out of our control.  
     Yes, they may have called it "ESB" or "Light Munich."  Originally, 
     this malt was specially kilned for a Gold Medal recipe for a brewery 
     in Ashburn, VA.  It is made from low protein 2-Row barley and is fully 
     modified for most of our customers using a single temperature mash 
     rest.
     
     Malt is funny.  No matter what you call it, it all comes down to 
     flavor and color.  Ashburne Mild is suitable as an ESB malt, Dark 
     Vienna, Mild, or Light Munich malt for any recipe that calls for 
     something exotic.  For instance, our Pale Ale malt is the same thing 
     as our Vienna Malt, except that it is made from 2-Row Barley.  We 
     could have easily called it Vienna.  It gets confusing in the U.S. 
     because brewers are making both ales and lagers.  A Vienna malt at 3.5 
     Lovibond from a malting company in Germany might taste very much like 
     a Pale Ale malt at 3.5 L from England; it depends on malthouse flavor 
     too.
     
     Hope I didn't confuse you further, but the short answer is that, yes, 
     Ashburne Mild makes an excellent ESB malt at 5.5 Lovibond.  It is 
     slightly toasty, malty, and gives a great full bodied flavor.
     
     Sincerely,
     
     Jim Basler
     Briess Malting Company
     jbasler at briess.com
     www.briess.com
     
     I can't wait to brew with this malt, gotta get myu yeast going.....
     
     
     Roger



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Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 11:42:47 -0600
From: Paul Gatza <paulg at aob.org>
Subject: Legal Brewing

Alan asked about illegal states for homebrewing. At present, the states
of Alabama, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Utah are the
states where home production is not permitted. At the request of Alabama
AHA members, I am hoping to budget a trip to Alabama to attend the
Legislators/Lobbyists dinner in March. Iowa also has potential to turn
next year. Idaho became legal on July 1. The states where homebrewing
status is unclear are Louisiana, Maine, Nevada, New Mexico, New York,
Ohio, and West Virginia. Indiana homebrewers got a much better law
passed there this year. I spoke with a brewer-representative from Ohio
who is looking toward legislation, and a member passed along another
representatives interpretation that homebrewing is allowed in Ohio.
Maine is off my radar screen at the request of a homebrew club official
who says Maine homebrewers and officials have a leave-well-enough-alone
attitude.

The AHA has done a lot of good work in identifying the laws that pertain
in each state. In some states, such as Idaho, we have been successful at
supporting the members in each state who seek legal homebrewing
protection. In some states, such as Indiana, we have dropped the ball,
and the efforts have moved forward without our help. Although
legalization may be considered a past issue in the legal states, it is
not from a shipping standpoint. We have been given the word by a major
shipping company that they would be willing to revisit the issue of
allowing homebrew shipping if homebrewing were legal in all 50 states.
- -- 
Paul Gatza
Director
American Homebrewers Association	(303) 447-0816 x 122
736 Pearl Street			(303) 447-2825 -- FAX
PO Box 1679				paulg at aob.org -- E-MAIL
Boulder, CO 80306-1679			info at aob.org -- AOB INFO
U.S.A.					http://www.beertown.org -- WEB


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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 14:01:36 EDT
From: JazzNball at aol.com
Subject: Life insurance and homebrew

In response to Bob Fesmire and his life insurance blood test. I recently had 
the same thing happen to me. I was approved by my insurance company, but the 
premium doubled. I was told it was because of the same elevated liver enzymes 
(SGPT and SGOT). My agent could not give me much help so I had my doctor do 
another blood test. When he reviewed the results from the insurance company 
he told me that the elevated liver enzymes were usually caused by excessive 
drinking or hepatitis. I told him I only drank 1-2 beers a day. Well, I just 
got back the blood test from my doctor and the liver enzyme levels are now 
normal. The doctor says I was probably exposed to a virus that elevated the 
liver enzymes. Now I need to get a new insurance test so that I can get that 
premium reduced. I would be interested in anyone knowing about any 
correlation in liver enzymes and Homebrew. Anyone else have this happen to 
them? And were you able to get your life insurance premium reduced? 


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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 14:02:46 -0400
From: "Stephen Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: Re: The Brave New Brewery Is Flawed

Phil writes ...

>I enjoy the laborious
>task of doing full mash beers and culturing liquid yeasts because that is
>how I make the best beer I can.

This really sidesteps the question tho'.  *If* you could make "the best beer
I can" w/o the "laborious task" you enjoy, would you ?

>I use as much science as I think necessary
>to achieve my goal.

Same here.  We just have different estimations about how much is needed to
achieve our goals.  Very good beer can be made with little knowledge, but to
go beyond that point increasing amounts of knowledge must be obtained.
Experience is a perfectly reasonable way to gain knowledge, but ...

I recently was at the center of the Rennerian universe and had a chance to
watch Jeff preparing French bread dough.  I also bake breads regularly, and
know a good bit about it, but I certainly picked up more in that hour of
observation than I could reliable learn in a couple months of experience and
experimentation.  Experience alone is the basis for a very long and
expensive
education.  Finding a source of reliable knowledge, whether in books or
anothers' experience is a shortcut.

Science appears to many as a collection of small and nearly irrelevant
facts. But the collection of enough small facts produce deductions and
occasionally convincing conclusions about much larger issues.  I understand
Pivo's complaint that this is 'virtual brewing', but I completely disagree
with his thought that this is irrelevant or antithetical to real brewing.
The folks who developed the traditional decoction process gained knowledge
via experience. Deductions about their many smaller results came together
into a mash process that incorporates a functional knowledge of lactobacilli
and the kinetics of several enzymes without knowing explicitly about these.
To get to this point some virtual brewers of a few centuries past had to
state many  "what if ...." questions based on what they knew or thought at
the time.

Western 'science', since the ancient Greeks has been obsessed with dividing
the world into smaller bits and trying to gain a functional understanding of
the bits.  One mistake is to ignore that 'science' doesn't and never can do
more than explain what we see in terms of these crude functional models of
the bits. It never presents 'truth', just a detailed approximation of truth.
The other misunderstanding is that 'science' is only about these ever
smaller and finer distinctions.  It is also about creating estimates of how
the larger more human relevant things work based on a knowledge of the
microscopic.

>Steve's following comment puzzles me:
>
>>The 'art' is
>>in choosing the goal beer flavor and aroma, and not, to me, in the method
of
>>achieving it.<
>
>My assessment of Steve's interest in brewing based on what I have read in
>here is that he is extremely interested in the "method of achieving it" to
a
>point far beyond what interests me.

Your puzzlement puzzles me.  Perhaps it's beyond your level of interest, but
still it is just to control the product.  I am only interested to the extent
that it impacts the resulting beer.  I'm just willing to go a bit farther
than most in seeking out that understanding and control.  I personally taste
something like oxidation in a fair number of HB beers and so am concerned
about the causes and cures.  I like malty flavors so  bother to look for the
compounds that may cause them, and their structures and possible origins. I
can enjoy more or less well attenuated beers to style and can sense the
difference.  So understanding the kinetics and control of the enzyme
hydrolysis is relevant to me.  I know the impressive impact a few tenths of
pH can have on a mash - so take interest in the phytin/calcium topic ...

>Once the science has no practical
>application, for me it becomes superfluous.

Right.  And if you can tell us how to determine in advance what information
is superfluous to future practical deductions you can count on a Nobel
prize.

A microbrewer friend mentioned that he would like to perform a protein rest
but had only single infusion hardware.  I suggested mashing in most of the
water making for a thick slightly lower temp mash.  This worked for him.
The suggestion is based on an understanding of enzyme stability and
activity - you won't find it in a cookbook.   Unfortunately understanding HB
brewing draws on a little information from widely varied subject matter.
The more you know about any of these from metallurgy to p-chem to
microbiology to fluid flow, the better your ability to draw practical
deductions.

>Yet here is Steve telling us he would be happy making SE beers
I stand by that.  If I could toss the process and make equal beers I'd drop
all-grain as quickly as I dropped home malting and kilning.

On Q2 Phil continues ....
> I believe the concept is flawed. The modern beers of today as produced by
>the major breweries are drifting further and further from what we as
>homebrewers know is real flavour.

Your reading of the question is flawed.  I specifically referred to PU and
Duval and other small traditional breweries and not "major breweries ".

>We are a minority of specialists who are enlightened to
>quality in beer.

If "quality in beer" is truly the concern among the illuminati then based on
the premise of my question you should have no objection to seeing PU and
Duval  fail, since a truly identical quality clone beers would exist.  I
suggest that many HBers have feelings for these traditional breweries which
extend beyond the product quality.

>I am not sure that Steve knows himself as well as he might think. If he
were
>to grow a tail I might just give him a good swing, out into space to join
>Eric Panther!

I do  know Eric and his more serious work - and for longer than you might
think. He has some impressive achievements to his (real) name.  I'd love
to join him - and you too Phil - perhaps for a beer sometime in Oz.  Tails
optional.

 -S





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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 13:07:16 -0500
From: msnyder at wm.com
Subject: handling carboys



Greetings to the Collective!

I believe I've posted this comment in the past, but after reading Marty Browns
unfortunate tale (HBD #3123) I thought I'd post again.  If you review past
Digests, you'll note that about every 6 months or so another individual is
seriously injured while handling a carboy.  Carboy handles, plastic milk
cartons, etc. have been suggested and work well, however I recommend one other
precaution.

Purchase a pair of common yellow leather work gloves and use them when handling
your carboys.  They WILL provide protection (for your hands) in the unlikely
event the carboy slips.  More important is the fact that the leather will still
"stick" to the glass if it becomes wet from spilled water or wort during
handling, and reduce the possibility of you losing your grip on the carboy.
Just don't gain a false sense of security and become careless when handling the
carboy - these things do grip!!!

Just a suggestion for the masses.  We don't need any more injured brewers out
there.

Mark Snyder
Atlanta, Georgia




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Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 16:04:21 -0400
From: Spencer W Thomas <spencer at engin.umich.edu>
Subject: Re: BT and Suporting those that Su 

>>>>> "John" == John E Schnupp <John_E_Schnupp at amat.com> writes:

    John> It is my opinion that the majority of the $$$ necessary to
    John> publish a magazine comes from the advertisers, not the
    John> subscribers.

I subscribe to an excellent cooking magazine, Cooks Illustrated
(http://www.cooksillustrated.com).  They carry NO advertising.  None.
Not a single word.

Subscription price?  About $30/yr for 6 issues.  Is it worth it?
Yes.  Do I miss the advertising?  What do you think?  :-)

Advertising is a double-edged sword.  Yes, it helps pay for the
production cost.  But it also means that you have to add more pages to
the magazine (many in color), increasing your production cost.

=Spencer Thomas in Ann Arbor, MI        (spencer at umich.edu)


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Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 17:13:56 -0400
From: "Donald D. Lake" <dake at gdi.net>
Subject: Brave New Brewrey II: Judgement Day

FERMINATOR II:  BEER JUDGEMENT DAY

LOS ANGELES, July 11, 2029

(disolve to a heap of fire-blackened human bones & corny kegs.  Beyond
the mound is a vast tundra of skulls and shattered brown bottles.  ..
where intense heat has half-melted two orange Gott coolers, the blast
has warped a converted keg.  Small skulls look accusingly from the
ash-drifts.)

VOICE
3 billion human lives ended on December 31, 1999.  The surviving brewers
of the nuclear fire called the war, Certifed Beer Judgment Day.  They
lived only to face a new nightmare, the war against the cyborg RIMMS
Machines...

Skynet, the computer which controlled the machines, sent two ferminators
back through time.  Their
mission: to destroy the leader of the human Resistance... Pat Babcock.
My son.

The first ferminator was programmed to strike at me, in the year 1984...
before Pat was born.
It failed. The second was set to strike at Pat himself, when he was
still a child.  As before, the
Resistance was able to send a lone warrior.  A protector for Pat.  It
was just a question of
which one of them would reach him first...

Sarah Connor



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Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 07:57:15 -0400
From: Randy Shreve <rashreve at interpath.com>
Subject: Yeast Starter for a Mead???

Sorry this is off the beer path...I know some of you folks make mead
too.....

My first mead will be taking off soon.  But first, a question.  How do
you make a mead yeast starter?  The Wyeast (sweet mead) pack says
something about using diluted fruit juice.  Shouldn't I use a honey
solution to step up the yeast?

Thanks!!

Randy in Salisbury, North Carolina




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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 20:51:29 -0400
From: Dan Listermann <72723.1707 at compuserve.com>
Subject: US News & World Report

Check out the 9/13/99 issue of USN&WR under health.  There is a portion 
of
an artical which interviews Dave Radzanowski, President of the Sieble
Institute who explains the shelf life of beer and the fact that light
exposure causes "skunky" flavors, not age as Bud would have you believe.

Dan Listermann  dan at listermann.com    72723.1707 at compuserve.com

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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 21:37:14 EDT
From: Biggarmz at aol.com
Subject: Response to HBD and Sophistry 9/7/99

In Response to Rod Prather's article HBD and Sophistry...I have tasted Lychee 
in beer.  Ten Years ago Brador from Canada was bottled in glass and not in 
cans.  It had a very pleasant taste about it.  I made many trips across the 
border to purchase it by the case.  One night I was dining at a chinese 
restaurant.  I bit into what I belived was a cooked onion.  Much to my 
surprise it was like a bottle of Brador exploding in my mouth.  I asked the 
waiter what it was and he replied Lychee.  Unfortuneately Brador no longer 
tastes the same.  I have not been able to find it bottled any longer and the 
Lychee flavor is no longer present.  


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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 21:51:15 EDT
From: AlannnnT at aol.com
Subject: millenium flame wars



Millenium, whether it comes this Jan 1st or next, will still be spelled 
millennium.

AT


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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 21:53:40 -0500
From: "Sean Richens" <srichens at sprint.ca>
Subject: durability of refrigerators or freezers with override thermostats

Something I've been wondering about...

I asked a refrigerator technician about using an override thermostat with a
chest freezer.  He was concerned that the evaporator pressure would be
running higher from the increased temperature, and that with the condenser
and everything also running at higher pressure, the compressor life would
be shortened.

Has anyone any thoughts or experience with running 50-60 F above the design
temperature?  How many years?  My expert suggested that a (licensed - gotta
protect the ozone) tech could withdraw some refrigerant from the loop and
optimize it for the desired temperature.

SR


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Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 13:12:06 +1000
From: Miguel de Salas <mm_de at postoffice.utas.edu.au>
Subject: Tasmanian Pepperberries

Here in Tasmania we have a bush called the Tasmanian Native Pepper (Drymis
lanceolata, for the initiated :)).

The berries of this bush have a very distinctive aroma, are sweet, but at
the same time, when the sweetness recedes, are spicy hot. The leaves are
also aromatic and hot, but the aroma is not so sweet (apart from the fact
that they contain little sugar). 

These berries have been used for cooking, and I've also seen a bush liqueur
flavoured with them (like gin is flavoured with juniper berries), and even
ice cream (I haven't tried this, but they say it's very good).

I would like to use them in a special brew, which ideally would be quite
light in flavour and color both to show the flavour of the berries at its
best, and their distinctive purplish-red colour.

I was planing to use the following recipe (19l - 5 american gallons) as a
base:

3 kg Franklin malt (very light, pilsner style malt from Tassie)
250 g wheat malt
250 g very light (20 L?) crystal
17 IBUs of Tettnanger hops (no finishing or aroma hops)
Wyeast 1056 Chico ale

Mashing at a high temperature (~ 68 deg. C?) for some residual sweetness.

Considering my system I expect an OG of 1.043 if all goes well.

Also, we have water here in Hobart that is a fair bit softer than Pilsen
water. I won't add any minerals, because I do want bitterness to be subdued.

The main question is: how much pepperberry should I add?

They don't have that strong a flavour, and I am planning to pasteurise them
and add them to the secondary. I am going for 100 grams, because I want the
brew to be quite distinctive.
I know it's hard without knowing what pepperberries are like, but has
anyone got any comments? 

Thanks!


Miguel de Salas

School of Plant Science,
University of Tasmania,
PO Box 252-55, Sandy Bay, Hobart
Tasmania, Australia, 7001.

Dept home-page:
http://www.utas.edu.au/docs/plant_science/

My Homepage:
http://www.southcom.com.au/~miguel/


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Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 20:34:39 -0700 (PDT)
From: Tim Anderson <timator at yahoo.com>
Subject: Millenium

You're all missing the point.  The thing to do is pretend that you
haven't been told 847 bazillion times that The New Millenium (TM)
starts in 2001, and just go ahead and party like it's 1999.  Drink
(prematurely) that 1990 Dom and that amazing barley wine you made a
year ago!  But save some, because next year you can smack your forehead
in faux surprise and do it all over again!  Wheeeee!  The year after
that we can all go back to celebrating for no particular reason.

tim
Official Homebrewer of The New Millenium (TM)


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Bid and sell for free at http://auctions.yahoo.com


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---