---

	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:
  Clean Glasses ("Jimmy Hughes")
  Re: Grain Mill Rollers for a homebuilt mill (DrPerp)
  Re: Grain Mill Rollers for a homebuilt mill ("Peter J. Calinski")
  Re: Oatmeal Stout (Jeff Renner)
  Attenuation, mill design (Dave Burley)
  Phil's Philler ("Paddock Wood Brewing Supplies")
  first field hopping (Bob Devine)
  FWH, what's the rationale for using late hop additions? ("Michael J. Westcott")
  Re: FWH (Jeff Renner)
  bouncing carboys/Fermenting in cornys (Aaron Perry)
  First wort hopping...or the emperor's new clothes? ("Dr. Pivo")
  RE: cell counts/article (Chris White)
  RE: RE: cell counts/article ("Pat Babcock")
  St. Louis Pubs (William Frazier)
  More Thermal Musings from The Southern Highlands (Wes Smith)
  Mash Out (Crossno)
  Moravian undermodified malt (Warandle1)
  A sad day.. ("Jason Birzer")
  re: Iron and Aluminum pots ("Stephen Alexander")
  RIMS,HSA, trans-2-nonenal, dogma = am god spelled backward. ("Stephen Alexander")


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

* Entries for the 18th Annual HOPS competition are due 3/24-4/2/00 
* See http://www.netaxs.com/~shady/hops/ for more information

* 18th Annual Oregon Homebrew Festival - entry deadline May 15th
* More info at:  http://www.hotv.org/fest2000

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----------------------------------------------------------------------


Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 08:08:51 -0500
From: "Jimmy Hughes" <inspector at bmd.clis.com>
Subject: Clean Glasses

I am having a problem getting my beer glasses clean, i.e. removing the soap
film.

Any tips would be appreciated.



Happy trails to you, 'til we meet again..............
Check out the free items, go to,
http://www.ncinspections.com
scroll down, click on the free after rebate link........
Save money, enjoy........




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Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 09:13:27 EST
From: DrPerp at aol.com
Subject: Re: Grain Mill Rollers for a homebuilt mill

From: "Scott W. Nowicki" <nowicki at voicenet.com>
Subject: Grain Mill Rollers for a homebuilt mill

Does anyone know where I might be able to purchase (or scrap & re-engineer)
rollers for a homebuilt grain mill?  

Does anyone know of any good designs for a homebuilt mill on the web (or
elsewhere)?  I've never been able to find one.

Thanks in advance for any help!  If I do pull this off, I'll certainly post
a "homebuilt grain mill" web page for others.

Scott Nowicki
Holland, Pennsylvania
nowicki at voicenet.com

I found plans and built my own mill in the book, Brew Ware  by Karl Lutzen 
and Mark Stevens from Storey Publishing. ( http:// www.Storey.com)
I had a local machinist turn and knurl the rollers.  I made mine from 1/4" 
aluminum plate that I already had instead of the wood used in the book's 
project.  The book also has several other home brewing projects.
Hope this helps.
Dr. Mike Perpall


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Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 01:12:03 -0500
From: "Peter J. Calinski" <PCalinski at iname.com>
Subject: Re: Grain Mill Rollers for a homebuilt mill

On Fri, 31 Mar 2000 Scott W. Nowicki asked:


>Does anyone know where I might be able to purchase (or scrap &
re-engineer)
>rollers for a homebuilt grain mill?  

I just built one using iron pipe for rollers.  I used 1-1/4 ID. pipe.  The
method I used to transfer the rotation from a shaft to the rollers was the
main problem and the solution was non-trivial.  It is too detailed to get
into here but if there is enough interest, I could type something up. 

<snip>


>Does anyone know of any good designs for a homebuilt mill on the web (or
>elsewhere)?  I've never been able to find one.

I am planning to put mine on my webpage but I just haven't found the time. 

Pete Calinski
East Amherst NY
Near Buffalo NY


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Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 10:21:25 -0500
From: Jeff Renner <nerenner at umich.edu>
Subject: Re: Oatmeal Stout

"Penn, John" <John.Penn at jhuapl.edu> asks

>I was wondering if I can
>use regular oatmeal in a partial mash?  Should I use the quick 1 min oats,
>or the old fashioned longer-to-cook oats?  I see flaked oats at the homebrew
>store but didn't know if I need to go to all that trouble.  I was hoping I
>could just throw them in the mash without having to do the extra steps of
>the cereal mash that I've seen recommended.

Flaked grains (oats, maize, wheat, barley, rice, rye) have been gelatinized
by steaming and then drying between heated rollers.  They can be used
directly in the mash tun.  I'd suggest quick oats rather than old-fashioned
just because they are thinner and probabaly more quickly converted.  A
cereal mash in completely superfluous.

>Any good recipes for an oatmeal
>stout?  I was kind of thinking of something like...
>  1# of oatmeal
>  2# english pale malt
>  1/2# roasted barley
>  LME as needed to bring gravity to about 1.055-7.
>  Hops to about 40 IBUs or so

That should work, but I think I might use a little chocolate in place of
some of the roast barley; I like oatmeal stout to be a little softer.  I
might also reduce the bittering a bit, but at that relatively high gravity,
it might be fine.

For something different, try malted oats.  They are available from North
Country Malts in upstate NY and your supplier should be able to get them
for you.  Search the archives for their address and for my successful clone
(1999) of the Scottish Maclay's Oatmeal Stout (70% pale ale, 22% malted
oats, 6% roast barley, 2% choc. malt, Fuggles to 35 IBU, 1.045).  You could
convert the recipe to a partial mash.

Maclay's is one of only two oatmalt stouts that I know of.  Arcadia of
Battle creek, Michigan also makes one, but they use flaked malted oats, and
less, as I recall.  I've checked with the British supplier of the flakes
who confirmed that the flaking process (see above) probably destroys the
enzymes.  This may make no real difference since there is a surplus of
enzymes in the mash.  I was even left in some doubt that the flakes were
really malted, but this may have been just communication problems.

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. 




Return to table of contents


Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 11:34:48 -0500
From: Dave Burley <Dave_Burley at compuserve.com>
Subject: Attenuation, mill design

Brewsters:

Doug Moyer proposes a thought experiment in attenuation and then asks
"whaddayathink"?

Doug, I have to agree I have had the same consternation about published
attenuation of various yeasts. Apparently this myth that different strains
of yeast have different abilities to attenuate was around for centuries in
the brewing industry and is difficult to kill.

DeClerk says in his book that agitation of the fermentation will cause ALL
yeast to attentuate to the same degree which is determined by the mash
routine.  Now that makes some sense to both of us. He also says that this
has been proven many times over and people still will not accept it. That
doesn't make a lot of sense, but there must be a reason why Wyeast
publishes these lists, despite the fact that I rarely agree even closely
with their results. Others experience different FGs with different strains
with the same OG and even the same wort. There must be a reason.

You touched on at least part of the answer. Flocculation. Another is
different Metabolism. A third not often discussed and I don't have much
information is Carbon Dioxide sensitivity.

With flocculation, dropping to the secondary immediately after the head
falls, which I always do, ensures the yeast are in contact with the wort,
despite any flocculation and I get excellent attenuation. Thus, the yeast
are often said to be deflocculated by this procedure. But see below. 
Others have rightly been sceptical that deflocculation plays any role,
since yeast are pretty tightly bound up. Proposal often made here is that
simply bringing flocculated yeast into contact with the wort is sufficient
to get fermentation. To some extent this is probably true.

Agitation of the fermentation in the old days was carried out by the CO2
produced by a powdery
 ( non-flocculating)  yeast in the case of British top fermenting yeast.
Often British yeast consisted of a mixture of two or even five stains, some
of which were powdery. The powdery yeast kept all of the
 ( even the flocculated) yeast in contact with the wort until it was
finished. This practice calls into question the procedure of selecting a
single colony of yeast, especially for British beers. Highly flocculent
yeast would be expecteed to produce sweeter ( from unfermented sugars) 
beers, which is the case for midland and northern British beers, whose
fermentations have often been "roused" or dropped historically.

As to why bottles carbonate when the yeast is supposedly flocculated,
yeasts deflocculate at certain SGs of sugar. Bottles are also small and
diffusion can also play some role as can agitation by generated CO2, even
with flocculated yeast.

Certain strains of yeasts can consume certain tri-saccharides and some
can't. The oft quoted but still denied by some, secondary fermentation is a
slower fermentation that really takes place throughout the fermentation and
continues after the rapid fermentation is finished. It can provide
additional reduction in SG as well as a cleaning up of by-products of the
primary fermentation.  You can follow this secondary fermentation by using
Clinitest, whereas the hydrometer is not sensitive enough to record it to
any great extent over a day or so. Failure to pay attention to this drop of
two or three points over a week or so can result in over carbonated
bottles.

Finally, carbon dioxide content.  Here the depth of the fermenter and
whether or not the wort is agitated during fermentation to release carbon
dioxide will have an effect on the yeast performance. This may vary from
strain to strain. This is perhaps a better explanation to why dropping
works than "deflocculation" which seems unlilkely in this low shear
environment. This occurs because carbon dioxide is not at equilibrium with
the atmosphere, as stirring or opening a bottle of beer shows. Often
inexperienced brewers comment that when they rack , "the fermentation
stops" because the bubbling of the airlock often stops. This is not true,
the fermentation continues, but does indicate that the CO2 is removed to
near equilibrium and must re-establish a certain concentration ( above
equilibrium) before it begins to bubble off again.  

Stirring has often been stated to cause beers of lower quality to be
produced. These may not be lower quality but certainly can be different
from the non-agitated batch in that they likely have less fermentable sugar
left over after the yeast have fallen out. These batches also are reputed
to have fewer esters and such.

Under the <unspecified> Wyeast conditions of fermentation somone at some
time got these results. We don't know how repeatable these numbers are nor
even how they got them. Were they forced?, measured by a hydrometer?, how
long after the primary fermentation were these numbers taken?, were they
dropped?, etc. etc. 

Should we ignore them as an exact predictor of attenuation?  Yes. Are they
at all useful? In a way as an indicator that certain yeasts are likely to
leave certain fermentable sugars and others aren't under some unspecified
circumstances.

Until Wyeast publishes their conditions of fermentation we won't know much
more.
- ---------------------------------------------
Scott Nowicki and others thinking about building his own mill: rollers
should be knurled or else the small rollers don't work very well. I tried
once to use a noodle maker with smooth rollers and it didn't work well at
all.  Don't be surprised of you finally decide to go with an established
brand. I suggest you design or buy a mill with an adjustable nip so you can
double mill coarsely and then finer to emulate a four roll mill. Faster
milling, better mash efficiency and better lauter.
- --------------------------------------------- 

Keep on Brewin'


Dave Burley


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Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 11:33:47 -0600
From: "Paddock Wood Brewing Supplies" <orders at paddockwood.com>
Subject: Phil's Philler

Dan Listermann <72723.1707 at compuserve.com> graciously corrects my mistake
about his fine Phil's Phillers.
Thanks Dan! I assumed it was stainless. We have fixed our catalog, and will
contact any customers whom we may have misinformed. I'm no less impressed
with the filler, even if it doesn't truly fulfill my stainless steel
fetish...

Stephen Ross -- "Vitae sine cerevesiae sugat."
______________________________________________
Paddock Wood Brewing Supplies, Saskatoon, SK
orders at paddockwood.com  www.paddockwood.com



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Date: Sat, 01 Apr 2000 10:36:33 -0700
From: Bob Devine <bob.devine at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: first field hopping

I have followed the topics of "first wort hopping" and then later
that of "mash hopping".  After considering thought, I have improved
on the use of hopping -- field hopping.

Here in Utah, where homebrewing is still illegal, one takes on
careful and stealthful habits.  Last year I planted some barley
amidst the hop plants as a way to shield them from prying eyes.

Surprisingly, there appears to be a strange cross-breeding as
some of the characteristics of the hop and barley intermingled.
The resulting barley plants started to climb a nearby fence
by winding around the supports!

After the fall harvest of these strange plants, I made ten gallons
of my standard pale ale recipe without changing the hop schedule.

Now you might not believe this, but the beer was noticeably
changed -- the hop bite was still there from the bittering hops
addition, but, the overall bitterness was rounder and more
integrated into the malt profile.

I suggest that everyone try this experiment.  Oh by the way, be
sure to first live in an area that was down-wind from the infamous
nuclear test area where numerous A-bombs were tested in the '40s and
'50s.


Bob "read the date" Devine
Homebrewing for over a decade, BJCP National judge


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Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 11:59:05 -0700
From: "Michael J. Westcott" <mikew at sedona.net>
Subject: FWH, what's the rationale for using late hop additions?

Based on the fact that the hop oils from FWH will be present
in the wort through the entire boil, wouldn't FWH be more
appropriate as a replacement for early hop additions? You
would keep late additions for the reason they are there anyway, finishing
and aroma?  What's the history behind FWH and the choice to use late
additions to perform it? I'm basically wondering why one would utilize hop
additions that will be present through the entire boil to replace late-boil
additions.
Is my understanding of FWH correct?

thanks, Mike



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Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 19:15:08 -0500
From: Jeff Renner <nerenner at umich.edu>
Subject: Re: FWH

Brewers

I recently gave a URL for Dave Draper's summary of First Wort Hopping, but
it is out of date.  I got this note from Dave, an old HBD stalward:

At 3:10 PM -0600 4/1/00, Dave Draper wrote:
>The URL ...  is out of date: You can find the FWH
>summary at my beer page, accessible by going to
>http://hbd.org/ddraper and following the link to the Beer page.

That site is more complete.

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: Sun, 02 Apr 2000 00:42:00 -0400
From: Aaron Perry <vspbcb at earthlink.net>
Subject: bouncing carboys/Fermenting in cornys

well, it finally happened to me.  

I had just finished transferring my ginger mead to the secondary, a glass 5
gal. carboy. The airlock was attached, mead resting peacefully.  I left it
where it had been placed for the transfer, a 5 gal glass primary looming a
yard above. I went to fetch a sample glass to test some of the mead left in
the primary. Sample glass in hand I grabbed the primary by the DRY neck with
my DRY hand. It slipped, bounced off the top ledge of the secondary, covering
me and my laundry room carpet with mead and glass. 

Now, a couple hours later, I'm down one utility type carpet. I had to rip it
out immediately in hopes of not soaking my neighbors downstairs with mead. If
only I had taken heed to the recent warnings on the HBD about glass carboys >:-(

Any way, I still have to brew, just not in glass....dont even want to mess
with it any more. So can anyone set me up with some ideas about modifying soda
kegs for use as fermentors. I'm thinking about airlock designs, possible
leakage from lids(probabbly not a problem with the airlock a "path of least
resistance"). Any info and experience would be most appreciated. Now I've got
to get to bed.



Not crying over spilled mead........
Aaron Perry
vspbcb at earthlink.net

personal responses are cool with me


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Date: Sun, 02 Apr 2000 13:18:58 +0200
From: "Dr. Pivo" <dp at pivo.w.se>
Subject: First wort hopping...or the emperor's new clothes?

Jeff Renner very kindly responded to my off line request to view the
"original" FWH results, and he pointed me to a very nice summary printed
on Dave Draper's pages.(http://hbd.org/ddraper/beer/1stwort.html)

I was curious to see how these conclusions were drawn, since the effects
suggested are in such contrast to my experience with the stuff.

I do believe people are reading conclusions into the material that
aren't there.

What they have found is better hop utilization when boiled longer (big
surprise there!), and that people did not like late additions as well as
early (personal taste thing).

What is not looked at at all, is if there is a difference between FWH
and early kettle additions after boil (is there any thing "magic" about
the proposed high pH greater isomerization theory, or is it just
exposure time).

What also is not looked at, is if any of the aromatic qualities that
individually identify the hop are retained.

Dave's list of contributed home brewer's reports, while both ambitious
and generous, are pretty close to useless as they can be, as they aren't
compared to "anything".  One theme that does seem to shoot through them,
though, is that  "hop aroma is gone" which would point in the direction
I am suggesting.

Having brewed about 120 first wort hopped batches (as "clearing hops"),
I can tell you what my impressions are.

FWH is alpha acid and not much else. You can use high alpha hops (and I
in fact most often  do) because no appreciable amount  of the hop
character comes through.

What I suppose should be done is to split a wort after sparge, steep
some hops in one at 75C for about an hour and then boil both, adding an
equivalent amount to the other batch after boil is reached.  Boil times
should be long, since utilization is sort of a falling exponential
thing, and one doesn't want "pure exposure time" to be a factor.

Run those puppies through a triangle test, and you'll at least have
answered the first question: "Is there anything special happening
flavour-wise with first wort hopping, or do people simply not like the
pungent aromatics?"

Having got that far, the next question is "Are any of the individual hop
characteristics retained?" (or does one indeed need "noble" hops here).

There you simply have to FWH two batches with equivalent alphas of two
distinctly different hops, and triangle them again.... If you are using
some late additions in that one, I would suggest they would far
overpower anything from FWH, and you'll get a "nil" difference response.

I suppose this will become the pemmican to be tugged over theoretically
as long as people wish to.

Probably time better spent doing the above suggested brews or something
 equivalent.

For me this will require doing some "stove top" boils, something I'm
loathe to do, but I suppose as summer approaches, I'll grab the
inspiration from "somewhere".

Anyone else game?

Dr. Pivo


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Date: Sun, 2 Apr 2000 13:11:22 +0100 
From: Chris White <cwhite at whitelabs.com>
Subject: RE: cell counts/article

I'd like to address a couple of points that have been brought up-

1.  Lynne stated in HBD #3285 that "The cell counts, for both White Labs and
Wyeast, in the table of the Zymurgy special issue were provided to the
author by White Labs."  I'm not sure where that information came from, but
we never intended to be the source for data on Wyeast's products.  I spoke
with the author, Amahl Turczyn (# upon request), on Friday and he adamantly
stated he got the data for Wyeast directly from them.  The data did agree
with what we have seen, which I think we submitted that at the time of the
article.     At the time the article was published, I don't recall there
being cell count information on their package, but I could be wrong about
that.

2.  About the tests done by AFL.  I think independent tests are great, I
would like to see more.  But "Cells were not counted by microscope-- this is
typically done only in the dairy industry" is not correct.  Every brewing
lab counts cells with a microscope (and/or a Coulter counter).  Done on a
regular basis, it is the most accurate method to count cells.  Plate
counting is inaccurate (brewing yeast are much more flocculent than most
industrial yeast), as are other methods such as spectroscopy (which I used
to do).  We do cell counts on a daily basis with a microscope, and typically
the numbers are 1-2 billion per ml, 35 ml per package, averaging 30-50
billion total cells.  We have counted 13 XL packs over the last 2 years, and
the highest we have seen is 0.13 billion per ml (or 130 million per ml), 175
ml, 22.75 billion total cells.  That was the highest, the average for the 13
samples was 18.02 billion total (viability not taken into account in the
totals- average viability has been 78%).  Regular packs have been in the
range of 3-5 billion total.  The most recent XL package was one I picked up
in Idaho 2 weeks ago.  Bear in mind that this data comes from our lab, but
we try to be as unbiased as possible.  We continually look at other liquid
and dry yeast to see how we compare.  Also, that doesn't mean there are not
XL packages out there that are higher in cell count, this is just what we
have seen.  I wouldn't discuss other companies products on this digest
except for the fact that it has been brought up here, with White Labs
involved.  I'm not saying that makes our products better or worse than
others, these are just the cell counts we have obtained.  As I mentioned in
the beginning, I applaud Lynne's effort to get independent testing.  But
there are many qualified brewing chemists and brewing labs out there, that I
think can do these tests accurately.  (Jim Liddil, George Fix, Maribeth
Raines, many of the breweries we (and others) send yeast to, etc.)  Also,
most of the products are on store shelves across the country, so they are
easy to get for testing.  Thanks,

Chris White



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Date: Sun, 2 Apr 2000 17:55:11 -0400
From: "Pat Babcock" <pbabcock at hbd.org>
Subject: RE: RE: cell counts/article

Greetings, Beerlings! Take me to your lager...

Monsieur Chris White <cwhite at whitelabs.com> dit:

<<We have counted 13 XL packs over the last 2 years, and the highest we have
seen is 0.13 billion per ml (or 130 million per ml), 175 ml, 22.75 billion
total cells.  That was the highest, the average for the 13 samples was 18.02
billion total (viability not taken into account in the totals- average
viability has been 78%).  Regular packs have been in the range of 3-5
billion total.>>

Question: When counting the cells of a Wyeast or William's smack pack, are
the packs smacked and "swelled" the recommended amount, or is the pack
simply opened and the cells counted without the bit of growth I'd imagine
occurs when the nutirent wort bubble is popped?!

Just curious...

 -
See ya!

Pat Babcock in SE Michigan         pbabcock at hbd.com
Home Brew Digest Janitor           janitor@hbd.org
HBD Web Site                       http://hbd.org
The Home Brew Page                 http://hbd.org/pbabcock
   "Just a cyber-shadow of his former brewing self..."




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Date: Sun, 2 Apr 2000 21:56:27 +0000
From: William Frazier <billfrazier at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: St. Louis Pubs

While last weeks St. Louis meeting is freshly in mind what pubs are 
recommended in the St. Louis area.  My wife (she who only drinks Schaeffer's
Light) and I will be there in May to pick up some grapevines to improve the
whites I now grow.  TIA.

Bill Frazier
Olathe, Kansas



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Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2000 10:32:01 +1000
From: Wes Smith <wessmith at ozemail.com.au>
Subject: More Thermal Musings from The Southern Highlands

Fellow HBD'ers,

There having been little input from this part of the world for several 
days, I feel duty bound to post in the Baron of Burradoo's absence. He 
mentioned something about Kiwis in a recent post bemoaning the fact that he 
would be "working for the bastards" soon. I had actually prepared some 
enlightening and uplifting information to assist him in handling (?) my 
ovine cobbers should he actually visit the "land of the long white shroud", 
but on reconsideration decided to hold it until a more suitable moment. The 
thought of Jill and her girl friends getting hold of such enlightening 
information could have totally spoilt a good game of pool and soured off a 
rice lager....

But I digress - I have a serious question regarding the "Latent Heat of 
Saccharification" - or is it the "Anomalous Behavior of a Mash"?

Observed over a period of many mashes, I have repeatedly noticed a 
temperature DROP when first applying heat in a step mash situation. As it 
happens I mash in my direct (gas) heated kettle with an infinitely variable 
heat source. Usually I run enough heat to get about a 1c rise in 2 minutes 
with continuous stirring. Say the mash has been sitting at 52c and I want 
to move up to the next rest temp, I turn on the burner and see an almost 
immediate temp drop of about 1c.

This has been observed as I said, on many occasions and verified by a good 
friend who has been using my kit to get himself up to speed on mashing. The 
same phenomenon will occur at each lift of temp but is most prominent at 
the lower rest temperatures. These observation I must add, have always been 
before the sun has passed above the yard arm - there being a golden rule at 
this brewery of no (serious) imbibing prior to that time.

So fellow brewers, what have we actually seen? Fact or fantasy?

Wes Smith
Bloke's Shed Brewery
Southern Highlands.   


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Date: Sun, 02 Apr 2000 21:22:03 -0500
From: Crossno <crossno at tnns.net>
Subject: Mash Out

written by Bob Jones and Micah Millspaw - Zymurgy (either in '91 or
'92):

> Permanent haze is the end product of chill haze. If you get chill haze
>permanent haze will follow in time.

under letting
>By infusing in this manner, stirring of the grains to insure uniform mixing
>of the grain and hot water is not necessary. By not stirring the water into
>the mash, hot oxygen reactions can be reduced.

>I feel that the particulates (husks and grits mostly) provide a place for
>proteins to clump onto during the boil and then settle out more effectively
>in cooling.

Micah thanks for sharing.  Do you still believe the above?  Do you have
any thoughts to add now these many years later?

Thanks,
Glyn Crossno
Estill Springs,  TN
- -- 
There's two theories to arguing with a woman.  Neither one works.


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Date: Sun, 2 Apr 2000 23:12:16 EDT
From: Warandle1 at aol.com
Subject: Moravian undermodified malt

Hi folks,

Spent a little time at the MCAB2 in St. Louis.  Tasted lots of great homebrew 
(including Jeff Renners FWHed CAP).  Also received 10 lbs. of the Moravian 
(?) undermodified malt.  I would like to use few pounds (along with some 
Vienna and specialty grains) in a partial mash for a dark lager.  What 
temperature steps do I need to hit for this grain?  And do I include all the 
(Vienna, etc) grains in the mash?

Thanks
Will Randle 


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Date: Sun, 2 Apr 2000 23:20:51 -0400
From: "Jason Birzer" <longshot at pressroom.com>
Subject: A sad day..

Found out that Brew America in NoVA is going out of business.  Myles, the
owner, has done this for 10 years and is looking to do something different
with his life.  He tried to find a buyer, but was unsuccessful and is now
closing the store.  He had one of the good shops, holding classes and
willing to be helpful to brewers of all levels.  I've been building a mash
tun and I needed a false bottom for it.  Even tho he is going out of
business, he's ordering one for me.  Really a class act and I'm going to
miss him.

The question I have is, who else is there in Northern VA?  BrewMasters is
too inconvienent for me to go to on a regular basis.  Anyone else?

Jason




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Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2000 01:56:57 -0500
From: "Stephen Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: re: Iron and Aluminum pots

Jonathan Peakall writes of aluminum pots ...
>They don't clean really well. If one scrubs it truly clean, the water
>used for washing turns gray and tastes metallic.

Absolutely.  Aluminum forms a very thin glassy surface oxide that should not
be removed by abrasive scrubbing unless you enjoy metallic flavors.

>I personally just went the converted keg route for my boiling vessels.
>And am stoked to have something I can scrub as hard as I like.

You'd better chill.  You can scrub off the passivated SS surface here as
well and introduce iron metallic flavors that aren't much more lovable than
the aluminum ones.  Don't overscrub your stainless either.

I think you will find that protein gunk cones free pretty well with an
immediate overnight cold[not hot] water soak and a sponge alone.  If not
caustic cleaners usually do a wonderful job in the remainder.  Automatic
dishwashing soap is a decent  substitute for the commercial stuff (wear
gloves&glasses).

Green Dow scrubbies are every bit as abrasive as fine sandpaper and scouring
cleanser even worse -  should only be used as a last resort.

BTW - since Marc and Jeff are discussing cereal mashes - scorch can be
removed fairly painlessly from pots with strong acid soaks - but it doesn't
do anything good for a SS surface in the long run.

 -S




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Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2000 02:14:15 -0500
From: "Stephen Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: RIMS,HSA, trans-2-nonenal, dogma = am god spelled backward.

Matt writes ...

>Do RIMS pumps work without introducing oxygen into the mash?
>[...]
>I mean, it may not introduce air, but will it cause the air that's already
>in the wort to be agitated causing HSA anyway?

'course the pumps aren't responsible for the introduction of oxygen, but the
recirc may cause mixing and air inclusion.  Bottom line is that I have
tasted numerous fine HBs made with HERMS and RIMS systems and although a
full scale study of the impact of pumping on aging and oxidation defects is
warranted - it is not likely to be forthcoming.  The differences re
oxidation defects are NOT obvious.

I truly hate to get you embroiled in such an embroglio Matt, but it is long
past time to re-examine HSA  ....

Anti-librarians PAGE-DOWN_NOW (you've been warned) ..

In a wonderful sequence of papers, Charles W.Bamforth wrote in JIB last
year [JIBv105,pp237-242]'Enzymic and Non-Enzymic  Oxidation in the
Brewhouse: A Theoretical Consideration'] and in the following issue some
researchers from Louvraine, Belgium reported [JIB269-274] on isotope
labeling of O2 to appraise the impact of oxidation during storage. Also a
related paper called 'Flavour Impact of Aged Beers'  [JIB v105,301-307] from
Dutch researchers.  Please note that no mega-breweries were injured in the
creation of these papers.  I can't possibly post a detailed synopsis, so a
full appraisal of these papers is reserved for the librarians [email me if
you seriously *need* a copy] .  Some excerpted themes are:

/Staling oxidation damage is more directly related to brewhouse conditions
[creating precursors] than to storage or 'normal' chemical changes that
occur with time and temperature.

/Oxidation due to post fermentation exposure to oxygen (as in bottling) has
an entirely different impact than oxidation during brewing process.
Specifically post fermentation causes oxidation of phenolics, sulphites and
isohumulones - *BUT* is not involved in lipid oxidation [which degradatively
results in trans-2-nonenal]..

/The second paper compares the value of PVPP, ascorbic acid and potassium
metabisulphite[metabite] re post fermentation oxidation. SO2 [from metabite]
strongly prevented polyphenol oxidation, and had no affect on sulphite
oxidation.  PVPP reduced the levels of polyphenols to about 1/2 without
changing the total amount oxidized, but increased the oxidation of sulphites
by ~50%.  Ascorbic acid on metabite treated beers increased the oxidation of
polyphenols [via the Fenton reaction/copper] and increased the sulphite
oxidation 5X !!  Re trans-2-nonenal, this paper concludes that the levels
are 'cooked into the beer' *before* fermentation, and that the yeast are
unable to reduce the "nonenal potential" of beer due to amine linkages.

 /Most interesting to me was Chas Bamforth's paper.   Among other things he
argues that oxygen in the mash is the determining factor - even more
important than enzymes levels and mash temps in determining oxidation.
Basically mash would absorb lots more oxygen by various processes if it was
available.  The oxidation during the mash is limited by the low O2 access.

Some of you may recall that I questioned the oracles of Seibel last year
about HSA on a small HB scale and they said it was ignorable,  In contrast
C.Bamforth notes that most studies relating oxygen uptake w/ flavor
destabilization have been conducted on a small [HB size] scale and,  " ...
there is usually a far higher  surface:mash (or wort) ratio than is the case
in commercial scale operations.  Consequently the opportunity for oxygen to
pass into the wort are considerably greater. [...] there is nevertheless no
uncertainty as to whether the substances which are principally involved in
utilizing the oxygen are relevant to staling downstream".

The remainder of CB's paper compare the relative rates and types of
oxidation reactions in wort.  The take away is that tho' wort may contain
only 3-5 ppm of O2, that during the mash & boil 50 to 200 ppm of O2 may be
consumed in these oxidation processes and  the extra oxygen enters thru the
surface of the wort.  Stirring/pumping of course improves the O2 access.
The amount of O2 necessary to completely oxidize all of the malt linoleic
acid (the trans-2-nonenal precursor) is small (fraction of 1ppm) but there
are other strongly competing reactions for the oxygen which consume more of
it.

Once again the result that trans-2-nonenal precursors are primarily formed
by lipo-oxygenase reactions is presented by reference, but that non-enzymic
utilization of oxygen is much higher.  It is estimated in one of his
references that 2/3rds of the O2 uptake in wort is in the boiler, 1/3 in the
mash tun - but of course the enymzes are lost in the boil, and this sort of
relation is expected due to the temp difference and the kinetics of the
non-enzymic usage.
===

What does it all mean Matt ?   If you can stand the HSA effects of a stirred
mashtun, then you can probably stand the effects of pumping as well.  Haze
and courser flavor from oxidized phenolics is apparently more non-enzymic.
If you see those try reducing O2 access at higher temps especially.  IMO
oxidized phenolics, or perhaps the lack of unoxidized phenolics, can have a
sensory impact of lack of freshness or dullness in some foods.  Again the
boiler and any hot O2 introduction is suspect.  Classic beer staling
compounds are a result of enzymes acting in the mash.  Lipo-oxygenase is
active at 90F, and tho' they are less stable than beta-amylase and don't
survive long at 150F, the amount of this enzymes activity  needed to do
damage is very small *IF THE OXYGEN IS AVAILABLE*.  Controlling O2 access
during the mash *should* have the biggest impact on the eventual fate of
your beer's non-enals.  Aldehydes are a very mixed bag with more complex
sources and paths than I can discuss here..

 -S




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