---

	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
		Digest Janitor: janitor@hbd.org


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Contents:
  Re: Franklin (Teresa Knezek)
  re: New B3 false bottom ("Steve Alexander")
  re: ferulic rest ("Steve Alexander")
  re: boil time ("Steve Alexander")
  Re: Umami (Jake Isaacs)
  pre-poured petri dishes (Randy Ricchi)
  RE: Hop Back Ideas (Steve Funk)
  10th Annual Peach State Brewoff (Covert Hops Society)
  Barley that tastes like coffee (Nathan Matta)
  BrewingTechniques Back Issues ("Michael Maag")
  Wankers/Beer topics ("Steve Alexander")
  Stubborn stout, light wheat, etc... (Teresa Knezek)
  re. pLambics, sour mash ("John Misrahi")
  Beer/Homebrew on Food Unwrapped ("David Houseman")
  Re: re: New B3 false bottom (Steve Alexander) (David Towson)


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Date: Sun, 29 Dec 2002 22:46:36 -0900
From: Teresa Knezek <teresa at mivox.com>
Subject: Re: Franklin

On or thereabout 12/30/02,  Bill Wible spoke thusly:
>I doubt Benjamin Franklin ever met a Muslim in his life...
>
>... So don't hit me with 200 year old quotes regarding current 
>situations that the quoted person could not possibly have know about 
>or understood.

Indeed. The best thing we can possibly do right now is to declare all 
our hard-won civil liberties outdated by virtue of modern technology, 
and surrender our constitutional rights to the government's 
discretion (after all, everyone knows modern governments are ever so 
much more trustworthy than those of Franklin's time).

Certainly, if Mr. Franklin had ever met a Muslim or witnessed the 
hazards of modern weaponry, I'm sure he would have abandoned his 
staunch support of personal freedoms, and civil liberties in a 
knee-knocking heartbeat.

Sarcasm aside, I fail to see what your short-sighted dismissal of the 
founding principles of our country really has to do with 
home-brewing. (Other than the fact that a country with no personal 
freedom is but one teetotalling dictator away from Prohibition, Take 
2.)

Shall we drop the unwinnable debate over whether Muslims are evil 
and/or civil liberties are disposable, and return to the much more 
agreeable subject of making beer?
- -- 
:: Teresa ::
http://rant.mivox.com/

"It has become appallingly obvious that our
technology has exceeded our humanity."
	-- Albert Einstein


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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 05:06:12 -0500
From: "Steve Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: re: New B3 false bottom

DaveT says ...

>When I bought my "brewing sculpture" from Beer, Beer and More Beer
> [...] stainless false bottom [...]  easily bent [...]
 ....
>I found the thing quite unsatisfactory, and I stopped using it
>for mashing.

Maybe it's dynamic sculpture of the deconstruction movement Dave!

>I still consider the Sabco arrangement superior
 ...
>my only connection with B3 is that of a
>very satisfied customer.

I don't get this.  BB&MB sells you a product which is so defectively
designed that you can't use it.   Then you switch to a Sabco which you
consider "superior".   Then you say you are a "very satisfied" BB&MB
customer   Just what exactly do they have to do to make you "unsatisfied" ?
Am I missing something ?  Did they replace the screen for free or something
?

My question is this.  You guys who mash with a false bottom(FB)
in place - just exactly how do you step the temperature ?  (w/o a pump I
mean).   There is always some grist under the FB and direct heating is a
formula for scorch and the FB plate retards any heat flow anyway.

False-bottoms - I don't see how you guys put up with them !

 -S




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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 05:25:49 -0500
From: "Steve Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: re: ferulic rest


George "Weizen Guy" de Piro writes ....

>Bill [...]]skipped his standard low-temperature ferulic acid rest while
>making Weizenbier the other day.  He worries that it will lack clove
>character.
>
>There most likely will be plenty of precursor in the wort, anyway,
resulting
>in plenty of clove character.  I have found yeast selection to be much more
>significant than a low-temperature rest.  Wheat malt also has more clove
>potential than barley malt.

George has superior experience on this point and there are good reasons to
think he's right, but a low temp rest will increase levels of ferulic acid -
that much is clear.   Whether you need more ferulic to make a good weizen is
very murky and dependent on the yeast (and grist) as George said.

Ferulic acid can be decarboxylated by heat or yeast to produce clovey
tasting 4VG(4-vinyl-guaiacol).   [ There is another cinnamic acid,
p-coumaric acid, which is similarly decarboxylated to 4VP(4vinyl-phenol).
The 4VP has a vanilla spicy tone - tho' some describe it as medicinal.
Barley has a fair bit of coumaric, but wheat has hardly any].

The idea that a rest around 43C-45C releases ferulic comes from a couple
studies.  One by an extremely well respected researcher at Guinness(Ian
McMurrough, et al).   Guinness is avidly interested in avoiding all 4VG
flavor and they found that a low rest released so much ferulic that the boil
then created tastable 4VG concentrations.   I only have a description of the
other paper, but Narziss and others at Weihenstephan studied this in weizen
grists and found that a 43-45C rest at pH 5.8 is maximal for ferulic acid in
the wort and 4VG in beer (same temps for barley malt too).

Ferulic is esterically bounds to cell wall saccharides (while covalent bonds
are more common for other phenolic acids).  A remarkable amount of ferulic
is freed during malting and mashing due to esterase enzymes.  Though malted,
mashed grains contain very large amounts of free ferulic only a small
fraction - around 5% is extracted into the wort.

For weizens a "phenolic-off-flavor"(POF+) type yeast converts ferulic to
4VG, but very inefficiently.   Fermentations around 20C(68F) temp maximize
the clove flavor for POF+ yeasts according to Boulton&Quain BY&F.  Some
sources claim higher temps produce more.  Most of the precursor ferulic
remains, unconverted in beers fermented with POF+ yeasts.

Guinness found that steeping malts and grains at various temps gave very
different ferulic extraction rates.   Flaked raw barley released only 2ppm
(compared to grist weight) at 45C, but 4.4ppm at 65C and above.   Various
barley malts produced ~22ppm ferulic levels at a 45C steep, but the figure
dropped to 6.5ppm for a 65C rest and 5.5 at 85C.  The explanation is that a
malt esterase enzyme frees more ferulic in the malt than the raw grain, and
that the esterase is most active around 45C, deactivated at 65C.

Guinness also performed some 50L test mashes and one with a 30' at 45C
mash-in and 15'-at-52C produced about 4 times the ferulic extraction as a
65C mash-in schedule [6.6ppm of wort vs 1.6ppm].

I don't have data on the extraction of ferulic acid from wheat and wheat
malt, but the level of bound ferulic acid in raw wheat is roughly 5 times
higher than for barley and this may be more extractable since there is no
husk protecting the wheat aleurone layer  [btw - corn(maize) has about 4X
the ferulic level of wheat!].  It's a safe bet that wheat releases a lot
more ferulic in wort than comparably treated barley - very probably in the
5x vicinity or above.

How much wort ferulic do you need to make a weizen beer ?   Studies of
several S.German weizens showed the beer had levels of unconverted ferulic
5.6-11.2ppm, and 4VG at 0.2-4.3ppm.    Calculating back this means something
like an upper range of 17ppm ferulic acid in the wort and 5.5ppm is
converted to 4VG in the most clovey example.

So how much of the ferulic is converted by yeasts ?   There are several
studies of yeast which add 100ppm of ferulic to wort and ferment 3 days at
24C.   That's enough ferulic to produce up to ~77ppm of 4VG.  One wild
S.cerevisiae produced 9.8ppm.  Four wheat beer yeasts produced from 2.33ppm
to 0.13ppm (rather low IMO).  Some of the conventional ale yeasts produced
1.0 to 1.4ppm of 4VG, while other ale yeasts and several lager yeast
produced only trace amounts.   So vast amounts of ferulic don't mean vast
amounts of 4VG - the yeast and fermentation conditions are key factors.

In the Guinness study the lager malt mashed-in at 65C produced wort with
1.6ppm of ferulic.   If wheat malt treated the same produced 5x that level
(8ppm) and if roughly a third of that was converted to 4VG - you'd have 2ppm
of 4VG which is midrange for a Bavarian weizen.    That's a lot of
assumptions, but the biggest one is how the yeast act.    If you are trying
to hit high levels of ferulic in the wort (15+ppm) because your weizen yeast
is a very inefficient decarboxylator then a low rest is likely needed even
for a 100% wheat malt grist.   The big mystery here is not how to increase
ferulic level (we know how) but how to characterize and control the yeast's
conversion of ferulic into 4VG.  There is little written on this.
Experience of the sort George has seems the only guide.

==========

The S.German weizens I've had were terrific with a big but  not overwhelming
clove flavor, esters big enough to balance the clove, that assertive wheat
flavor on the palate  and just enough hop bitterness to make it a nice light
beer.  Big carbonation & head too.   Many of the American versions are out
of balance with far too much 4VG and not enough of anything else IMO.

Kunze offers a nice few of details on making hefeweizens: 11-13P wort,
50-100% wheat malt with Munich, dark caramel or colored wheat malt adding
color.  He suggests extensive mashing for wheat malt - double or single
decoction starting at 35-37C and using the equivalent of 1.4 to 1.5 qt/lb
water/grist ratio.  Boulton & Quain note that traditional weizens were
fermented at up to 25-30C in open fermenters and that the switch to cooler
closed fermentation reportedly caused blander weizens.

Another nice weiss&weizen page is ...
http://www.netbeer.co.at/beer/english/witbeer.htm
developed by Hubert Hangofer.  If memory serves George uses Hubert's weizen
yeast at the Albany Pump Station.

So George - how do you control & balance the clove vs ester flavors in your
weizens ?  Temps, aeration, pitching rates, open fermenters etc ?   Please
comment on what you see as the flavor and design issues for weizens.   How
to you handle your hefe's ?    How is that weizen yeast from Hubert Hangofer
working for you and do Logsdon-WY or White-WL vend it yet ?

>The low-temperature rest can have an undesirable impact on head retention
>and body of the beer.  Too much protein degradation occurs at such low
>temperatures.

OK - but Kunze suggests intensive mashing for wheat malt.   I'd expect much
worse head+body problems from a 50C-55C rest, but certainly 43C-45C isn't
helpful.    Isn't this offset by the wheat malt characteristics George, or
is the problem that your brewing hardware requires a slow rise thru the
50-55C danger zone if you mash-in at 45C ?

 -Steve



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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 08:26:09 -0500
From: "Steve Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: re: boil time

>why not just boil the bittering hops for the required long time (and you
>could use less in the brew-water too)  and add the mash liquor just for the
>last 20 minutes or less?

You could but a more concentrated hop boil means less isomerization.
Boiling hops for a 5gal batch in 1gal of water you'd get a very poor yield.
The hops boil pH is critical.   Much below 5.0 and the utilization rate
drops, much above 5.5 and the boil extracts nasty beta-acids.    The 20min
wort boil may not form optimal hot break or boil off enough DMM->DMS, but
it's still a feasible method.

There are commercial pressurized wort boilers (think pressure cooker) which
operate at 120C-130C and can perform effective break formation and higher
than normal hop utilization (and isomerization) in as little as 6 minutes.
The object is to save fuel costs, but the higher temp also saves a lot of
boil time and hops.

 -S




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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 11:18:35 -0500
From: Jake Isaacs <rjisaa0 at uky.edu>
Subject: Re: Umami 


> glutamates which are complexed glutamines

I hate to even comment on this (since we seem to be steering off-topic), 
but glutamate and glutamine are chemically distinct amino acids (one is 
not a complexed form of the other).  However, the process of acid 
hydrolysis of proteins does also convert glutamine to glutamate (a 
confounding aspect of early attempts at protein analysis and sequencing).


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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 12:26:15 -0500
From: Randy Ricchi <rricchi at houghton.k12.mi.us>
Subject: pre-poured petri dishes

I noticed with dismay that Brewers Resource no longer sells disposable 
petri dishes which are pre-poured with agar. I haven't used these for a few 
years, so I don't know when they stopped offering them, but they were very 
easy to use. Brewtek guaranteed they would be sterile for at least 3 
months. I had some laying around unopened for about a year and a half 
before they got moldy, and that was at 65F or so.

Does anyone know of another place to get these?



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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 09:53:15 -0800
From: Steve Funk <steve at hheco.com>
Subject: RE: Hop Back Ideas

Ed Jones asked about hop back ideas to help him with his next 
brewery-related project.  Well Ed, my hop back is all 316 stainless 
steel and is definitely not fragile.  It is a pair of 2-inch quick 
disconnect cam-lock fittings.  The fittings have pipe thread on one side 
and lock together on the other.  The 2 inch pipe thread end of each 
disconnect is fitted with a SS reducing coupling to 1/2 inch pipe thread 
and a barbed hose fitting is installed into that.  I cram a small "plug" 
of stainless steel scrubby material into the downstream half as a filter 
to prevent the hops from entering the CFC.  I can put up to an ounce and 
a half of whole leaf or plug hops into it.  I just install it inline 
between the kettle and the CFC and use gravity to flow through it.  Wort 
exiting the CFC goes directly into a fermentation vessel.  I also use a 
false bottom in the kettle and whole hops in the boil which together 
filters out all of the hot break material before it can enter and 
possibly clog the hop back.  Below are the  catalog numbers for the 
fittings from McMaster-Carr.  NAJASC.  BTW, I used SS but there also is 
aluminum, brass and thermoplastic cam & groove hose couplings too which 
are much cheaper than the $165 for the SS version.
www.mcmaster.com
# 53015k15 NPT male x coupler $44.39
# 53015k45 NPT male x coupler $32.50
# 4452k647 reducing coupling (2)$31.25 ea
# 53505k19 hose nipple (2) $12.64 ea
# 7361t13 stainless steel scouring scrubber $9.80 6-pk (enough for 10 years)

Cheers,
Steve Funk
Brewing in the Columbia River Gorge
188722, 290.31 apparent Rennerian




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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 10:52:10 -0800 (PST)
From: Covert Hops Society <coverthops at yahoo.com>
Subject: 10th Annual Peach State Brewoff

Hello all,

I want to invite you to participate in the 10th Annual
Peach State Brewoff in Atlanta, GA on Saturday 2/8/03.


US Play/Watertower has graciously offered their
facility to us again this year.  Last year, the
facilities worked out quite well.  In addition, we had
a record number of BJCP judges and we will continue to
recruit experienced judges this year to ensure good
quality feedback on your entries.

I do want to make you aware a few changes this year.

Ribbons have been ordered in advance and will be
available with scoresheets at the awards ceremony
immediately following the competition.  While we have
always gotten the results out with 48 hours on the
web, we are committed this year to getting all the
scoresheets and prizes out in a timely manner.
  
The sponsor list is quite impressive so far.  We are
aggressively pursuing additional sponsors and I feel
we will have some great prizes this year.

We will NOT be judging Meads and Ciders this year. 

I hope you will consider entering this year.  If you
are interesting in judging or stewarding please let us
know.  

All the info, including the entry form, is on our
website at www.coverthops.com.  The entry deadline is
Jan 25!  We expect to have 200+ entries again this
year.

Thanks and Good Luck!
Chris Collier
Covert Hops Society
10th Annual Peach State Brewoff Organizer




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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 14:00:53 -0500
From: Nathan Matta <whatsa at MIT.EDU>
Subject: Barley that tastes like coffee

First, my apologies for not finding this in the archives.  I searched for
a while, but all of my searches turned up WAY too many hits to be
useful.

Now, to the meat (or coffee) of the matter.  My mother doesn't drink
coffee for religious reasons, but likes the taste.  She recently found a
beverage called "BarleyBrew" which is made from 100% barley, and
looks and brews up pretty much like coffee.  The bad news is that the
company is out of business, and the stuff is no longer being made.
So, does anyone have any suggestions regarding what would be a good
type/roast/etc of barley to grind and brew up like coffee?  She'll probably
be ordering it online, so something pretty straightforward would be ideal.

I'm not particularly good with grains, but I'd say that what my mom now
has is probably about 100 L (a bit lighter than most ground coffee), and
tastes like a normal malted barley with a mild coffee flavor (might be a
little less sweet than normal).  Thanks for any and all advice!

Nathan


========================================
Nathan Matta
Fuzzy Beer Home Brewery
Randolph, MA, USA
[652.2, 86.4] Apparent Rennerian



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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 15:48:12 -0500
From: "Michael Maag" <MichaelMaag at doli.state.va.us>
Subject: BrewingTechniques Back Issues

I received an Email about a week or two ago from
Stephen Mallery, letting me know my back issues
from BrewingTechniques had been mailed.
Today (12/30) they arrived.
Steve is one heck of a guy.

Mike Maag, reading BT in the Shenandoah Valley (Staunton, VA.)



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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 16:25:03 -0500
From: "Steve Alexander" <steve-alexander at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: Wankers/Beer topics

Bill Wible says ...

>I doubt Benjamin Franklin ever met a Muslim in his life,

So Bill, it matter to you whether terrorists are Muslim, Shinto, Mennonite
or Anglican ?   What exactly is your malfunction ?

>If he were alive today, I'm sure he'd [...]

WWBFD.   Funny thing, I was just channeling with Benji this morning and he
said that since he's become a soulless panicky fool that he now likes your
plan to expel foreigners and nuke Mecca.

- --

Let's *all* take the political diatribes over to the forum meant for that
purpose at hbd.org and leave this digest to beer talk.  I'd sincerely love
to run each of your half-baked, bigoted, cowardly thoughts through the
public shredder Bill, but HBD isn't the place.

Maybe Pat can start an anti-Muslim forum.  It appears there is enough
interest !

what a world, what a world,
 -Steve



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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 12:40:13 -0900
From: Teresa Knezek <teresa at mivox.com>
Subject: Stubborn stout, light wheat, etc...

My first all-grain brew (an .063 OG stout) is still sitting in the 
secondary fermenter, and I am at a bit of a loss as to what to do 
with it...

After a week in primary (with WYeast 1338), the gravity had only 
dropped to .030. I pitched a packet of rehydrated Muntons, and 
stirred everything up, and waited another week. It had dropped to 
 .025. I racked it to secondary, having heard that racking will 
sometimes 'rouse' an apparently stuck fermentation.

I was over at a fellow brewers house while he brewed up a stout in a 
super-spiffy steam jacketed kettle, and he suggested adding some 
Beano to the fermenter, to help break down excess unfermentable 
sugars that may have been produced during my too-warm mash (between 
155degF and 160degF). What the heck... added four drops of Beano to 
the fermenter the following day, swished the bucket back and forth to 
try and rouse a bit of yeast...

Checked it again this weekend, and it was down to .023. Started a 
packet of Coopers and pitched it in there on Sunday. I'd really like 
to end my apparent "near beer curse" after my first two batches came 
out tasty, but apparently non-alcoholic.... but perhaps this stout is 
not the brew to break my unlucky streak? I figure I'll bottle it next 
weekend either way... but if anyone has some clever ideas for kicking 
the fermentation up a bit, I'm game.

On a brighter note, the all-grain American wheat I brewed 10 days ago 
seems to have fermented down to a good FG.... It started out a bit 
crippled by a low OG, due to (I think) overly hasty sparging and 
excessive water volume, only about .036... but three days later I 
hopefully raised the potential % a bit by draining about 1 gallon out 
of the fermenter, and boiling it with .5lb. DME, .25lb. honey and 
 .25lb. sugar, then pouring it back in the fermenter when it had 
cooled. The airlock bubbled steadily for most of the week, and was 
down to .009 when I checked on Saturday. I'll check it again tonight, 
and see if I have a bottle-ready batch.

I got a bottle of partial mash rye beer from another local brewer 
(they come out of the woodwork all of a sudden...), and was thinking 
of trying an all-grain amber rye next. Anyone got a favorite rye 
recipe to share, or should I make it up as I go along?
- -- 
Teresa - Two Rivers, Alaska [2849, 325] Appt. Rennerian
"It has been my experience that folks who have no vices
have very few virtues."  -- Abraham Lincoln


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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 17:11:17 -0500
From: "John Misrahi" <lmoukhin at sprint.ca>
Subject: re. pLambics, sour mash

Gary M. Chumney wrote the following about brewing pLambics,

I then add enough cold water to bring the mixture to 110 and add a
handful of crushed malt to the mash to start lactic acid fermentation.  I
hold this at approximately 105 degrees for the week to get a good lactic
acid base to add to the main mash

My question to you Gary, is how do you hold the mash at the appropriate
temperature (105F)  for a week? Do you use an electric blanket? space
heater?

I have my first pLambic in the fermenter as we speak, and am very interested
in brewing some more. I find your strategy involving a variety of yeasts as
well as the sour mash to be very intriguing. I kept it simple for  a
beginner, starting with a dry ale yeast (Coopers) and then adding the wyeast
lambic blend to the secondary along with some blackberries. As a side note,
it seems to be fermenting incredibly slowly. I had thought the coopers yeast
present would ferment out the blackberries quickly and then the lambic blend
would take over. What are signs that the lambic blend is active? What
aromas/visual clues become present, and how long do they take to make
themselves known, on average?

Sorry for all the questions, but this is a new and fascinating field of
homebrewing for me.

John Misrahi
Montreal, Canada


[6631.2, 17.4] Apparent Rennerian

Seen on a tee shirt - "The internet is full. Go away!"

"Ah, Billy Beer... we elected the wrong Carter." -Homer Simpson

"Fryer oil is like underwear, it needs to be changed once in a while or it
breaks down"  - Andrew Perron





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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 21:32:43 -0500
From: "David Houseman" <housemanfam at earthlink.net>
Subject: Beer/Homebrew on Food Unwrapped

Tonight, 12/30, on the Food Networks, Food Unwrapped, the program focused on
beer, micro/mega brewing AND homebrewing.  A respectable program and
portrayal of brewing, even the homebrewing.  A few errors that should have
been caught by careful editing and the right expert to consult on the show.
Look for a repeat later in the week.

Dave Houseman



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Date: Mon, 30 Dec 2002 22:40:14 -0500
From: David Towson <dtowson at comcast.net>
Subject: Re: re: New B3 false bottom (Steve Alexander)

In HBD 4132, Steve Alexander wonders what the heck...

>I don't get this.  BB&MB sells you a product which is so defectively 
>designed that you can't use it.   Then you switch to a Sabco which you 
>consider "superior".   Then you say you are a "very satisfied" BB&MB 
>customer   Just what exactly do they have to do to make you "unsatisfied" ?

Yeah, it occurred to me after I sent the message that my final comment 
didn't exactly agree with the rest.  Here's the deal.  I have purchased a 
substantial amount of stuff from B3, and I have enjoyed carrying on a 
dialog with them concerning things I like, and things I think could be 
improved.  Some of my suggestions have been adopted, and some not.  And I 
made my opinions quite clear to them concerning their wimpy false 
bottom.  But overall, I have been extremely pleased with the things I've 
bought from them, and I've had a great deal of fun using the equipment.  I 
find them very pleasant and accommodating to deal with, and except for the 
original false bottom, I think their stuff is of very good 
quality.  Anybody can make a mistake.

Sorry for the confusion.

Dave in Bel Air, MD



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