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	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
  re: Barley in beer ("-S")
  Re: link of the week - beer bottle collection ("Greg 'groggy' Lehey")
  Re: calories in alcohol (Bob Devine)
  BYO low-carb article review ("-S")
  RE: one-step (Chuck Brandt)
  Best of Philly 2004 results ("Joe Uknalis")
  Heresy or fact ? ("Ken Peters")
  Beer to dinner ("Spencer W. Thomas")
  Re: Fix and the 40C Rest (Joe Fasel)
  Mixed Units?  Step Mash Calcs (MOREY Dan)
  Re: One-Step ("Dave Larsen")
  Mash Rest Temperatures ("Martin Brungard")


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Date: Sun, 25 Apr 2004 23:04:11 -0400
From: "-S" <-s at adelphia.net>
Subject: re: Barley in beer

I agree with many of Dave Burley's comments regarding raw barley additions.
Adding raw barley is not quite the same as having the very undermodified
German malts which Max Delbruck studied a century ago, but it about as close
as one can come without the effort of home-malting.   If you want the
experience of mashing undermodified grist then an unmalted grain adjunct
will do  nicely.

In British experience (M&BS chap 8), that low levels of raw barley addition,
the 10-20% amounts that Dave mentioned, do NOT require additional mash rests
(may benefit from it tho), however beyond 20% raw the need for a 50C rest or
enzyme additions becomes apparent.   Adding the <20% amounts of milled
barley directly to the mash and mashing a bit more extensively gives extract
yield for the barley around 75% that of pale malt (~26.5 degree-gallon/lb).
Kunze talks extensively about adjunct brewing (despite Reinheitsgebot) and
states basically the same as M&BS on pp86 and pp222 with an 80% extraction
as compared to malt.

Kunze & M&BS both state that raw barley gives a different flavor - no
surprise.  My experience when malting 6-row feed barley, (including measures
to reduce phenolics) is that it gives a clear and somewhat offensive
phenolic flavors when used  in large quantity.  I expect the flavor would be
noticeable and yet acceptable at 10-20% of grist.  Using feed barley is not
a fair means of comparing flavors of unmalted and malted barley, nor does it
imply anything about the impact of modification on flavor.  6-row brewing
barley is selected for flavor and feed barley is not.

An approach which avoids the "horse feed" flavor and also the cereal mash is
to use torrified barley flakes.  These don't require a b-glucans rest yet
have similar protein/FAN properties as whole grain.  I like the use of these
(and good raw grains) in beer, but I don't have the impression that their
addition makes my beers magically more Germanic in flavor.  Flakes add a
clear 'raw grain' flavor in quantity - I find this neither offensive nor
appealing just different.  The heavier proteins protein add a sort of body
and foam-headiness that is generally desirable, but one can get this from a
tiny raw barley addition(2-3%) if that's the goal.  Many beers do benefit
from 2-4oz of crushed raw wheat or barley flakes.

The idea that the fabled undermodified malts of the 19th century, malts
which actually require traditional 3-step decoction,  make the best beer
belongs is quite romantic, but very dubious.  To paraphase Dorothy, if you
must go looking for your heart's desire, don't look any farther than a fine
selection of modern malts at your LHBS.  If it isn't there you never really
lost it to begin with.

As for the Moravian malts ... the idea that these are undermodified and
therefore better is unadulterated hype.  The 2 Czech Moravian malts I've
seen have SNRs of 44% and 38.33%.  That's a huge 3% above and a scant 0.67%
SNR below Kunze's circa 1985 spec range of modification and both well above
what was  typical 50 years ago.  These may be nice malts, but they are not
similar to the historically undermodified decoction malts.

 -S




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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 14:05:50 +0930
From: "Greg 'groggy' Lehey" <grog at lemis.com>
Subject: Re: link of the week - beer bottle collection

On Saturday, 24 April 2004 at 13:09:57 -0600, Bob Devine wrote:
> Fun site this week.  Many homebrewers are collectors of
> beer-related items.  This website has 2246 bottles for viewing.
> http://tolsun.oulu.fi/kbs/beer/kbsbeer.htm

Sad that the quality of the comments is so low.  Also the ratings are
way off IMO; I suspect that's because most of the comments appear to
be from people who obviously don't understand beer.  Amusing to read,
in part, but nothing to rely on.  Also, it seems that the choice of
beers is a little haphazard.

Greg
- --
Note: I discard all HTML mail unseen.
Finger grog at lemis.com for PGP public key.
See complete headers for address and phone numbers.


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Date: Sun, 25 Apr 2004 23:38:09 -0600
From: Bob Devine <bob.devine at worldnet.att.net>
Subject: Re: calories in alcohol

> Recent posts that mention calories in alcohol have me
> thinking again about something I've wondered about in the
> past - how the body deals with alcohol.

Here's a quick snapshot of metabolic processes.

First, when alcohol hits the stomach, about 1/4 is absorbed
through the stomach wall (an empty stomach absorbs it about
three times faster)  The rest is absorbed through the
intestinal tract. Peak blood alcohol levels occur about
30 to 60 minutes after consumption. 

How quickly does alcohol get metabolized?  Current estimates
about that your liver convert ethanol to acetaldehyde at about
8-10 grams per hour, regardless of how much you drank, but this
conversion rate differs by individual. In the next step, the
acetaldehyde is converted, eventually, to acetyl-conenzyme A
which can be used as an energy source by your body.

Genetic differences are known for the metabolic pathways. For
example, one variant in an enzyme that slows conversion of
alcohol is found in 10% of Europeans but a majority of east Asians.
Symptoms are higher blood alcohol levels and facial flushing.

Women absorb and metabolize alcohol differently from men, probably
due to their smaller size (on average) and a lower amount of the
alcohol metabolizing enzyme in their stomach.  So more alcohol
reaches their blood stream directly.

About 90-97% of the alcohol is metabolized with the remaining
single-digit percentage escaping via breath or urine.

Alcohol yields about 7 Calories per gram.  So roughly you
would think that roughly 300 grams (~11 ounces) would provide
the total caloric needs for an adult male, roughly 2000 Cal/day,
assuming that someone could actually live on such "empty calories".

There is no simple conversion of calories from alcohol to weight gain.
When alcohol is taken with food, the body converts the alcohol first
and synthesizes fat to store the food's calories.  But epidemiological
studies show that some overweight people lose weight with a moderate
consumption of alcohol.  And confusingly, many chronic heavy drinkers
can knock down 1000's of alcohol calories that amount each day but
remain skinny.

Math pop quiz -- If your liver can convert 8 - 10 grams/hour
(roughly 1/3 to 1/2 ounce) and if a bottle of beer contains
that amount, can you drink an entire 24-bottle case of beer in
one day at the rate of a bottle per hour and not get legally drunk?

> Mike
> Gig harbor WA
> (Rennerian: go west until you hit salt water then back up a few steps)

But if you still see sunshine, you only hit the Great Salt Lake.
Go northwest some more.... ;-)

Bob Devine
(who used to live in rainy Redmond, Wash.)



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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 01:49:56 -0400
From: "-S" <-s at adelphia.net>
Subject: BYO low-carb article review

After reading  that there was a recent BYO article  (v10, no3), on low-carb
beers I ran off and picked up a copy.  I was hoping to get an interesting
insight into the issue .... all hopes were dashed about 3 paragraphs in.
It's exactly what I would expect of an unedited article - one with no
insightful and critical  prepublication review.

The first few paragraphs start off well enough discussing the popular Atkins
diet as the motivation for low carb beer.  Then the article then deviates
from the obvious "elephant" issue.  .  There is no description of the type
of carbs in beer nor the type of carbs of concern to Atkins dieters.   This
is a bit like discussing electricity without mentioning  current and
voltage.   There is little indication that there even are distinguishable
carbs.  This is exemplified in the attempt to measure beer carbohydrate
using a type of diabetic blood sugar meter which only registers glucose
(most strip meters use a glucose oxidase enzyme reaction specific to
glucose).  The author may as well have used a pH meter to measure total
carbs.  Apparently no thought process exists behind this dismally misguided
effort beyond, "I have hammer, therefore everything is a nail".

There are several sweepingly erroneous statements, for example that certain
flavors ("Sweet and malty are out") are unavailable in a low-carbohydrate
beer.  Malty flavors are primarily due to tiny amounts of Maillard products
which do not add any considerable carbohydrate, and there are plenty of
non-carbohydrate sweeteners in use, including in alcoholic beverages.  This
particular assertion is central to designing beers and is also apparently
dead-wrong.

The article correctly covers the topic of increasing wort fermentability,
achieving high attenuation and reducing residual unfermentable
carbohydrates.  The use of amyloglucosidase in pro-brewing is noted but the
possibility of obtaining it is ignored.  (It's easy to obtain by special
order).  Instead the author studies the use of Beano(tm), an
alpha-galactosidase enzyme preparation.  There is no consideration for the
fact that Beano's intended purpose is to degrade non-Atkins type complex
carbs, which don't matter,  into simple ones.  A proper look at this issue
would require a serious analysis of the actual sorts of carbs present in
well attenuated beer and which are degraded by the respective enzymes.  [[
One can find some real data on the issue in the HBD archives where Doc Pivo
did a fasting BSL test after drinking some rather wretched residual
extract]].  The article suggests that the first mention of Beano in Brewing
appeared in BYO circa May 2001.  I myself posted about Beano in HBD#3012,
Apr 1999, and I certainly wasn't the first.  The article ignores the brewing
issues involved in adding starch based Beano tablets to the fermenter.

After discussing the reduction of residual enzymes the author launches into
a completely counterproductive discussion of adding vast amounts of
artificial sweeteners with carbohydrate bulking agents to the highly
attenuated beers.   No support for this action appears tho'  the author
boldly states that sweeteners counteract the thin body of well attenuated
beers,  also that one can (and by implication should) add an equivalent
amount of sweetener to make up for the lowered gravity due to Beano.  Did
the author think that the dextrins reduced by Beano were sweet flavored
(they aren't) and therefore deserved replacement with equivalent sweetness ?
Does he not realize that the malto-dextrin Splenda bulking agent is exactly
the sort of carb he just removed from the beer ?   He concludes the section
suggesting the addition of 12-16 ounces (by volume?) of Splenda to a typical
beer !  Tho' a much smaller amount of sweetening might be useful, the author
would  be well advised to consider non-carbohydrate body & mouth-feel agents
such as proteins or (non-Atkins carbo) glycerol..

A table of nice HB recipes with apparently fictitious carbohydrate content
listings is included.  Where the writer could possibly have gotten these
figures is unexplained.

I'd like to see some really top-notch articles in BYO, but this sort of
stuff gives the mag a bad name.  A critical review should ask the evident
questions and expect to find the answers in the text.  Someone's asleep at
the wheel on the editorial staff.

HBD more better 4me,
 -S





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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 06:36:44 -0400 (EDT)
From: Chuck Brandt <cdbrandt at alum.mit.edu>
Subject: RE: one-step

Nathan:

I used to use 1-step to sanitize everything: carboys, buckets, 
siphons, hoses, & bottles.  I got tired of the slight white residue it 
was leaving on my bottles (for aesthetic reasons only) and have 
since gone to using iodophor for the bottles.  Overall, YMMV but 
1-step is simple and easy to use and has worked quite well as a 
sanitizer for me over the past 5 years.

Chuck Brandt
[193, 88] apparent Rennerian
Aka Pittsburgh, PA


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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 07:58:29 -0400
From: "Joe Uknalis" <birman at netaxs.com>
Subject: Best of Philly 2004 results

Congrats to Brian Moore of Wilmington, DE on his Best of Show California
Common!

Full competition results are at:
http://www.hopsclub.org/

thanks to all the entrants, judges, stewards, sponsors and especially our
host

http://www.noddinghead.com/ (thanks Gordon!)

 Joe Uknalis



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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 08:00:11 -0500
From: "Ken Peters" <kpeters6 at cox.net>
Subject: Heresy or fact ?

I was lead to this interesting link by a posting on the
rec.crafts.brewing newsgroup. As the author states, most of this flies
in the face of the conventional wisdom repeated here and in most "hobby"
oriented books.  The author appears to have the background to lend
credence to his observations. Any thoughts about these opinions?

http://www.beertools.com/forum/index.php?post=6297#anchr-6297

Kenneth Peters
Harrah, OK  



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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 10:49:03 -0400
From: "Spencer W. Thomas" <spencer at umich.edu>
Subject: Beer to dinner

>
>
>I try to cover the bases from a 
>lawnmower lager, a full flavoured pilsner,  a *somewhat* challenging bitter 
>pale ale or IPA or a stout.   I generally stay away from bringing a 
>barleywine, double imperial IPA, Belgians or anything that is sure to turn 
>off a neophyte unless I know there are some beer geeks present.
>

I beg to differ.  People who enjoy wine will, in my opinion, like many 
Belgian-style beers, but will have more trouble with something like an 
IPA that has high bitterness.  A good "triple" or "blond" Belgian-style 
beer is a great match for any white wine, while the "double" style 
easily replaces a red wine (and as was previously mentioned goes GREAT 
with cheese.)  Both of these styles have relatively low bitterness and 
many "wine-like" characteristics.

I'd also recommend Boon Marriage Parfait to replace a dry sparkling 
white or "blush" (but not that sweet "white zin" dreck) wine.  It goes 
great with turkey, for example and is absolutely lovely in champagne flutes.

Finally, if you're bringing dessert, it's really hard to beat a nice, 
thick imperial stout over quality ice cream.  I once was asked to bring 
dessert to a wine-tasting dinner.  I picked out a good vanilla ice cream 
and brought along a few bottles of Bell's Expedition Stout 
(http://snipurl.com/5yjm).  I wouldn't let anyone watch as I prepared 
the "ice cream sundaes" in the kitchen.  They got lots of compliments 
and when I finally admitted that the "topping" was beer, I was asked 
"and what else?"  "Just beer" was my reply, to the astonishment of the 
guests.

=S



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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 09:03:09 -0600
From: Joe Fasel <jhf at lanl.gov>
Subject: Re: Fix and the 40C Rest


In HBD #4527, -S writes:
> JoeF writes,
> 
> >I don't have AoBT, but from your figures above, I think you do
> >have a mistake in your math.
> 
> I don't think so, tho you made a minor error in your calc Joe.  You
> are right to bring this up again as it is a confusing issue.

Well, what can I say?  You are right, and I was wrong; my apologies;
mea maxima culpa; I'm not worthy; etc.  I dug the scrap of paper I
did my calculations on last week out of the recycle pile and located
my error in calcuating the mass of water to go with 20kg grain and 16L
added boiling water.  Not only that, but I found the independent
compensating error I made checking that result by going the other way
and calculating the final temperature.  Some days are like that, I
guess.  Maybe it's a good thing I switched from physics to CS lo these
many years ago.  ;-)
> 
> >Using 0.275 for the specific heat
> >of malted grain,
> 
> It's a minor factor, but that number is far off..  The specific heat
> of  0 to 3% moisture malt is 0.38 to 0.39 not nearly 0.275.
> M&BS pp 324 has a table.  0.4 is good enough for any brewing
> calc.

I got that number from searching hbd.  If I had looked a little harder,
I would have found other numbers nearer 0.4.  Also, a couple of people
had given a value of 1.6 J/g-C, which again is about 0.38, converting
to calories.  I also checked to see what value ProMash uses: 0.4175.
(Well, I didn't actually use ProMash, which would have required me to
hold my nose and boot Windows.  I used the ProMash FirstStrike Palm
program.)

So, as you say, there has to be something wrong with Fix's numbers in AoBT.
Most likely, again as you say, the amount of the boiling infusion is wrong.
Another possibility is that the amount of grain is wrong.  Maybe that
was meant to be 12kg instead of 20.  I say this because it's close to the
27lbs total grain bill in Fix's 1994 posting that I mentioned before:

http://realbeer.com/spencer/FAQ/Fix-mash.html

Remember, I also mentioned that there are problems with Fix's numbers there.
(Maybe George was nearly as prone to casual errors as I!)  But they are not
as far off, and could be explained by having mistranscribed an initial
infusion of 6gal and addition of 3.5gal as 6.5 and 3, respectively.

Anyway, thanks for straightening me out.

Cheers,
- --Joe


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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 11:27:12 -0500
From: MOREY Dan <dan.morey at cnh.com>
Subject: Mixed Units?  Step Mash Calcs

Units please!  Mixing SI and English units in calculations can be confusing.

> It's a minor factor, but that number is far off.. The specific heat of 
> 0 to 3% moisture malt is 0.38 to 0.39 not nearly 0.275. M&BS pp 324 
> has a table. 0.4 is good enough for any brewing calc.

I believe that is 0.39 Btu/(lb*F) or 1.63 kJ/(kg*C) for "grain".  For water
the specific heat is 1.0 Btu/(lb*F) or 4.19 kJ/(kg*C).  In the calculation
we assume that specific heat is constant, which is reasonably accurate in my
experience.  BTW, I use 0.4 Btu/(lb*F) as default value for my calculations.

With regards to step mashing.  I routinely calculate step mashes.  I have a
12 gallon stainless steel mash tun that weighs approximately 10 lbs.  The
specific heat of SS is approximately 0.11 Btu/(lb*F).  Since the outside
surface must be "near" room temperature and the inside surface is at mash
temperature, we can estimate the average temperature of the mash tun is the
average of the mash and room temperatures.  Using the previous assumption
the thermal capacity of the mash tun is:

0.11 Btu/(lb*F) * 10 lbs * 1/2 = 0.55 Btu/F

or approximately equal to 1.38 lbs of grain.  I have no experience with
insulated coolers and cannot comment on them.

It is far more important to know the ending mash temperature of each step
when calculating step mashes.  Since the mash thermal capacity is much
greater than the mash tun, any errors in the assumed ending temperature will
result in significant deviations form the target temperature.

With a little record keeping (experimentation), one can characterize their
mash system in the form of the lump capacitance model.  This model can be
used to predict the mash temperature at the end of each step.  The result is
a better prediction of the actual infusion or decoction required.  From the
temperature measurements, on can calculate the product UA for their system.

UA = - ln((Te-Tr)/(Ti-Tr)) * C/t

where,

Te is the ending mash/step temperature
Ti is the initial mash/step temperature
Tr is room/ambient temperature
C is thermal capacity = sum of mass*cp for each constituent in the mash
t is time in minutes

UA is a characteristic of the system and can be considered constant.  I have
calculated this for my system using different water to grist ratios and
different batch sizes and found very little variation.

To predict the ending temperature:

Te = (Ti-Tr)exp(-UA*t/C) + Tr

The calculation is easy and it eliminates the guess work.  I'm hoping that
in the future, various brewing software will add this feature.  Until then,
I'll have to stick with my homebrewed code.

Cheers,

Dan Morey
Club BABBLE  http://hbd.org/babble
[213.1, 271.5] mi



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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 21:16:19 +0000
From: "Dave Larsen" <hunahpumonkey at hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: One-Step

Nathan asks whether or not to use One-Step as a sanitizer.   I too asked 
this question a few years ago.  Mind you, I had been already using it for a 
while for both cleaning and sanitizing, as per my brew shop's 
recommendation.

First, let me say that I never had a bad batch using One-Step.  However, 
with that said, I had heard some anecdotal evidence that people had trouble 
with it in the sanitation department.  As a result, I started to ask some 
basic advice on the contact time needed to effectively sanitize.  Nobody 
could give me a straight answer.   Even from the manufacturer, they will 
give you rhetoric on how they can not even call it a sanitizer because of 
government regulations.  I eventually stopped using it because of that.

I now use two products: Straight-A to clean and StarSan to sanitize.  
Straight-A, by the same manufacturer as One-Step, is a fine general purpose 
brewery cleaner and StarSan gives you a straight answer: two minutes and you 
are sanitized.  As a result, I am pretty confident in my cleaning and 
sanitizing regimen.

As far as crowns are concerned, there are some who claim that you don't even 
have to sanitize them.  In fact, as I understand it, many commercial 
breweries don't.  However, I could never bring myself to do that, so I use 
StarSan on my crowns.

Dave
Tucson, AZ


>I was wondering what the general opinion was about using "One-Step" as a
>sanitizer?  Should I be using it?  Is it the best out there?  What about
>when I'm sanitizing my Oxygen absorbing bottle caps?
>
>Nathan T. Hoskins
>Brewing in Kentucky
>nathanhoskins at adelphia.net



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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 13:27:47 -0800
From: "Martin Brungard" <mabrungard at hotmail.com>
Subject: Mash Rest Temperatures

It is relatively clear from the recent discussions that single temperature 
infusions or tempertures in the 60 to 70C range can produce decent beer.  
The rests under 60C look like they are unnecessary in most cases.  But, 
there does seem to be a case where a low temperature rest could still be 
recommended.  That is the 44C rest for a bavarian weizen.  I've noticed 
several posts in the archive that point out that a rest in the mid 40's 
promotes the production of 4VG precursors.

I suppose that a decent weizen can still be produced with a single 
temperature infusion, but is that recommended by anyone?

I can see that using a single decoction or boiling water infusion could help 
step the mash quickly through the head killing temperature range.  To make a 
boiling water infusion work with a 44C rest, I would need to start with a 
fairly thick mash of around 0.75 qts/lb.  Does anyone have some data on the 
effect of running this 44C mash with this thick of a mash?

I'm trying to avoid ending with the mash too thin after an infusion.  I 
usually formulate my mashes with a 1.25 to 1.33 qts/lb ratio.  My 
calculations indicate that I might be upwards of 1.5 qts/lb if I were to use 
an infusion to step from 44 to 60C.  I don't get the impression that this 
will be a problem.  Are there any thoughts on this?

Martin Brungard
Tallahassee, FL



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