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	FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
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Contents:
  Re: Bottles didn't carbonate ("Greg Brewer")
  Re: Gluten Free Beer (Andrew Lavery)
  re: Amylase continues working? ("steve.alexander")
  Cereal Mash temp question... ("Michael Eyre")
  What do you think of this? (Jeremy Bergsman)
  shaarbeek cherries ("Jim Liddil")
  Re: Wyeast 1968 London ESB Ale Yeast ("Alex Sheftel")
  Re: Flour beer? ("Greg 'groggy' Lehey")
  Re: Wyeast 1968 London ESB Ale Yeast ("Greg 'groggy' Lehey")


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Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2006 08:48:49 -0500
From: "Greg Brewer" <gbrewer1 at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Bottles didn't carbonate

Many thanks to several folks who replied to my plea for ideas on what
to do with two cases of non-carbonated double IPA.  Based on their
suggestions, I moved the cases from my basement up to my warmer
bedroom at my bedside.  Every night for two weeks I inverted the cases
before going to bed, forcing the yeast to travel the length of each
bottle every day.  Last night I opened a test bottle and was thrilled
to find it adequately carbonated with an absolutely fabulous pure
white head that remained to the bottom of my glass!  I honestly did
not expect such a simple approach to work, and am glad I did not mess
around with opening each bottle and adding yeast or re-priming, which
I had considered doing.  Now the cases are back in the basement with
their brethren, and my wife can quit hazing me about sleeping with my
"precious babies"...

Cheers,

Greg in Chicago



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Date: Sat, 22 Apr 2006 22:52:33 +1000
From: Andrew Lavery <alavery at iprimus.com.au>
Subject: Re: Gluten Free Beer

Dennis O'Brien wrote:

>1. I use ProMash and am looking for potential SG data
>for various malts: millet malt, buckwheat malt,
>sorghum malt, sorghum syrup, quinoa malt, etc.
>  
>
A range of 1.032-34 should cover the malts, millet being the lowest.

>2. If anybody would care to give insights on the
>flavor and use of various gluten-free malts, it would
>be very helpful.  From what I have gleaned from
>various sources so far, millet malt seems to make a
>good equivalent for a base pale malt, buckwheat is an
>OK substitute for wheat, sorghum is OK but lends a
>sour taste, and there is no good equivalent for
>crystal. 
>Comments?
>  
>
Pretty close, sorghum also makes a good base and the sourness can be 
minimised by paying strict attention to bacteria control in malting.

Crystal can be done, it's just a matter of finding a variety of grain 
that has an overlap of the amylase temp range with the gelatinisation 
range.  I generally get around 50% conversion in my crystal, it's enough 
to develop the flavours and mouthfeel and the rest gets converted in the 
mash.

Focus on getting your pale malt right first though, without it you won't 
get anywhere fast.

Cheers, Andrew.
Ballarat, Victoria, Australia.


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Date: Sat, 22 Apr 2006 09:49:31 -0400
From: "steve.alexander" <-s at adelphia.net>
Subject: re: Amylase continues working?

Petr Otahal asks ...
 ... if amylases continue working in a whisky mash
(no mashout or boil).

The short answer is yes !  Some alpha-amylase survives the mash
(even a mashout) and will continue to degrade dextrins slowly,
but more thoroughly than you might expect.

Piggott et al, in "Whisky Technology" state that all malt wort
will have FG of 0.997 to 0.998.  They suggest other final
gravity figures (all less than 1.000) for other grain adjunct
additions.  They claim that high FG figures (around 1.0035, or
3.5 degrees) indicate that the raw grain adjunct was insufficiently
cooked (sic cereal mash)

>Last batch was 14P (1.056) 
>starting gravity and finished at 0.5P (1.002), [...]

Commercial whiskey wort begins a little stronger than yours
 and ends a little lower.   Good job Petr.  It sounds like
you should be looking for slightly more attenuation rather than
worrying about too much, but you're on the right path.

BTW, some limited lactobacteria activity in the whisky fermentation
is said to be desirable as this has a positive impact on the final
whisky flavor. It's almost unavoidable anyway.

To put this in perspective, beer fermentation achieves ~77%
apparent attenuation  or ~63% real attenuation, while the
~103% whisky apparent attenuations is ~83% real attenuation. So
whisky folk ferment abt 20% more of the total extract than beer
brewers.


 -S




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Date: Sat, 22 Apr 2006 13:02:57 -0700
From: "Michael Eyre" <meyre at sbcglobal.net>
Subject: Cereal Mash temp question...

Steve, 

If this is so, why do the distilleries (yeah, distilleries, not
breweries... afterall, they'r the ones using the most corn I can think
of in a mash) do a rolling boil on their corn and grains? If all that's
required is 62-74 degrees, what's up with the boil? I realize the
distilleries typically do some things differently that a brewery and I'm
not sure if that has anything to do with the difference, but if they
didn't have to boil, why would they do the whole process and waste the
energy/expense
of it all if the end result would be the same? 

Mike

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

Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2006 17:37:48 -0400
From: "steve.alexander" <steve-alexander at adelphia.net>
Subject: Re: Cereal Mash

A classic cereal mash involves mixing roughly 90% crushed raw grain
with about 10% crushed malt and then immediately stepping this to or
just above the raw grain gelatinization temperature.   Some ranges
for gelat temps for common raw grains (and others) are:
	maize(corn)	62C-74C
	sorghum		69C-75C
	rice		61C-78C
	wheat		52C-64C
	barley		60C-62C
	potato		56C-69C


The large ranges probably have to do with the substantial variation
of gelat temp as the fraction of amylopectin varies in (e.g. in waxy
grain varieties).  The actual gelat temp for a given sample is quite
well defined.  The point of the cereal mash is NOT complete conversion,
but efficient extraction of starch with enough alpha-amylase present
to free water and avoid retrogradation.

The amylopectin fraction of starch traps a *lot* of water molecules
and although other factors are involved, the primary purpose of the
cereal mash is to release the raw grist amylopectin, then chop these
up with the super-abundant alpha-amylase of the malt.  This allows the
cereal mash to avoid retrogradation (starch turning to glue and lost
to the wort) while using only a "normal" amount of mash water.
Without the alpha-amylase it requires some ridiculous amount of water
(~20qt/lb) to avoid retrogradation.








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Date: Sun, 23 Apr 2006 08:54:27 -0700
From: Jeremy Bergsman <nobody at comcast.net>
Subject: What do you think of this?

http://www.warenhaus-geissler.de/index.php?r=module/info.php&sel=25248

Reactions?
Search keywords: Germany upwards reverse recirculation RIMS
- -- 
Jeremy Bergsman
jeremy at bergsman.org
http://bergsman.org


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Date: Sun, 23 Apr 2006 20:44:46 -0400
From: "Jim Liddil" <jliddil at gmail.com>
Subject: shaarbeek cherries

>
> Date: Thu, 13 Apr 2006 08:36:15 -0400
> From: "Spencer W. Thomas" <hbd at spencerwthomas.com>
> Subject: Shaarbeek cherries
>
> As far as I know, the Shaarbeek cherry is not available in the US.  A
> couple of friends (Ken Schramm and Dan McConnell) wanted to grow some
> about a decade back.  They could get stock shipped from Belgium, but by
> the time it went through quarantine, it would likely be dead.

Well that is one way to tell the story, wink wink nudge nudge......

And as I recall Shaarbeek does not really exist.  But my memroy is
hazy from too many beers at that particular AHA event. :-) And Amy is
the expert.  If you have a tree you can sometimes request scion wood
if you know how to graft and you then have a tree that produces
various varieties.  Extension service folks are usually quite open to
giving out scion wood if they have what you want.  At least in  CT. My
next step now that my tree is mature enough is to start grafting.

>
> As far as I know, this cherry has not been commercialized in the US,
> either.  There is a new dark, sour cherry that some Michigan growers (at
> least) have picked up: the Balaton cherry
> (http://www.hrt.msu.edu/Balaton.html).  This cherry sounds to me like it
> would work better for a kriek-style beer than standard Montmorency
> ("pie") cherries.  It appears to be available by mail order from several
> sources.

I have a dwarf north star that produces quite well and is pretty
intensely sour.  They are small and the tree produces well, but I also
only grow organically and I have a cage around it to keep birds and
squirrels away.

Jim



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Date: Sun, 23 Apr 2006 20:50:16 -0400
From: "Alex Sheftel" <asheft at po-box.mcgill.ca>
Subject: Re: Wyeast 1968 London ESB Ale Yeast

Amazing coincidence: I was checking the Wyeast site for a description of 
their 1968 strain to see if it is a diacetyl producer when I saw this post! 
(I've got two beers in primary that I want to know when to rack).  From what 
I understand, after you think fermentation is more or less finished, you 
should leave the beer on the yeast for a few days for it to absorb the 
diacetyl.  Apparently, top fermenting yeasts are higher diacetyl producers 
than typical lager yeasts, but their high temperature fermentation quickly 
promotes the absorption and metabolism of the diacetyl that is produced. 
Thus, the diacetyl rest for an ale yeast is basically an extended primary 
fermentation time (as you suggested as one of your options).  I brewed my 
beers last weekend (Friday and Saturday / Brown Ale and Pale Ale) with this 
yeast; I'm going to rack them to secondary fermentors on Thursday and/or 
Friday.  Does anyone with more experience with this yeast have any 
suggestions for a diacetyl rest?


> Can someone explain to me how one conducts a diacetyl rest for this
> yeast that would look different than the fermentation itself?  Or does
> the author simply mean to allow the beer to remain at fermentation
> temperature for somewhat longer than is required to actually finish the
> fermentation?



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Date: Mon, 24 Apr 2006 10:51:56 +0930
From: "Greg 'groggy' Lehey" <grog at lemis.com>
Subject: Re: Flour beer?

On Tuesday, 18 April 2006 at 23:59:19 -0500, Gary Smith wrote:
> While waltzin' through Costco I passed by their huge
> bags of flour & I couldn't help but wonder if anyone's
> ever tried (with success) making beer from flour.
>
> Seems like the addition of some 6 row for enzymes
> might do the conversion but how to deal with the
> inevitable sludge? Husks? I sure wouldn't run it in my
> rims, that would be a nasty mess to clean afterwards.
>
> I'm not thinking high quality brew but just wondering
> what might be possible.

I used flour as an adjunct recently.  It gave quite a good beer, but
also the worst stuck sparge I've ever had.  You'd have to find a way
to avoid turning it into glue.

Greg
- --
Finger grog at lemis.com for PGP public key.
See complete headers for address and phone numbers.


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Date: Mon, 24 Apr 2006 10:54:27 +0930
From: "Greg 'groggy' Lehey" <grog at lemis.com>
Subject: Re: Wyeast 1968 London ESB Ale Yeast

On Friday, 21 April 2006 at  7:16:43 -0400, Fred L Johnson wrote:
> A description of Wyeast 1968 London ESB Ale Yeast includes the
> following:
>
> "Diacetyl production is noticeable and a thorough rest; 50-70 degrees
> F, (10-21 degree C) is necessary."
>
> Can someone explain to me how one conducts a diacetyl rest for this
> yeast that would look different than the fermentation itself?  Or
> does the author simply mean to allow the beer to remain at
> fermentation temperature for somewhat longer than is required to
> actually finish the fermentation?

I asked this question a while back, about the same yeast.  The
consensus was that you need to leave the beer on the yeast cake at
around 18<insert degree sign here> for a few days to allow the yeast
to convert the diacetyl.  That's what I did, and the resultant beer
was fine.

Greg
- --
Finger grog at lemis.com for PGP public key.
See complete headers for address and phone numbers.


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