FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES
		Rob Gardner, Digest Coordinator


Contents:
  Why Control a Refrigerator? (John DeCarlo)
  barley wines--yeast & technique (Tony Babinec)
  Re: high-temp ferment (korz)
  Temp Controllers ("Rad Equipment")
  Re: HefeweiBbier in CA (mcnally)
  Re: Re: Lager vs Ale malts? (korz)
  Wyeast Whitbread / Barleywine yeasts (korz)
  drinking in Cincinatti (Chip Hitchcock)
  Pubs in St. Louis (lindel holden)
  grolsch lager (Glenn Anderson)
  Re: Kegs, Thermostats, Jocky Boxes  Trub (Richard Stueven)
  Dishwashers and Bottles (KIERAN O'CONNOR)
  Green flakes, etc. (Jeff Frane)
  Dry hopping (Keith Winter)
  Sake' brewing...? (The Rider)
  lactobacillus/o-rings/thermostats/efficiency/recipes (korz)
  Root Beer (Thomas D. Feller)
  Re: Lager vs Ale malts? (Larry Barello)
  Culturing Yeast (Chris Estes)
  Re: lactobacillus culture (Norm Pyle)
  Red Ale Recipe Request (REYNOLDS BRIAN LEE)
  The St. Louis Brewing Company (ala Dave Miller) (whg)
  barley wines (Brian Bliss)
  Keg connects (John Freeborg)


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

Date: Tuesday, 21 Jul 1992 09:22:38 EDT
From: m14051 at mwvm.mitre.org (John DeCarlo)
Subject: Why Control a Refrigerator?

Jack S asks [and I paraphrased]:

[why use an external thermostat with a refrigerator?]

I don't know what Baderbrau does, but here are the general reasons for
using a thermostat with a refrigerator or freezer.

1) Most refrigerators are not designed to maintain a specific temperature.
   The temperature may vary by 5 to 10 degrees at a particular setting in
   many commercial fridges.

2) Calibrating a refrigerator (which setting keeps it closest to 48 F?)
   is a difficult process, particularly because of 1) above.  If you always
   wanted to ferment and lager at the same temperature, it might not be
   so bad.

3) [This doesn't yet apply to you and may never, Jack.] The temperature
   you choose to ferment at and to lager at depends on the particular
   yeast strain you use and the style of beer you are trying to achieve.
   If you vary these (and most homebrewers do), you may rarely ferment
   and lager at the same temperature twice in a row.

   A typical three-batch use may have a lager fermenting at 45F and then
   lagering at 38F.  Next week the brewer makes an ale and ferments it at
   65 F.  Two weeks later another lager, this recipe calling for fermenting
   at 42F and lagering at 35F.

   You can easily see how an external thermostat will greatly ease the job
   of this homebrewer.

Internet: jdecarlo at mitre.org (or John.DeCarlo at f131.n109.z1.fidonet.org)
Fidonet:  1:109/131

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 10:11:06 CDT
From: tony at spss.com (Tony Babinec)
Subject: barley wines--yeast & technique

Tom Bower asks about barley wines and the yeast to use.  I don't
have a lot of barley wine brewing under my belt, but here's my
experience.

I think the two yeasts mentioned are the obvious place to start.
One very good homebrewer uses Wyeast "American" ale almost exclusively
for his beers, including barley wines, and has gotten excellent results.
He says that he might try another yeast for barley wine.  His sensory
perception is very acute, at least compared to mine, and he smells stuff
that I don't; I thought his beer was just fine.  And Bigfoot Ale turns
out very nicely, especially for that gravity.

The Whitbread ale yeast is Wyeast "British."  I would use that in preference
to the dry whitbread ale yeast.  George Fix has commented on the three 
strains in the yeast, one of which is a high-alcohol performer.

I see no reason to go to a second yeast, such as a champagne yeast.  The
best commercial barley wines are made with house yeasts, and we should
be able to match that.  However, getting a properly attenuated beer from
the yeast is not necessarily straightforward.

I made a barley wine in March, and decided to use Whitbread.  The beer 
came out at about 1.086 starting gravity.  I left it in primary fermentation
for most of March, racked it to another carboy at the beginning of 
April, racked it again at the beginning of May, and bottled in early June.
One reason to give it such a long time is that you could see fermentation
activity in the carboy.  To keep the yeast going, I'd occasionally rouse
the yeast by swirling the carboy for a minute or so to stir things up.
Also, for reasons I'm not entirely clear on, it seems that dry hopping will
sometimes get a slowed fermentation going.  Either the hops (pellets are
easier to use here) provide a nucleus for suspended yeast, or there is 
something in the hops that gets the yeast going.  Or, maybe it was the
racking that did it.  In any event, in my experience, it needed a long
secondary fermentation.  Also, dry hopping makes sense for this beer.
Sorry, I don't have the brewing notes with me, so I don't have the final
gravity, but I'm pretty sure it was in the 1.020s.

You should add hops as much as you like.  For one thing, the large 
starting gravity in the boil pot means that proportionately more hops 
are needed to attain bitterness.  The huge, heavy maltiness of the
beer needs hop bitterness to offset it.  Add hops at different times 
in the boil, and dry hop.  The long aging, both in secondary and in the
bottle, means that hop character will change and fade over time.  These
beers can be stored for a long time, and you'll want to have one in a
year or two or more.

How did my barley wine turn out?  I haven't tasted it since bottling, and
should taste it one of these days to see how it's progressing.  With
bottling in June, I'm thinking that it might be drinkable towards
year-end.  It tasted good at bottling time.

One other thing:  how much priming sugar should you use at bottling?
I normally use 3/4 cup for 5 gallons, and I more or less halved that
amount.  You don't want a fizzy barley wine, and with all that malt
and sugar and a strong performing yeast, you don't want a gusher down
the line.  

Have fun!

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 10:08 CDT
From: korz at ihpubj.att.com
Subject: Re: high-temp ferment

Rick asks:
>What sort of off-flavors are caused by high-temp fermentations?

High-temperature fermentations cause an increase in the production
esters, a slight increase in the risk of bacteria reaching levels
of significance, an increase in the production of diacetyl and an
increase in the production of fusel (higher) alcohols.  The esters,
diacetyl and fusel alcohols, are not necessarily off-flavors unless
they are produced in such large quantities that they are distracting
or inapropriate for style (such as low-to-mid gravity lagers).  Note
that "high-temperature" is relative -- for an ale, temperatures over
75F are usually considered "high" whereas for lagers, temps over 50F
are usually considered "high."  Also, nothing starts suddenly at a
particular temperature, it's all a continium.

On a related note: if your yeast has a tendancy to create phenolics
(like Munton & Fison's Muntona yeast), it will create a more the higher
the fermentation temperature.

One factor that should also be addressed is that our brewing environment
may be different during warmer months: doors opening more often, open
windows, higher humidity (great for mold production), higher concentrarions
of wild yeasts as well as bacteria in the air, and warmer tapwater
(resulting in slower chilling if you use a tapwater-powered chiller).
Therefore, sanitation during warmer periods is much more important and
off-flavors can often be traced to problems in the environment.

Al.

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Date: 21 Jul 92 08:27:48 U
From: "Rad Equipment" <rad_equipment at rad-mac1.ucsf.EDU>
Subject: Temp Controllers

Subject:  Temp Controllers                      Time:8:20 AM     Date:7/21/92
Jack Asks:

>Baderbrau ferments, ages and bottles/kegs their beer at 50F.
>This is a high quality pilsner lager and any fridge I have
>ever seen can maintain 50F with no outside help.
 
>What am I missing?

Jack, my dispensing frige won't stay above 40 degrees at the lowest setting
with the original thermostat. It is about 15 years old, a basic no-frills 14.5
cubic foot 2-door.

RW...

      Russ Wigglesworth              CI$:      72300,61
|~~|  UCSF Medical Center            Internet: Rad Equipment at RadMac1.ucsf.edu
|HB|\ Dept. of Radiology, Rm. C-324  Voice:    415-476-3668 / 474-8126 (H)
|__|/ San Francisco, CA 94143-0628


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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 08:27:15 -0700
From: mcnally at wsl.dec.com
Subject: Re: HefeweiBbier in CA


	In HBD 929:

    Can't think of any other great beers that are also available in
    bottles represented yesterday, but one other mention is a
    hefeweizen from Gordon Birsch (of which I got the last glass!)
    which was very tasty. I don't believe they sell in bottles though.

I'm surprised that you liked this; the people I was with uniformly judged
it to be *way* too sweet and, well, just all wrong.  It simply tasted
bad to us.  All I can say is that the Hefeweizen from Twenty Tank was
even worse.  On the other hand, the Sudwerk (Privatbrauerei Heubsch)
Hefeweizen was excellent; they really seem to know how to do it.

Oh well.  To each his own.

_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
Mike McNally                                           mcnally at wsl.dec.com
Digital Equipment Corporation
Western Software Lab

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 10:32 CDT
From: korz at ihpubj.att.com
Subject: Re: Re: Lager vs Ale malts?

Jeff writes:
>Jim specializes in continental-style lager malts, which he says differ
>from ale malts in protein content due to a longer, more gradual increase
>in kilning temperature.  Ale malts have a shorter kilning time with a
>sharper upwards temperature curve.  The end result is that lager malts
>retain more proteins which are necessary to sustain the yeast over long
>lagering periods.

Just one minor addition: yeast can't use the proteins directly, they do
however, require the amino acids which make up these proteins.  The
protein rest that generally has been accepted as "required" for lager malts
is for the purpose of giving the proteolytic enzymes an opportunity to
break the proteins into amino acids.  According to Charlie's TCJoHB (and
probably TNCJoHB -- I've read both, but I'm sure it's in the original),
highly-modified malts have lower protein levels and higher levels of these
required amino acids.  Given that recent posts (Jeff's included) have
indicated that "all malts these days... are highly modified" I don't know
how much of the protein/amino acid issue (and subsequent importance of the
protein rest) is still true.  Comments?

Al.

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 10:44 CDT
From: korz at ihpubj.att.com
Subject: Wyeast Whitbread / Barleywine yeasts

Wyeast #1098 is (allegedly) the Whitbread 3-strain.

I would use Wyeast #1056, "American Ale" which is (allegedly) the
Sierra Nevada yeast.  Whereas the Whitbread is a fine yeast, I,
personally, feel that Whitbread beer has too "breadlike" a flavor,
so I've avoided Whitbread yeast.  If you like the flavor of Whitbread
beer, then you've got a choice.  I'd skip the wine yeast.

While I'm at it, someone (sorry) asked if Bell's beers have culturable
yeast in them.  They certainly do have yeast in the bottom of the
bottle, but I don't know if it's culturable -- try it.

Al.

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 11:46:55 EDT
From: cjh at diaspar.HQ.Ileaf.COM (Chip Hitchcock)
Subject: drinking in Cincinatti

   I will be accompanying a businees trip to Cincinatti in early October, which
means I'll have plenty of time on my own. Please send any recommendations for
brewpubs or microbreweries in the area (and, for that matter, anything else
you can recommend to do in a city that couldn't take Mapplethorpe...).

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 12:20:14 EDT
From: lindel holden <lholden at s850.mwc.edu>
Subject: Pubs in St. Louis

   Hi,

   I may be going to St. Louis for a couple days on business
   and was hoping there might be some good microbrews or pubs
   with good beer on tap in St. Louis inspite of the
   fact that half the town is owned by anheiser busch.
   Does any on HBD have any recommendations?

   you can send responses directly to me if you like.

   lindel holden
   internet - lholden at s850.mwc.edu


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Date: 	Mon, 20 Jul 1992 20:00:00 -0400
From: Glenn Anderson <glenn.anderson at canrem.com>
Subject: grolsch lager


I have tried to duplicate Grolsch Lager in several attempts with Dutch
lagers which have been what I consider "unsuccessful". I'm not sure if
it is the recipie or my water, or what.

I apologize for clutering the HBD with a recipie request but does 
anyone care to share with me a tried and true Grolsch emulator?

Thanks...GA
- ---
 þ DeLuxeý 1.21 #11377 þ Brewer fails CRC - More bottles than caps
- --
Canada Remote Systems  - Toronto, Ontario/Detroit, MI
World's Largest PCBOARD System - 416-629-7000/629-7044

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 09:49:29 PDT
From: gak at harirud.wrs.com (Richard Stueven)
Subject: Re: Kegs, Thermostats, Jocky Boxes  Trub

In HBD #929, arf at ddsw1.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling) writes:

> What am I missing?

This is a straight line if I ever saw one!

I'm not going to touch it, though...

:-)

gak
107/H/3&4

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 12:51 EDT
From: KIERAN O'CONNOR <OCONNOR%SNYCORVA.bitnet at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Subject: Dishwashers and Bottles

RE: Dishwashers. I found the dishwasher tip in the HBD about 8 months
ago or so.  Thanks to whomever put it there.

I put the dishwasher on the rinse cycle and then heat dry them.  I
thne bottle on the dishwasher door, so any spills go right into the
dishwasher.  I have the bottling bucket just above the dishwasher and
I use Phil's Philler.  W/ one hand I bottle and the other I get the
next bottle ready.  I haven't had any problems w/sanitizied bottles
(although people would agree that I certainly have other problems).

Kieran O'Connor

oconnor at snycorva.bitnet

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 10:07:24 PDT
From: gummitch at techbook.com (Jeff Frane)
Subject: Green flakes, etc.


First of all, a hearty THANK YOU to Tony Babinec for all the information
on Belgian malts.  I'd heard these were available, and had asked George
Fix a couple of questions about them, but this information is all I
needed and enough incentive to urge Steinbart's to start carrying them.
Is the Belgian Ale book referred to part of the AHA series?  I haven't
seen it, although I've been looking for it eagerly.

From: Glenn Anderson <glenn.anderson at canrem.com>

Glenn asks about little blue flakes coming out of his wort chiller.  
Sounds to me like verdigris--and it sounds like time to bring in
the chemists.  According to the dictionary, verdigris formed by the
action of acetic acid on copper is poisonous, while a deposit of
copper carbonates is not.  

What I don't understand is why they're appearing.  I've been using
the same counterflow wort chiller for about seven years and I've
never seen anything like that.

From: winter at cirrus.com (Keith Winter)
Subject: Dry hopping

>I'm pretty sure about the quantity of hops I want to use but I'm not 
>sure about how long to leave them in.  I usually secondary for about
>two weeks with most of my brews.  Is this long enough/too long if I 
>dry hop in the secondary?  

It's long enough, but ... Having dry-hopped 20+ batches, I've learned
there is a significant change over a longer period of time as the
beer slowly gathers hop character from the infusion.  My own experience
has been that the beer only really develops that incredible hop essence
after about 4 weeks.  (I'm able to determine this by the simple scien-
tific method: I drink the beer from the keg which is dry-hopped.  It
usually reaches its peak about the time it runs out!)

From: mfetzer at ucsd.edu (The Rider)
Subject: Sake' brewing...?

>Well, I've been challenged to brew a decent batch of Sake' and have to
>admit I know nothing about it. Some time ago someone mentioned that a
>fungus is responsible for converting the starch in the rice?

>Would any and all sake' brewing experts, novices, or wannabe's point 
>me in the right direction?

Michael Fetzer

You should contact Fred Eckhardt, who is publishing a sake newsletter
these days.  He also has a tested sake recipe.  Send him a note at
Box 546, Portland OR 97207.  In the next month or so, his book on
sake should have been to the printer and back.  It has a _lot_ of
information about sake -- more than you probably wanted to know!

- --Jeff Frane




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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 12:21 CDT
From: korz at ihpubj.att.com
Subject: lactobacillus/o-rings/thermostats/efficiency/recipes

Michael requests a source for Latobacillus.  If it's Lactic Acid bacteria
that you want, ask your retailer to order you Pedicoccus Cerevisiae from 
G.W. Kent in Ann Arbor Michigan.

Jack writes:
> >Additionally, since the o-rings are not in contact with the beer then
> the idea that even some minute residual odor will destroy the flavor
> profile of a malty beer seems very unlikely.
> 
> I would be interested to know how you think the o-ring seals without 
> contacting the beer.  My guess is that at least 30% of the large one sealing 
> the lid is exposed to beer on the inside.

I don't know at what angle you're storing your kegs -- I keep mine upright
and the only time the large o-ring touches the beer is during the carbonation
agitation.  My guess (I bought my kegs new) is that the o-rings *inside* as
well as outside the the disconnects (I'm only familiar with ball-lock) are
to blame for the cola/rootbeer/etc. flavors.  Foxx sells the little o-rings
for probably a dollar per dozen.  At that price, why bother keeping the
old ones?

> >From: korz at ihlpl.att.com
> >Subject: Fridge thermostats
> 
> >Roger suggests using the Honeywell thermostat for converting a fridge
> to our temerature range.
> 
> Just, pray tell, what is "our temperature range"?  I am having a hard time 
> not being bored with all this talk of fridge temp controllers.

Our temperature range is 32F-75F or so.  The original thermostats on all
my fridges (and especially my chest freezer) won't do any better than
40F.  You need to consider the apartment dwellers who simply don't have
a 65F basement or anyone who wants to brew lagers.

> Baderbrau ferments, ages and bottles/kegs their beer at 50F.  This is a high 
> quality pilsner lager and any fridge I have ever seen can maintain 50F with 
> no outside help.
> 
> What am I missing?

Maybe the insulation on your fridge is bad.  Under nomal circumstances
(now I'm lagering a bock in one fridge and trying to keep 40 pounds of
fruit frozen till I get a chance to brew with it in another), my two
"ale fridges" are set to 54F and my "lager fridge" (a little one, on which
I use the original thermostat) is about 37F.  On the issue of Baderbrau,
it's a *great* lager, but not a pilsner -- 50F is much too warm for
lagering a pilsner which (like Pilsner Urquell) are lagered at 33F.
50F is really at the warm end of lager fermentation.

> >From: Jeff Benjamin <benji at hpfcbug.fc.hp.com> `
> >Subject: Counterflow chiller plans, killer sparge gadget
> 
> >Tonight we just tried out some new lautering hardware that beats the
> Zapap lauter tun hands down (Charlie, how could you have lead us astray?
> :-).
> 
> >The manifold is made with about 5 feet of tubing, 4 tees, 5 endcaps, one
> elbow, and one step-down for matching the size of the plastic hose.
> 
> I am so glad people are beginning to see the light.  There are other ways of 
> doing things, aren't there?
> 
> You can go one step farther (closer) and use only 6 inches of tubing and a 4 
> X 6 inch piece of window screen, rolled into a tube and clamped on to the 
> tubing.  I have been using this since my first all grain batch and see no 
> reason to ever get any more complicated.

As you will recall when you first posted your window screen lautering system,
I said that it would probably give you lower extraction efficiencies.  A
short while ago, you posted a recipe and your extract efficiency was pretty
low, which could be due in part to other factors, but I'm sure that the
fact that your lautering system only draws runoff from the center is most of
your efficiency problem.  I checked my files and could not find your recipe,
but to the best of my recollection, it was 9 lbs of grain yielding 5 gallons
of 1045 wort.  This is 25 points per pound/gallon (45 * 5 / 9).  Many HBD
posters have reported 33 points and some even higher.  33 points would give
you 1059 from 9 lbs of grain.  Looks to me as if you're throwing away
(or composting or making bread from) 25% of your grain's sugars.

Larry writes:

>Al Korz chastisted me for including a partial recipe for Oatmeal Stout
>in HBD #924 (an article about mashing oats and other specialty grains).

Gee... I hope my email to you didn't sound too harsh.  All I meant to
say was that you gave the grains and hops for a recipe, yet you didn't
originally include the yeast (and in retrospect, the fermentation temperature).
I've found that the yeast makes the biggest contribution to the flavor
of a beer -- more so than ratios of grains or type of hops.  If one was
to try to duplicate your beer without knowing the yeast or fermentation
temp, their version would probably taste significantly different.

In general, when posting recipes, we all need to remember that thanks to
Mark Stevens and Karl Lutzen, our recipes have a much longer half-life.
Virtually any recipe that is posted will, eventually, end up in The Cat's
Meow.

Al.

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 10:34:42 PDT
From: thomasf at deschutes.ico.tek.com (Thomas D. Feller)
Subject: Root Beer



There have been a number of posts asking about Root Beer recipes, well I came 
across this,

					OLD FASHIONED ROOT BEER

"Use strong bottles with patent stoppers or tie corks in securely. Use a stone 
crock or granite vessell in which to let drinks stand while 'working.' Fresh 
roots from the woods are always preferable to dried herbs. Select a cool place 
in which to store the drinks; the longer they stand in a warm place after 
bottling, the more effervescent they will become! When filling bottles, fill to 
within an inch of the top.

1 cake compressed yeast					5 pounds sugar
2 ounces Sassafras root						1 ounce Hops or Ginger Root
2 ounces Juniper Berries						4 gallons water
1 ounce Dandelion root						2 ounces Wintergreen

Wash roots well in cold water. Add juniper berries (crushed) and hops. Pour 8 
quarts boiling water over root mixture and boil slowly 20 minutes. Strain 
through flannel bag. Add sugar and remaining 8 quarts water. Allow to stand 
until lukewarm. Dissolve yeast in a little cool water. Add to root liquid. Stir 
will. Let settle then strain again and bottle. Cork tightly. Keep in a warm room
5 to 6 hours, then store in a cool place. Put on ice as required for use."

The Fleishman Company, Excellent Recipes for Baking Raised Bread, 1912


I have never tried this recipes, always used extract for local homebrew store, 
but  I thought someone might find it useful.

Tom Feller

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 08:39 PDT
From: alm at brewery.intel.com (Al Marshall)

To: homebrew at hpfcmi.fc.hp.com
Subject: Various Schmidlings

 
>  
>  I would be interested to know how long you soaked them.  I never bought new 
>  ones but I have soaked them overnight in: bleach, 100% alcohol, vinegar, 
>  baking soda, lie water and several other things which now escape me.  I can 
>  still smell coke on all four of the ones I have.  One of them that was only 
>  casually soaked in bleach and carefully flushed with water, all but destroyed 
>  a batch of beer.  The taste of coke was so strong, the beer was barely 
>  drinkable.

I suffered with this also.  After spending portions of days messing around
with the old rubber on cornelius
kegs (and still smelling the soda-pop
stench), I paid a very modest fee (the dollar
amount is lost to my aging brain cells)
for a complete set of new rubber parts.
I would have done it sooner if I knew how cheap it
was.  The stainless steel cleans well with one of the hydroxide cleaners,
but that rubber seems to be a tough nut to crack.


> 
> Just, pray tell, what is "our temperature range"?  I am having a hard time 
> not being bored with all this talk of fridge temp controllers.
> 
> Baderbrau ferments, ages and bottles/kegs their beer at 50F.  This is a high 
> quality pilsner lager and any fridge I have ever seen can maintain 50F with 
> no outside help.

I have a refrigerator you haven't seen, and it would never go above 45F.
Moreover (due to some phenomenon I don't understand) when there was 
a primary fermentation in it, it would actually chill down to the high
30s.  My only attempt at a lager fermentation in this environment produced
a very sluggish primary ferment.  

I now have a Honeywell controller attached and am quite happy with the
results:  I have successfully done refrigerated
ale primaries of 65F in the summer
(when my house was in the high 80s).
If I ever try a pilsner, I'll go for the highest primary temp
I can get away with, which many people think is 50F.


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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 11:49:42 PDT
From: polstra!larryba at uunet.UU.NET (Larry Barello)
Subject: Re: Lager vs Ale malts?

In  HBD #929, Jeff Benjiman writes:
>...
>
>Jim specializes in continental-style lager malts, which he says differ
>from ale malts in protein content due to a longer, more gradual increase
>in kilning temperature.  Ale malts have a shorter kilning time with a
>sharper upwards temperature curve.  The end result is that lager malts
>retain more proteins which are necessary to sustain the yeast over long
>lagering periods.  Therefore, he says, you can use a lager malt to make
>an ale, but not the other way around.  He also stresses that lager malts
>will benefit from a multi-step mash to extract these proteins, whereas
>ale malt can be used for a one-step infusion and achieve the same
>protein extraction.

Although I don't doubt the accuracy of your buddies statements, classical
liturature on brewing/mashing (e.g. The Practical Brewer) make it pretty
clear that the lower temperature protein rests are to provide short amino
acid chains that the yeast can use for a nitrogen source.  Intermediate
length chains contribute mouthfeel and body.  Longer chains cause chill
haze.  Over cleaved protein (e.g. too long a protein rest) can cause head
retention problems as well as insipid mouth feel.

>From your description, Ale malts should have more longer chains - due to
the shorter time that they are kilned at temeprature that favor protolitic
enzymes (pardon my spelling).  In fact (from memory, no reference at hand)
the longer germination time (aka over modification) is what is responsible
for the availablility of free amino nitrogen (FAN) without the protein 
step in mashing.  Lager malts (classic undermodified) presumably have more
of the starch locked up in the steely endosperm with long interlocking 
protein chains.  The protein rest is needed here to generate FAN, reduce
long chains (chill haze) and liberate the starch for sugar conversion.
>
>Larry Barello posts that "The bottom line is that step mashing is
>probably a quaint practice that is a hangover from big commercial
>breweries that use lots of rice and corn (where step mashing is still
>needed)."  According to Jim, this isn't the case.  A step mash is useful
>for ensuring a high-protein wort, not for converting adjuncts (though it
>may be helpful there as well).  We all agree, however, that in terms of
>enzymatic power and sugar extraction, lager and ale malts are
>comparable.

I was not being clear:  The step mash is to generate more FAN since the
corn and rice has such low quantities to begin with.  Stepping has nothing
to do with starch conversion, per se.  The fully modified grains 
available today don't have a problem with long proteins or insufficient 
FAN for yeast growth.  With undermodified malts (which we agree are 
probably unavailable today) the step mash is needed for chill haze and 
starch release as well as FAN.  
>
>Jim also maintains that the difference between US and UK pale malts is
>that UK barley is grown in soils that are less heavily fertilized with
>artificial fertilizers and therefore have a lower nitrogen content.

Please get some references from you buddy.  The above statement sounds
like cow doodoo to me.  ALso, run my statements, above, by your friend.
I don't mind being corrected if the state of the art has changed recently.

I hope folks don't find this article too long.  This is an interesting
subject that has pretty broad implications on how much work we homebrewers
do to get award winning beers.  One reason I got started on this is that 
I observed many commercial micro-brewers using single step infusion mashing
using various "lager" malts (e.g. GWM Pale Malt) and wondered why they 
were getting excellent results with so little work.  Another tidbit to
chew on.  Many use relatively high temperatures too, like around 160f
for the single step.  Perhaps that is to compensate for the minimal use
of expensive specialty malts?

Cheers!

 - Larry Barello

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 15:53:49 -0400
From: cestes at argos5.DNET.NASA.GOV (Chris Estes)
Subject: Culturing Yeast


I was wondering if anyone out there could give me some pointers on the
best methods of culturing yeasts from beer (SNPA in particular).  I know
that its available from Wyeast, but lets hypothesize...

If I were cheap and lazy (which of course I am not!) would the following
scenario be possible and if not, why not? :  During the course of brewing
my next batch of beer, I (perhaps with some help) drink a six pack of
SNPA, leaving 1cm or so of beer (and yeast sediment) in the bottle (beer
is to be drank from a glass - no lips on bottle).  When my brew is done,
I swish the yeast sediment up and dump the bottles into my primary.

Will this work?  Must I do more to use Sierra Nevada's yeast?

Just wondering...

 -Chris Estes-

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 13:21:31 MDT
From: pyle at intellistor.com (Norm Pyle)
Subject: Re: lactobacillus culture


lg562 at koshland.pnl.gov asks:

>I have a friend that would like to obtain a culture of Lactobacillus.
>Could anyone provide me with a starter or point me in a direction
>where I can get a starter for him?  Many thanks!

Well, I'm not yet sure, but I may have one in my current pale ale.  I'll let
you know in a few days... :-) :-(...

Norm

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 14:31:02 -0600
From: REYNOLDS BRIAN LEE <reynolds at spot.Colorado.EDU>
Subject: Red Ale Recipe Request



Hi

I am new to brewing and since i have a few batches
in the fridge already i would like to solicit a recipe
for a red ale.  My favorite kind of beer.  I am looking 
for an extract/specialty grain recipe (no mashing) to
imitate beers like:  Chicago Legacy Red Ale, Red Rocks Red
(Rock Bottom Brewery, Denver), or Red Robin Red Ale (Boulder
Brewery).

thanks 

bri
reynolds at spot.colorado.edu

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 09:45:07 CDT
From: whg at tellabs.com
Subject: The St. Louis Brewing Company (ala Dave Miller)


I recently visisted Dave Miller's Brewpud/Micro-Brewery.  It's in a pretty
strange part of town in St. Louis (21st and Locust).  The brewery is called
the St. Louis Brewing Co. (or something very close to that) and the attacted
bar/restaurant is called the Tap Room.  The atmosphere is quite nice. It's 
the old factory/wharehouse motif, with lots of bare wood and duct work. The
brewery is in plain view behind a big glass wall so you can gaze enviously
at the equipment as your wine and dine (beer and dine?). The food was 
quite good by the way.

And now what you've all been waiting for da' beersss.  They had six beers 
on tap and the bartender was perfectly willing to give you an ounce or so
of each for a grand total of $0.00. Let's see they had:

Pilsner - Didn't try it but probably should have as it's Miller's fav style.
Weizen -  very sour, definately in the Berliner Wiess arena
American Wheat Ale - Boring, definately for the adventureless yuppsters.
ESB - Very clean bitter much like a fresh Fuller's.
Irish Stout - Black and creamy as you'd expect.

There may have been one more but my memory is foggy.  My overall impession
is that all the beers were technically excellent. Not a flaw could be found.
But honestly, they all seemed to be so good as to be almost sterile and 
adventureless.  All of these beers would do very well in competions as they
are faultless and perfectly examplify the style, but somehow they lack depth
in their character. These are of course my admitedly non-expert opinion.

The best brew in the house was the guest beer Bully Porter form the ***** 
brewery in Colorodo (does anyone know who brews this?). I only got half a 
glass sinse the keg was running out, but it was chewy and chocolately
and just all around yummy.



Walter Gude    ||   whg at tellabs.com


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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 23:41:45 CDT
From: bliss at csrd.uiuc.edu (Brian Bliss)
Subject: barley wines

From: Tom Bower <bower at hprnlme1.rose.hp.com> writes:
>I've got barleywine on the brain, and am looking forward to making one now
>for this winter's consumption.  It'll be my first attempt, and I have a 
>question:  I haven't seen much consensus on what yeast to use...  
>
>There seem to be several schools of thought:
>
>        - Use a wine yeast (exclusively)
>        - Use an ale yeast (exclusively)
>        - Use an ale yeast to start, then add a wine yeast later to finish
>
>At the moment, I'm leaning toward using a hardy ale yeast;  the triple-strain
>Whitbread comes to mind, as (from what I read here on the HBD) it contains one
>strain which will survive the higher alcohol levels.  Also, I imagine the
>SNPA American Ale yeast may do, since SN uses it for the Bigfoot.  I'm trying
>to look at this barleywine as a strong beer rather than as a wine, and hope-
>fully de-emphasize the wineyness.  All you barleywiners, what say ye??

I've only made two batches which could be considered barleywines - 
I usually chicken out and go for something slightly lighter (but not much)

batch 25: 

20 lb lager malt
1/2 lb crystal malt
5 lb munich malt
1 lb roasted lager malt
2 tsp gyspsum
1 hr 15 min protein rest 132 - 115 F
mash 152 F w .5 oz amylase enzyme for 2.5 hrs
mash out 165-172F
sparge with 168F H20 to make 11 gal
siphoned off to make 9 gal sweet wort at 1.064 (i.e. the sparge stuck,
  so I stirred it up, letting husk material into the sweet wort.
  I then let it settle, and siphoned off the husks -
  note the substandard extraction rate)
26.5 g 5.6% AA Goldings leaf 1:40
25 g hallertau leaf 1:40
26.5 g 5.6% AA Goldings leaf :50
25 g hallertau leaf :50
7-14 g hallertau leaf :40 (scales became unbalanced)
7-14 g hallertau leaf 10:30
 .75 tsp irish miss :10
cooled to 88 F, pitched WHITBREAD ALE yeast
OG 1.090, racked after 1 week G 1.034, bottled 1 week later
 w 4 oz (by weight) corn sugar, FG 1.034

I wrapped it in a cold towel, but there was so much heat
released from the fermentation that it became quite warm.
After 36 hrs I put it in a bucket of 70F water.

I submitted it to the AHA's homebrew contest this year.  Both judges
said "not enough alcoholic punch" and "not enough hops" for a barleywine,
and both gave it a 27, though from the breakdown of the scores, I got
the impression that they agreed on the 27 beforehand, and then somehow
tried to justify it (since 27 corresponds to "not true to style").
Both agreed that it was well-brewed, malty, estery.   1 judge said
slight chill haze and the other said somewhat astringent.

Maybe it made a better scotch ale,
But I loved her, and she's gone, captain.


then there's batch 29:

10 lbs schreirer 2-row
5 lbs munich
1 lb wheat
323 g crystal malt
1/5 tsp salt
1/2 tsp epsom salt
1 tbsp gypsum
4.5 gal 145 F water to make mash ph 5.3 
protein rest 126-120 30 min
mash 153F for 2:50
mash out 165-170
sparge water ph 5.8 to make 8.5-9 gal wort
1-3lb 5oz can glenbrew hopped scotch bitter 1:25
1/2 oz 4.2% AA fuggle plug 1:14
1/2 oz 4.1% AA hallertau leaf 1:14
1/2 oz 4.2% AA fuggle plug :40
1/2 oz 4.5% AA fuggle pellet :40
1/2 oz 4.1% AA hallertau leaf :40
1/2 oz 4.2% AA fuggle plug :13
1/2 oz 4.5% AA fuggle pellet :13
made 4 gal, sG 1.099 wort
pitched Wyeast Belgian Ale starter - ferment at 65-70 F
  for 6 weeks. FG 1.031   bottled w 100 g corn sugar.

After 3 months in the bottle, there is still very little carbonation.
I definitely should have added more yeast at bottling time.
The beer tastes more like a port than a barleywine.
Very little hop character.  It's a belgian strong ale like I wanted,
but not quite what I was aiming for.  I'll see what time does to her.

anyway, I've used up my bandwith to this congested digest today,
My vote: go for the whitbread ale, keep the temp high for the early
fermentation if you want an estery product.

Oh, and on the subject of oatmeal stouts - Does anybody else
think that Sam Smith's has a bacon flavor?  How does a
Bacon stout sound?

bb

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Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 20:00:53 CDT
From: johnf at persoft.com (John Freeborg)
Subject: Keg connects


I just ordered the kegging equipment today so of course now I have a
question!  I have (3) pin lock soda kegs which used to contain diet coke and
sprite.  Somebody posted a message about how to disassemble the in/out
connectors so they can be cleaned.  I tried to do this on one of my
kegs and came to the conclusion that I was probably going to rip the valve
off before it ever came apart.  Am I doing this wrong?  Do they come out
(easily)?  Are the small o-rings everybody talks about the ones I see
on the outside of the valve housing?  I have the large 3-4" diameter
o-rings for the main opening, but I ordered some replacement o-rings
for the valves.  Are there more o-rings inside the valves I should be
concerned about?  Is there any way to clean the downtube easily?

Are there *bad* consequences that can happen if your CO2 tank tips over
on its side (other than trashing the gauges)?  Does the liquid CO2 enter
the keg - or freeze the line so bad it snaps apart?  Or am I worrying too
much.....

I'm also in the new apartment hunting mode at the moment and am wondering
how other people use their propane cookers.  I've got a King Kooker propane
burner which works great.  However, I may have to brew on my patio in
the new apartment.  Not a problem for most of the year, but this is
Wisconsin so doing it during Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb is probably not feasible.
Do other people use these things inside?  I've heard of using them
in basements, but what about well ventilated kitchens (sounds like
inviting disaster to me...).  I can just see the fire investigator asking
me how the fire started - "Well, you see I was in the middle of brewing
this awesome stout when a boil over occurred and all hell broke loose...".

 - John

- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Freeborg          Software Engineer         Persoft
johnf at persoft.com                                465 Science Dr.
608-273-6000                                     Madison, WI 53711

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End of HOMEBREW Digest #930, 07/22/92