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


Contents:
  dry beaning (dave ballard)
  Brewpubs in SF (Hal Laurent)
  really low O.G. question (SMITH)
  wyeast "munich" #2308 (Tony Babinec)
  Gammel Brygd (George J Fix)
  wyeast "belgian" ale experiences (Tony Babinec)
  re: oats in extract brews (mcnally)
  Byron's Mead and Micha's comment (GEOFF REEVES)
  Hops, PPWhat?, Mills  (Jack Schmidling)
  Re: hard cider query (Richard Childers)
  Coors & Civil War era Brewerys (yoost)
  beer (SLNDW)
  Papazian's Propensity Pilsner Lager (John Chervinsky)
  Adjunct Clarification (Get it?) (Glenn Tinseth)
  Beer and Food; ppm <--> mg/l (Pat Lasswell)
  RE:cookers BTU (Paul dArmond)
  Re:  1056 Slow Fermentation ("John Cotterill")
  Miller Reserve Draft (Guy D. McConnell)
  Wyeast 1056 Info (Was: 1056 Slow Fermentation) ("John Cotterill")


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

Date: 16 Sep 1992   8:16 EDT
From: dab at blitzen.cc.bellcore.com (dave ballard)
Subject: dry beaning



Hey now-  I saw someone's posting of a x-mas brew recipe that had some
vanilla extract in it.  That got me thinking about doing a porter with 
some form of vanilla in it.  I'm assuming that alot of the aromatics
of vanilla extract would get scrubbed away either in the boil or primary
fermentation so I figured on putting a tablespoon or two into the 
secondary.  A little more pondering led to the thought of tossing 
a vanilla bean or two (or three) into the secondary as a sort of
dry hop process.

So what do you think?  I've never really used whole vanilla beans for
anything so I'm not too sure about their characteristics.  I know you
have to slit them open and scrape out the guts, but that's about it.
Is 2 or 3 beans too much?  Any head-reducing oils involved?  Anyone?
Anyone?

thanks
dab

=========================================================================
dave ballard			
dab at cc.bellcore.com            
=========================================================================


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 09:45:02 EDT
From: Hal Laurent <laurent at tamdno.ENET.dec.com>
Subject: Brewpubs in SF

In HBD #970, Todd Vafiades asked about brewpubs in San Francisco.
For the most varied and extensive collection on draft, I recommend
that he head across the bay to the Pacific Coast Brewing Company in
downtown Oakland.  You can take BART there from S.F. (I think it's
near the 12th St. station).  PCBC carries around 30 different beers
on tap at a time, five or so that they make themselves.  They have
quite a variety of styles.  You'll have no trouble finding something
different than you're used to.

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Date:    Wed, 16 Sep 1992 9:27:23 -0500 (CDT)
From: SMITH at EPVAX.MSFC.NASA.GOV
Subject: really low O.G. question

greetings humans.

I've got a troubleshooting question for you folks.  Last night I brewed up
a Christmas ale-type wort, using the below recipe:

Woolypate Christmas '92

Steep in 1 1/2 gal water at 155 degF for 30 min:  1 lb 10 degL crystal
  malt, 1/4 lb chocolate malt, 1/4 lb cara-pils, 1/4 lb flaked barley
Add 6 lb Breiss pale extract, 6.6 AAU Fuggles, 1 cup blackstrap molasses,
  6 oz. diced/peeled ginger; boil 45 min.
During last 10 min. of boil, add:  10 1" cinnamon stix, 15 cracked
  cardamom pods, 1 tsp nutmeg, 12 cracked allspice, zest of 4 oranges
Cool, add to carboy to make 5 gal, and pitch Wyeast Irish Ale at 78 degF.
Future:  maybe dryhop with 1/2 oz Saaz if I feel like it.

However.  Upon measuring O.G. of this mixture, it read only 1.020!  (yes,
I remembered the temperature conversion.)

I see several possibilities:

1)  my hydrometer is seriously ill
2)  this liquid extract was diluted by the supplier in the store (I bought
    bulk by mail order).  **
3)  the 5-gal mark on a 5-gal carboy is not where I think it is.  I'm
    using a 7-gal for the first time and marked the 5-gal point by filling
    up a 5-gal carboy, pouring this into the 7-gal, and marking the level.
4)  IT'S ALL BREISS' FAULT!  (sorry, couldn't resist)
5)  the ever-popular "other"

**  I thought it seemed a little thin.  I won't say
    where I got it unless the other two 6-lb jars turn out to be thin.

2) seems a little outrageous, as does 3) and 4).  1) would require a
sudden change in my hydrometer, it used to work fine.

Could anyone suggest a way to find out what happened?  And a way to add
some oomph to this brew if it's actually as thin as it seems?


|    James W. Smith, NASA MSFC EP-53    |     SMITH at epvax.msfc.nasa.gov      |
|    I'm so depressed.  If I didn't have so much to do, I'd be a nihilist.   |
|     Neither NASA nor (!James) is responsible for what I say. Mea culpa.    | 


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 10:05:43 CDT
From: tony at spss.com (Tony Babinec)
Subject: wyeast "munich" #2308

Here is the description from Wyeast of their "Munich" #2308 strain:

"Munich Yeast from Wissenschaftliche in Munich #308.  One of the
first pure yeast available to American homebrewers.  Sometimes
unstable, but smooth, soft, well-rounded, and full-bodied.  Medium
flocculation, apparent attenuation 73-77%.  Optimum fermentation
temperature:  50 degrees F."

Homebrewers should not be discouraged from using this yeast, as it
produces great lagers.  It is often described as "unstable," and I
think what is meant by that is that it can produce sulphury aromas
and flavor notes.

I'm not sure what is meant by "optimum fermentation temperature" in
the Wyeast description,  but I'll guess that it means this:  if you
ferment colder, you're needlessly slowing down the primary
fermentation; if you ferment much warmer, you'll speed up the
fermentation at the expense of true lager flavor (for example,
undesired "fruitiness").

What has worked well for me is this:  ferment for 3 to 4 weeks at
48/50 degrees F.  When you sense that fermentation is dramatically
slowing, which is evident both from the drop in krausen and the
slowing of the fermentation lock, step the temperature up to 60 F
to encourage diacetyl reduction and the completion of fermentation. 
See Byron Burch's comments on this yeast in his article in the
Yeast Special Issue of Zymurgy.

Also, in the latest Zymurgy, George Fix has an interesting article
on sulphur flavors in beer.  At one point, he talks about
experimenting with this yeast and conducting a 3-step fermentation
that starts cold (mid-40s) versus a constant temperature
fermentation.  

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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 10:02:15 CDT
From: gjfix at utamat.uta.edu (George J Fix)
Subject: Gammel Brygd

Thanks to Kurt Swanson for giving all of us the tip about the Swedish beer 
Gimmel Brygd. Neither Laurie or I have had the pleasure of tasting this beer. 
The black malt tones suggest something along the lines of the late but not 
forgotten Noche Bueno. We will send out requests to see if someone will send 
us some. (Kurt??? We will be glad to exchange, and send you some of ours.)

George Fix
 


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 10:37:10 CDT
From: tony at spss.com (Tony Babinec)
Subject: wyeast "belgian" ale experiences

I've made a few beers with Belgian yeasts.  When I was making the
first one, I didn't know at what temperature to ferment the beer.
Some brewers advised cold, and others advised warm.  Since then,
I've read Pierre Rajotte's superb "Belgian Ales," and he has
settled the question for me.  Rajotte says that Belgian brewers
will ferment their beer warm, up to 86 degrees F.  If you think
about it, in using Belgian yeasts, you are looking for flavor notes
from esters, phenols, and the like, imparted by these yeasts,
and warm temperatures will encourage exactly this.

The first Belgian-style beer I made was with bottle-cultured Chimay
yeast.  I bought the freshest Chimay Red I could find, drank it
(yum!), and pitched the dregs into some starter wort.  I plated out
some yeast, and isolated and built some up.  The beer made with
this yeast was fermented at a winter basement ambient temperature
of 60/62 degrees F.  The resulting beer had that Chimay character,
although it was no rival for the real thing, and it did have some
banana-ester and "bubblegum" flavors.  I don't know what effect the
temperature had, although I believe a warmer ferment would have led
to more pronounced flavors.  I also don't know how healthy the
yeast were, although to all appearances they performed well.  The
good news is that over time the banana and bubblegum flavors have
receded and a phenol flavor, sort of spicy like cinnamon on the
tongue, has come forward.  All in all, it's an enjoyable Abbey-
style beer.  So, I'd say give the beer some time in the bottle,
especially as these beers tend to be high gravity beers.

I've used Wyeast "Belgian" on a couple occasions.  In one instance,
I moved the carboy to a relatively warm room, and fermented at
about 76 degrees F.  The resulting beer was recently bottled, and
tasted great at bottling time.  I don't know whether Wyeast
"Belgian" is Chimay, but they produce similar flavors.  The net
effect is a big plus to homebrewers.  The homebrewer doesn't need
to go through the effort of bottle-culturing Chimay, as Wyeast
"Belgian" is readily available.  This opens up a whole range of
styles.  See Rajotte's book for many recipe ideas.  By all means,
obtain bottled beers and try to isolate their yeast, but know that
the "Belgian" yeast is available.

The above experiences are anecdotal and don't really prove
anything.  But, again, my sense is to ferment warm or at ambient
temperatures, and make no special effort to ferment cool.

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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 08:47:37 -0700
From: mcnally at wsl.dec.com
Subject: re: oats in extract brews


What exactly is the point of adding oats to an otherwise all-extract
beer?  I can't imagine it's possible to get any oat flavor without 
really boiling and mashing the oats.

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

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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 10:28:19 -0600
From: 105277 at essdp1.lanl.gov (GEOFF REEVES)
Subject: Byron's Mead and Micha's comment


> From: walter at lamar.ColoState.EDU (Brewing Chemist)
>
> Also I question whither this mead won Byron that prize, 
> or he won it for some other reason, known only to the AHA.
>                                Micah 
  
I probably shouldn't but I take ofence to this comment for two reasons.
Whatever other complaints one might have about the AHA, how it is run,
or how it handles various activities, the judgings are run as fairly
as possible. Since I'm a judge myself I have personal experience and
am probably inclined to take the comment more personally than intended.
Furthermore a friend of mine (and member of our club), Gordon Olsen,
judged the meads in the finals. He was once meadmaker of the year
and knows his meads. Not only did he come back raving about this mead
but he would never take part in any 'fixing' of the competition.

I'm the first to admit that the quality of judging isn't as consistently
high as I would like but no one who is thinking about submitting a
beer to the competition should be discouraged by any thoughts that they
don't have as good a chance of winning as anyone else.

Geoff Reeves
Atomic City Ales


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 09:03 CDT
From: arf at ddsw1.mcs.com (Jack Schmidling)
Subject: Hops, PPWhat?, Mills 

 
 To: Homebrew Digest
 Fm: Jack Schmidling
 
 >From: korz at iepubj.att.com
 >Subject: Hop yields Midwest (with caveat)
 
 >My four, 2nd-season plants had these yields after drying:
 
 Nugget      -- 2 ounces
 Wilamette   -- 1 ounce
 Hallertauer -- perhaps 1/4 ounce
 Hersbrucher -- perhaps 1/8 ounce
 
 Just for reference... my four, 1st season plants (all Chinook) produced
 1.5 oz after drying.  Just enough for a batch to compare with commercial.
 
 All of the hops came from one plant.  Two of them were the original plants I 
 bought in mid-Winter and the other two, I propigated from stems off these 
 two.
 
 The original plants are both about 15 feet tall but one is completely barren. 
 The freebees are about 5 feet tall with no flowers either.
 
 >From: gjfix at utamat.uta.edu (George J Fix)
 >Subject: Belgium Malt
 
 Just a note for the health nuts.....  I had a chat with Siebel's yesterday to 
 learn more about their malt.  I would love to find a local source instead of 
 having to have it shipped from Minnesota.
 
 My first question was, "is it direct or indirect kilned?"  He was a bit 
 flustered at first and the upshot was that he really didn't know.  He stated 
 emphatically that the nitrosamine level was 4 PPB.  I think what he meant to 
 say was that it is less than 4.  This is the FDA standard and was arrived at 
 by asking the maltsters how low they could get it without converting to the 
 indirect method.  So, when someone says 4, you can pretty well bet it is not 
 indirectly kilned, which results in less than one or undetectable levels.
 
 That point aside, my question is, are we talking PPB or PPM?   In 
 conversations with Bries, the limit was stated as 4 PPM.  It doesn't make 
 much difference from a practical standpoint but it is hard to sound 
 convincing when one could be off by a factor 1000.
 
 >From: Kinney Baughman <BAUGHMANKR at CONRAD.APPSTATE.EDU>
 >Subject: The cost of a Corona
 
 >Richard Stueven writes:
 >Subject: Why Should I Buy a Grain Mill?
 
 It is most interesting that, with almost 200 MALTMILLS and tens of thousands 
 of Coronas out there, all we have heard so far are reasons NOT to own a grain 
 mill.   So to balance the discussion, I will offer my totally unbiased 
 opinion.
 
 Clearly, the reason is not to save money.  I built my first mill because the 
 only source for nitrosamine-free malt (that I am aware of) does not crush it.  
 I was left with taking it the local brew shop to be pulverized on his 
 "modified" coffee grinder.  
 
 I suspect that everyone who makes the plunge can supply his own reason but I 
 would guess that the major reason is that it just makes brewing that much 
 more fun to have all the right equipment.  Once a person decides to have the 
 right equipment, the cost (within reason) is not all that important.  This is 
 probably also the reason why many folk opt to spend even more money for a 
 roller mill.
 
 Although they both do an excellent job at what they were designed to do, one 
 was designed to crush malt for homebrewers and the other was designed to 
 grind corn for tortillas.
 
 I make tortillas, BTW and wouldn't mind having a Corona.  Grinding corn in a 
 blender is another good example of not having the right equipment but then, I 
 don't take tortillas as seriously as I do beer.
 
 js
 

p.s.  The above was written before reading this mornings Digest and I was
glad to see Korz bring up that old article.  My recollection is that the
pub crushed it to start the brew at night but if something came up that put
it off till the morning, they had to increase the grain my 10%.  Mighty
hard to believe but great for mill promotion.  

I have made the last last two batches in a manner that simulates the 
$5000 machines with multiple rollers and screens and it made absolutely
no difference.  I ran the malt through with the spacing set at about .075
and then again at about .030.  I still get that boringly consistang yield
of 28 pts/lb/gal.

jjs
Z.

Oops.. looks like I did it again.  Dont know how to fix it.


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 10:49:16 PDT
From: Richard Childers <rchilder at us.oracle.com>
Subject: Re: hard cider query

> Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 08:38:56 -0400 (EDT)
> From: Shaun Vecera <sv11+ at andrew.cmu.edu>
> Subject: hard cider query
> 
> Any good (and relatively easy) hard cider recipes out there?  Any
> responses will be appreciated!
> 

I picked up a pamphlet this last weekend, after having the opportunity
of tasting some hard apple cider at a local bar in San Francisco ...

Picking my way carefully through the maze of options I was cognizant of
in the realm of apple cider production, I arrived at the following recipe.

	purchase	1 gallon of unfiltered cider
			1 packet of champagne yeast ( or white wine )
			1 size 9-1/2 rubber plug with hole
			1 vapor lock of your favorite variety

	heat		1 gallon of cider, in jug, to 160 F, using candy
			thermometer, water bath ( large pot ) and wooden
			spoons ( as insulators from the bottom, for jug ),
			to 'terminate' any infectious agents, with cap
			loosely attached to top of jug, for  at  30-60 mins.

	Tighten cap, allow to cool to room temperature.

	Add ( re-hydrated ) yeast to apple juice, attach vapor lock.

This brings us up to the present. The apple juice is fermenting nicely.
It took a day or two to start, but now it's quite productive, foaming up
and into the vapor lock, which I'm changing about twice a day.

Next time, I'll insert a short plastic piece of pipe into the stopper,
and attach a piece of tubing, guided into an overflow container, to
avoid this messy business, and attach a real vapor lock later in the
sequence, after fermentation has mellowed out a bit.

A few caveats :

	(1)	I have no idea where this will end up.	(-:	I'm making
		a guess that from here on, it will conform to regular ways
		of dealing with fermented solutions, including the option
		of multiple fermentations, and a precipitate on the bottom
		that will include living yeast cells that can be recycled.

	(2)	There seem to be several ways to approach this business
		of 'pasteurization'. First off, when you buy it, it is
		most likely already pasteurized, to extend shelf life,
		even if you buy it from an organic food store, as I did.

		Methods include the addition of various chemicals, as
		well as slow heating over a long period of time, and a
		quick heating to a precise temperature for no more than
		fifteen seconds. The tradeoff is between changing the
		flavor versus entertaining an infective agent which will
		ruin the batch. Experimentation is indicated. Keep the
		temperatures low. ( One interesting approach was to do
		the pasteurization after the bottling !! )

	(3)	There seem to be several schools of thought regarding the
		proper yeasts. As has been noted here by several others,
		the 'real' cider yeasts exist on the skin of the apple and
		are a part of the ecology, not easily isolated, best dealt
		with as a synergy. This school of thought regards the above
		sequence of pasteurization and the addition of foreign yeast
		colonies, I suspect, as an abomination. They might be right.
		But this was once true for every drink brewed on the planet,
		and is no longer, and we seem to be coping OK.	(-:

	(4)	There is considerable agreement that the type of apple is
		important, and that blending gives the best results. For
		this reason, I chose my apple juice with care, selecting
		one that named the species used. 'Delicious' apples are not
		inappropriate, but should be modified by the addition of
		some crab, pippin, or other small apples, for acidity.

- -- richard

=====
- -- richard childers		rchilder at us.oracle.com		1 415 506 2411
         oracle data center  --  unix systems & network administration

                    Klein flask for rent. Inquire within.


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 13:04:05 -0500
From: yoost at judy.indstate.edu
Subject: Coors & Civil War era Brewerys


These aren't related !

First Coors takes a real bashing and rightfully so but .........

Don't bash them too hard until you've tried Coors Winterfest.

Only brewed at Christmas time and difficult to get.


This beer has a lot of character and can be ranked right up there with

some of the Micro Brews.


Next , while visiting Terre Haute, IN . I got drug into an antique store

by my wife only to find that the antique mall was an old Civil war era

Brewery at one time and the owner had researced the history and found that

the brewery is underground about 30 ft. for lagering. and they actually brewed

underground.


He hopes to find some old equipment while excavating the underground I'll

keep the HBD posted.

 -John W. Yoost

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Date: 16 Sep 1992 12:27:57 -0600 (MDT)
From: SLNDW at CC.USU.EDU
Subject: beer


Super Dave writes:

>BTW... Who invented beer??


well,....

YEAST!!!!

 -toot

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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 14:29:28 EDT
From: johnc at das.harvard.edu (John Chervinsky)
Subject: Papazian's Propensity Pilsner Lager


Hi,

Does anyone have any experience with the Propensity Pilsner Lager recipe
in Papazian's book?

The recipe calls for "light" clover honey but I have been unable to find
anything labled as such.  Is this just a subjective reference to color?

I would like to lager this beer.  What would be a good starting point for
primary and secondary fermentation temperatures and conditioning temperatures?

How does this recipe compare to Budvar?

Thanks very much for your help!

John Chervinsky


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 11:50:25 PDT
From: tinsethg at ucs.orst.edu (Glenn Tinseth)
Subject: Adjunct Clarification (Get it?)

Sorry about the pun in the subject line, but I couldn't resist. It seems that
there is still a little confusion about which adjuncts need to be mashed and
which don't. Adjuncts high in unconverted starch need to be mashed. This
includes any form of unmalted (and unroasted) cereal grain such as oats
(any form: steel cut, flakes, powder, extruded pellets), wheat, rice, barley,
potato, cat tail roots, you name it. The yeast can't eat starch, and prefers
maltose, but will settle for other simple mono, di, and tri saccharides. 

The starch can be converted to simple sugars by beta and alpha amylase enzymes
which you can get from malted barley, malted wheat (a little), diastatic malt
extract, and from Enzyme-in-a-Drum (TM). Most homebrewers use the excess
enzymes present in most of today's American 2 or 6 row malted barley to
convert the starch in their favorite adjunct by doing a partial mash, usually
50:50 malted barley to adjunct. 

Adjuncts that don't need mashing, i.e. can easily be used by the extract brewer,
include most of the color malts (most of the starch has been burnt) and 
crystal/caramel malts (kind of premashed by the maltster). For both of these,
a simple steeping will extract all the goodies from the crushed grain. Malted 
wheat and rye as well as plain old malted barley *do* need to be mashed.

Hope this didn't cloud things further;^)

Glenn

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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 11:34:46 PDT
From: Pat Lasswell <patl at microsoft.com>
Subject: Beer and Food; ppm <--> mg/l

Recently somebody requested references on what foods go well with what
beers.  Last night my wife gave me a book entitled, REAL BEER AND GOOD EATS;
it describes the history of brewing both in Europe and America, the state of
beer today, and has chapters for California, the Northwest, the Midwest, the
Northeast, the South and for the region from Texas to Montana (which it
calls "North of the Border"). Each of the regional chapters contains some
history, some beer travelogue, and lots of recipes that both use beer as an
ingredient, or are intended to be eaten with beer.  The book contains
numerous suggestions as to which beer styles go well with what kind of food,
but poses no pretense of correctness:

	But above all, feel free to experiment.  Any writer on beer and food
	is just giving you his or her educated guess based on individual
	tasting experiences.  You might prefer something entirely different.
	Have a potluck beer and food party with your friends: Line up a bunch
	of different beers, set out some delicious foods, and taste away.
	Experiment, enjoy, and put together your own favorite combinations.
	As the bishop said to the actress, it's an intrinsically pleasant
	experience any way you choose to do it.


The details:

REAL BEER AND GOOD EATS, Bruce Aidells and Denis Kelly.  Alfred A. Knopf,
New York, 1992.  ISBN 0-394-58267-5.  In Canada, the book is published by
Random House of Canada Limited.  Hardcover, 355 pages, price unknown.

Usual disclaimers....


1 ppm = 1 mg/l. Parts per million is a ratio of weights of solvent to solute.
1 liter of water is 1,000,000 mg*, therefore 1mg of solvent in 1 liter of
water gives a concentration of 1 ppm.

* at 3.98degC to be exact.


Pat Lasswell


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1992 13:30:04 -0700 (PDT)
From: Paul dArmond <paulf at henson.cc.wwu.edu>
Subject: RE:cookers BTU

JLIDDIL wonders about the relative merits of different size propane
cookers: 

I have two propane cookers, one "American Cooker" [made in USA] rated at
135K Btu and one "American Camper" [made in Taiwan] rated at 35K Btu.  The
big one is a "blowtorch" type burner and the little one is a ring burner,
like on a kitchen stove.  Both burners gain efficiency when surrounded by
a sheet metal enclosure to hold the heat to the kettle.  The larger burner
does not heat water 4 times faster than the small one, it is maybe twice
as fast. 

I speculate that the blowtorch type of burners entrain much more air, and
thus have less concentrated heat and lower efficiency.  It is easier to
scorch the bottom of th kettle with the ring burner. 

It should be noted that Btu rating for burners only refers to their gas
consumption (i.e. the size of the orifice).  Heat transfer to worty fluids
is usually not marked on the box.  Bigger is faster, but not more
economical.  Another blow against the myth of economy of scale. 

- --Paul


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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 13:50:18 PDT
From: "John Cotterill" <johnc at hprpcd.rose.hp.com>
Subject: Re:  1056 Slow Fermentation
Full-Name: "John Cotterill"

Thanks to all who have replied on my problems with a slow 1056 yeast 
fermentation.  To recap I have a batch of IPA where the fermentation was 
vigorous for a few days from a starting gravity of 1.058 to about 1.040.
Once the SG hit 1.040, the fermentation has slowed dramatically.  I would
now estimate the SG is dropping by .001 every 5 days.  Some more data:  the
beer is extract based, I used a 16 oz starter, and aerated the cooled sweet
wort for 3 hours using an aquarium pump (with filter).  Some suggestions that
I have gotten from the HBD readers are:

     1)  Not enough O2 in wort (probably not the cause for this one)
     2)  Not enough nutrients in malt extract for healthy yeast
     3)  The yeast flocculated  (sp?) too soon and is sitting on the bottom
          of my vessel   
     4)  Rumor has it that Wyeast has had some problems with mutant 1056 
          yeast this year (may be related to 3 above)
     5)  Try another starter

So what I have done you ask?  The first thing that I did was prepare a sterile
batch of yeast nutrient (1/4 tsp of yeast nutrient boiled in 20cc H2O).  I
added this to the fermenter.  Next I agitated the beer by shaking the heck
out of the fermenter (a keg - watch out for that liberated CO2!).  I hope
this gets the yeast back into suspension.  I realize that I have done two
things here, and won't really know which one helped if the fermentation starts
up again.  I have also called Wyeast to see if they know of any current 
problems with 1056.  I'll let everyone know what happens.
JC
johnc at hprpcd.rose.hp.com

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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 16:51:11 CDT
From: guy at mspe5.b11.ingr.com (Guy D. McConnell)
Subject: Miller Reserve Draft

    As has been mentioned a number of times before, Alabama is not a mecca
of good beer.  With the opening of the microbrewery in Birmingham, the soon to
open brewpub in Mobile, and the number of decent beers begining to show up on
the shelves here in Huntsville, that may be changing.  I saw Miller Reserve
All Barley Draft in a local Brunos store the other day.  While I don't expect
it to be the best beer I've ever had, I intend to try it.  Anyway, I saw a
commercial for in on TV the other night which I found quite amusing.

    They start out saying "In 18something Frederick(?) Miller created an all
barley draft beer and held it in reserve because he knew it was something
special.  Now Miller is bringing it back in Miller Reserve All Barley Draft. 
It's an idea whose time has come around again" or something to that effect.
So now they're taking credit for "reviving" beer made the way God intended.
I'm sure this move has nothing to do with the continued decline in sales of
the mega-brewers over the past few years.

- -- 
Guy McConnell  guy at mspe5.b11.ingr.com
"All I need is a pint a day"

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Date: Wed, 16 Sep 92 17:27:00 PDT
From: "John Cotterill" <johnc at hprpcd.rose.hp.com>
Subject: Wyeast 1056 Info (Was: 1056 Slow Fermentation)
Full-Name: "John Cotterill"

I just got off of the phone with Dave at Wyeast.  I described my problem to
him and he offered the following help and information:
 1)  Make sure that the wort is WELL aerated.  (In my case this is not a 
      problem)
 2)  1056 is VERY susceptible to mutation.  They recommend that the yeast
      be used within one month of the date on the package.  They expect 
      mutations to occur within 30 to 90 days after the date on the package.
      How does one culture this stuff without mutations?  I should have asked.
      Anyone know?
 3)  My notes are not good on this one, but.....  If your starting gravity
      is 1.048, no problem.  If you get 8 points above this, Dave said that
      the pitching rate should be doubled (I started with 16oz, so that means
      a 32oz starter with my starting gravity of 1.058).  For every 8 points 
      above 1.056 double the rate again.
Bottom line for me.  Dave suggested that, since my beer is at 1.040 right
now, that I repitch with a 16oz starter, aerate as before, and I should
be in good shape.  He also said that they would credit the store I bought
my original yeast from, so the store can give me a free package to get me
going.  Pretty good of them I'd say!

By the way, I went home at lunch and it still looks like nothing is happening
even after trying the things I mentioned in my previous message, so I will
re-pitch and hope for the best.
JC
johnc at hprpcd.rose.hp.com

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End of HOMEBREW Digest #971, 09/17/92