Q&A: Homebrewing

[cdh]

But google "dry yeast contamination" and you'll see there are a lot of problem dry yeasts out there.

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Well, how old are most of those reports... the first few results that Google presents are vintage 1993. Did your predecessor use the bricks, or the sachets? I could see the bricks presenting contamination issues if they weren't used all at once... But the sachets and the bricks are very different things.

I'd always thought the Chloraseptic flavor was an artifact of chlorinated water, not bad yeast... and Band-Aid flavor comes from Brett., which would be quite a surprise in a dry yeast sachet... but one I've never heard a report of happening.

Edited April 23, 2006 by cdh (log)

[ScoopKW]

But google "dry yeast contamination" and you'll see there are a lot of problem dry yeasts out there.

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Well, how old are most of those reports... the first few results that Google presents are vintage 1993. Did your predecessor use the bricks, or the sachets? I could see the bricks presenting contamination issues if they weren't used all at once... But the sachets and the bricks are very different things.

I'd always thought the Chloraseptic flavor was an artifact of chlorinated water, not bad yeast... and Band-Aid flavor comes from Brett., which would be quite a surprise in a dry yeast sachet... but one I've never heard a report of that happening.

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The brewery used one brick per batch. You should have seen the look on the owner's face when I tossed 20 pounds worth of bricks into the trash when I started.

Here's a "Wizard" report on phenolics: http://byo.com/mrwizard/743.html

You can find similar stuff in George Fix's "Principles of Brewing Science," and the MBAA's "The Practical Brewer."

I also recommend: Brewing: Science and Practice by Dennis Briggs; Designing Great Beers by Ray Daniels; and Hardwick's "Handbook of Brewing."

The Ray Daniels one is affordable. I'd probably spend the money on a brew tower rather than buy the other two, however. (I was lucky enough to have them given to me.)

Regards,

ScoopKW

[cdh]

Here's a "Wizard" report on phenolics: http://byo.com/mrwizard/743.html

You can find similar stuff in George Fix's "Principles of Brewing Science," and the MBAA's "The Practical Brewer."

Indeed... those resources say that yeast produces the phenolic compounds... and you need the chlorine in the water to make them react and form Anbesol flavored beer.

All of this is going over the heads of the intended audience here, though. This course is for folks who have never brewed before, who don't know if they want to drop hundreds of dollars on the hobby, but are still interested in seeing what they can make. While having a stainless conical brew sculpture would be incredibly cool, I don't have the thousands of dollars to drop on that kind of toy... The aim of this course is to prove to the world that you can make fine beer without one.

I'm editing to add a quick reference to an interesting article on yeast from the same source as Scoop's reference... For those who want to learn more about yeasty considerations, have a look at http://byo.com/feature/1098.html.

Edited April 23, 2006 by cdh (log)

[FoodMan]

I'm almost a week into fermentation and here is how my wort looks like

That looks ok, right? the temperature where this is sitting is a little higher than the ideal, probably around 75-78F. Hopefully that is not too high. Unfortunatly it will be very difficult for me to actually get it an lower without investing in a fermentation chamber or something.

Kegging? Maybe it is just me (very very new at this...) but I think bottles for 3-5 gallon batches are just more appealing.

[Rombot]

Thanks for the welcome.

Well I have fallen behind a little but I have finally started my brew. I think (I hope) it went ok, day 2 of fermentation and there is a layer of stuff on top of the wart and it is giving off a nice smell (apple and cinnamon), I hope that is good.

I actually adjusted everything for metric units and as my malt came in kilo bags, the simplest conversion was to do a double batch using 3kg (6.6 pounds) of malt and then adding a little more of everything, this also had the added benefit of producing more beer . I must say I did enjoy using a huge pot with all four gas burners on the stove going at full blast, that got it to a really good boil.

Now a few questions...Is there a rough rule in regards to ratios of ingredients for most beers? Can the ratio of ingredients of the recipe we have just done and the others to follow be applied to other recipes of your own creation?

Ok then goodluck all, will keep you updated and hopefully this will be a success.

Rom

[cdh]

I'm back from my jaunt to TX, and it's good to see reports of progress.

Elie, your picture looks just right. The layer of foam on top is just what you should be seeing. That means that your yeast are getting enthusiastic in there and doing their job. Your beer will appear much lighter when the yeast get done and drop out of suspension. Much of the opacity of your beer is the trillions of yeast cells still hopping from sugar molecule to sugar molecule.

Rombot, sounds like you're on the right path too. As to proportions, that really depends on the style of beer you're trying to brew. To avoid the metric conversion, it is the specific gravity of the wort that is important... This is a 1.068 beer, which is going to be somewhat richer and stronger than most mass market commercial beers. There is a wide variety of styles out there, and some of them are meant to be stronger than this, and many are meant to be weaker. See here for examples.

[FoodMan]

I'm back from my jaunt to TX, and it's good to see reports of progress. 

Elie, your picture looks just right.  The layer of foam on top is just what you should be seeing.  That means that your yeast are getting enthusiastic in there and doing their job.  Your beer will appear much lighter when the yeast get done and drop out of suspension.  Much of the opacity of your beer is the trillions of yeast cells still hopping from sugar molecule to sugar molecule.

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Glad to hear that. There something bugging me though. Why aren't we worried about contamination of the fermenting beer? I mean the cheese cloth allows air in. Isn't that why brewers use airlocks for the fermentation vessel?

[cdh]

Glad to hear that. There something bugging me though. Why aren't we worried about contamination of the fermenting beer? I mean the cheese cloth allows air in. Isn't that why brewers use airlocks for the fermentation vessel?

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We're not worried about contamination because the dish towel should be impenetrable to all of the little airborne beasties out there. They are a lot bigger than air molecules. You might be more reasonably concerned about oxidation, however. The reason for the airlock is to keep oxygen away from the beer as much as to keep beasties out. Oxygen is not beer's best friend, and can shorten the life of a beer. However, while the yeast are doing their job in there, they are making a blanket of CO2 that rises from the beer and keeps the oxygen away.

Edited April 27, 2006 by cdh (log)

[jsolomon]

Another reason we aren't as worried about contamination of the fermenting beer is that the pH levels (acidic) that yeast produce, as well as the ethanol are not particularly microbe-friendly. So, once you are past the first few hours, where your yeast are setting up shop, there is a low chance of infection. It's when you have a new, sterile wort, that you need to worry the most.

Also, while individual cells of microbial beasts are much smaller than the spaces between the weave in a towel, many of the things they ride on are not, so the vast majority of things floating will be trapped in the matrix of the towel covering. I'm not so sure about a non-quadrupled cheesecloth, but then you're covered by the previous paragraph.

Just remember what Charlie Papazian always wrote, "Relax. Don't worry. Have a homebrew."

[cdh]

Just wanted to check in and see how things are going... It seems that everybody is about a week and a half into their ferments now, right? If so, I'll aim to get the next lesson posted by this weekend so that you can get your beer bottled.

We just need to let your beer finish fermenting before we bottle it, so I don't want to provide temptation to take a shortcut by giving you bottling instructions before it's time.

So, everybody out there who is brewing along and hasn't commented, let me know how far into the ferment you've gotten.

[FoodMan]

Just wanted to check in and see how things are going... It seems that everybody is about a week and a half into their ferments now, right?  If so, I'll aim to get the next lesson posted by this weekend so that you can get your beer bottled.

We just need to let your beer finish fermenting before we bottle it, so I don't want to provide temptation to take a shortcut by giving you bottling instructions before it's time.

So, everybody out there who is brewing along and hasn't commented, let me know how far into the ferment you've gotten.

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I was wondering when we'll see the bottling lesson...My beer seems to be doing ok so far. This Thursday it will be two weeks. So do I need to bottle it by Friday or Saturday?

[cdh]

You should aim to bottle it this weekend sometime. Provided it is someplace out of a draft, it should still be protected from oxygen by the blanket of CO2 it made while fermenting... but since this is an open ferment, you want to get it bottled shortly after it finishes producing CO2, as it will eventually dissipate and let oxygen near your beer.

[cdh]

Another thought... Now would be the time for everybody to give their fermentor a bit of a jostle. Rock it back and forth a couple of times or gently swirl it. This will rouse the yeast that have settled and give them another bite at any remaining sugars in there. They should settle back down by this weekend.

[Matty]

I'm a little behind now - I had to make another batch as I realised I made a dumb mistake* with the first one. My second batch is a week old tonight.

* My new thermometer runs 0-100 and thereafter the 10 degree intervals are marked 10, 20, 30 etc. I pitched my yeast at what looked like 60 degrees but was actually 160 degrees. I think I wrote that I thought it had cooled quickly

A good lesson though and I enjoyed a second run at it.

Chris - I wonder if you ought to add more words of caution about boilovers in lesson 2 at the adding the DME stage. I went *very* cautiously the second time around and the first four or five spoonfuls still frothed up quite vigourously. Just a thought.

Cheers,

Matt

[Rombot]

Hi all

I may have a slight concern . It is only 1 week and 3 days since I pitched my yeast and all activity has seemed to have ground to a halt. after 48 hours I had a nice layer of foam and now everything looks flat and very inactive.

Is this a situation where i should just leave it alone and let it look after itself or do i have a problem.

hopefully I wont have to go back to step one but if need be well it is only more practice.

Rom

[cdh]

I may have a slight concern  . It is only 1 week and 3 days since I pitched my yeast and all activity has seemed to have ground to a halt. after 48 hours I had a nice layer of foam and now everything looks flat and very inactive.

Is this a situation where i should just leave it alone and let it look after itself or do i have a problem.

hopefully I wont have to go back to step one but if need be well it is only more practice.

Rom

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Your situation sounds just fine. Fermentation begins with a big burst of activity as the yeast multiply and go on a feeding frenzy. That goes through most of the available sugars in your wort. After that finishes, the yeast keep on playing the role of little chemical reactors, and clean up after themselves by finishing any uncompleted reactions. The first part puts on a good show, while the latter does not. But both aspects of the fermentation are important to getting a good tasting beer.

So a few days to a week of showy foam, followed by a week of seemingly little going on is exactly what you should be seeing. You're on track.

As I'd mentioned above, rousing the yeast would be a good thing to do midway into the ferment, as lots of them have settled to the bottom. So give your fermentor a tilt and a swirl to bring some yeast back up into the beer so that that can play their role more effectively.

Edited May 3, 2006 by cdh (log)

[FoodMan]

I have a couple of "beginner" questions;

1- "rousing". I guess I'll do this today when I get back home, but is the goal here to disturb the layer of sediment on the bottom? Mine is about a good 1/2 inch now. What about the layer of foam on top? We are not to break or disturbn that right?

2- I noticed for the past couple of days that the foam layer has a couple of "holes" in it with the wort showing. Is that ok? Or does it mean that I really need to bottle the beer because it is exposed?

Looking -and very nervously- forward to the bottling class.

[cdh]

Elie-

1- Yup, rouse the sediment on the bottom. Foam on the top doesn't matter, don't worry about it too much.

2- The foam is not the only thing protecting the beer, so don't worry that it is dissipating. CO2 is denser than air, and hence falls. Observe the gasses coming off of dry ice. That principle means that all of the CO2 that got produced by your yeast and came out of solution is now sitting on top of your beer. It will take some time before it diffuses out through the room and comes to an equilibrium distribution. Your beer should be safe for another few days.

[jsolomon]

All activity may have appeared to cease, but more than likely, activity has simply slowed markedly. Remixing your beer will help re-awaken your fermentation. Oftentimes fermentations seem stuck, but they've simply slowed. That's why it's important to either use a hygrometer to know when you've used all of your fermentable sugar, or give sufficient time.

Elsewise, you'll have a mess post-bottling.

[FoodMan]

Elie-

1- Yup, rouse the sediment on the bottom.  Foam on the top doesn't matter, don't worry about it too much.

2- The foam is not the only thing protecting the beer, so don't worry that it is dissipating. CO2 is denser than air, and hence falls.  Observe the gasses coming off of dry ice.  That principle means that all of the CO2 that got produced by your yeast and came out of solution is now sitting on top of your beer.  It will take some time before it diffuses out through the room and comes to an equilibrium distribution.  Your beer should be safe for another few days.

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Ok, I roused and swirled the fermenting jar last night and right away all the "foam" from the surface broke apart and fell down to the bottom. Also the smell of the wort is very nice, it actually smells like beer with a nice hop aroma.

Will the bottling class be posted tomorrow?

[cdh]

Also the smell of the wort is very nice, it actually smells like beer with a nice hop aroma.

It's not wort anymore... the yeast have worked their magic and it is beer now. Glad that it smells good to you... I was hoping for a crowd pleaser recipe.

[Rombot]

Thanks for that, I was worried for a little while.

My wart/beer is also smelling rather nice and if it is indicitive of the of the final product it should great and well worth the effort.

I have just realised that the football world cup starts in 5 weeks and by that time the beer should be ready . Also the next batch may be ready as well, the timing could not be better. Gonna save it all for the comp and drink all but a few bottles (for tasting at 6 months or so) over the two weeks.

Well thanks again and yay for beer and football.

Rom

[FoodMan]

Chris,

What is the best way to get a siphon going using the bottle filler. I mean I can think of one or two, but my concern is contamination. Since the bottle filler has that thing at the tip to prevent overfilling so "sucking" on it to get a siphon going is not possible. The only other way I can think of is filling the tube+bottle filler with water, dipping the tube end in the beer and hope the water will get a siphon going.

What exactly do you do?

[cdh]

The only other way I can think of is filling the tube+bottle filler with water, dipping the tube end in the beer and hope the water will get a siphon going.

What exactly do you do?

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That's exactly what I do. Works just fine.

[eGCI Team]

Please note that the recipe for red ale in Class 3 has been changed. We inadvertently included an earlier version in the class yesterday; it's now corrected. We apologize for any inconvenience.