Brewing Master

Question:

Well, Andy, you’re in luck because all you really get from dry hopping is aroma…how easy it _that_?  :)  Hops need to be boiled in the wort to get bittering or much in the way of flavor.  Toss in an oz. of those Cascades for a week or two and you’re good to go! – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I know this topic came up recently, but I wanted to get a concensus after the discussion.  I just racked an all grain Sierra Nevada Clone that tastes great now (when I racked it).  I want to dry hop it to get only aroma and no flavor or extra bitterness to speak of.  I have some cascade plugs, and I would like the groups advice. Andy from Hillsborough

Response:

Well, Andy, you’re in luck because all you really get from dry hopping is aroma…how easy it _that_?  :)   Toss in an oz. of those Cascades for a week or two and you’re good to go!

I am really starting to wonder what I will get.  I put an ounce of Cascade (loose-in a hop bag) into my imperial stout.  Now this big brew has been aging, with the hops, since about February.  Here it is, mid November, and I can’t wait to crack it open.  I will finish carbonating the keg (it has been pressurized) and have it ready for New Years.  Anyone left dry hops in this long?  What can I expect? FD

Response:

HOMEBREW Digest #4095                        Sat 16 November 2002         FORUM ON BEER, HOMEBREWING, AND RELATED ISSUES        THIS YEAR’S HOME BREW DIGEST BROUGHT TO YOU BY:           Northern  Brewer, Ltd. Home Brew Supplies         http://www.northernbrewer.com  1-800-681-2739     Support those who support you! Visit our sponsor’s site! Contents:   lager yeast esters / S-23 bready fruity (long post) (Petr Otahal)   RE: SS conicals ("Wayne Holder")   Bleach ("Kevin Boyer")   Boiling Aertion Stone? (Fred L Johnson)   Bulk vs. Bottle Lagering/Conditioning (Bob Hall)   Business Assistance ("Creek Banjul")   Hypochlorite ("Eric R. Theiner")   Re: Cleaning Aeration stone (Demonick)   dry-hopping (homebre973)   beer at deer camp! ("Micah Millspaw")   Kegs O Beer in Louisville ("Eric R. Theiner")   Re: SS Conical Project Update ("Mike Sharp")   Barley Wine priming question (Sebastien Riopel)   Re: priming? ("greg man")   RE: first all grain and keg (Kevin Crouch)   Thanx ! ("Axle Maker")   Aerobic Yeast Propagation (Fred L Johnson)   RE: first all grain and keg (Donald and Melissa Hellen)   RE: hypochlorite (Donald and Melissa Hellen)   Re: Classic American Pilsner Recipe/Report/Ranting ("Tidmarsh Major") * * Show your HBD pride! Wear an HBD Badge! * http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/shopping * * Beer is our obsession and we’re late for therapy! * If your e-mail account is being deleted, please unsubscribe first!! To SUBSCRIBE or UNSUBSCRIBE send an e-mail message with the word   ACCOUNT YOU WISH TO HAVE SUBSCRIBED OR UNSUBSCRIBED!!!** IF YOU HAVE SPAM-PROOFED your e-mail address, you cannot subscribe to   the digest as we cannot reach you. We will not correct your address   for the automation – that’s your job. HAVING TROUBLE posting, subscribing or unsusubscribing? See the HBD FAQ at http://hbd.org. The HBD is a copyrighted document. The compilation is copyright   HBD.ORG. Individual postings are copyright by their authors. ASK   before reproducing and you’ll rarely have trouble. Digest content   cannot be reproduced by any means for sale or profit. More information is available by sending the word "info" to Hi All, Im catching up on the last few digests, after spending last week working in the bush and this week catching up on the work I missed while away. In digest #4089 Randy Ricchi wrote some comments about esters in lagers and I would like to share some observations. I used to think that one sign of a good lager was that there were no esters. To me, estery meant ale-like, and lager beer meant no esters. Lately, I’ve been  re-thinking that. Obviously, we wouldn’t want a lager with the ester character of an English ale, but I believe some subtle ester character is needed for a beer to taste "beery".

I have to agree with you here Randy.  A few months ago (maybe six or seven) I did a bit of side by side tasting of some of our locally produced megalagers.  You might wonder why I would do such a "horrible" thing, and Im sure I’ll cop some flak from the Aussies on the list, but lets just call it an educational exercise.  Some of you may know that the megabreweries here in Australia usually produce around three "types" of lagers (I wont call them styles because they are all a bit too similar), and I did a comparison of only a few of these.   Many make a lager that includes some crystal malt and is typically called a "Draught", and quite a number make lighter coloured and v. slightly more hoppy brews under the label "Premium" (I think these also have a higher proportion of malt).  There are also a number of lagers under the label "Bitter", but unfortunately they are far cry from their ancestral roots in England and aren’t particularly bitter either.  There are also quite a few light beers, which in Australia refers to the alcohol concentration (light beers are around 2.8% abv), but these aren’t really worth drinking since they are like making love in a canoe = FCTW! The beers that I tasted were three of the Draught and three Premium varieties: Cascade Draught Boags Draught Carlton Draught Cascade Premium Boags Premium Crown Lager (premium type) What is of note is that all of the Draught beers have a very slight mixed fruit or apple aroma, the fruitiest of which is Boags Draught, whereas all the Premium types have very little esters and are extremely clean with the slightest touch of malt and hops.   This lack of fruitiness makes the Premiums very boring beers after a few mouthfuls your are lucky to taste much of anything, I think this is the whole point of these beers, there is nothing anyone could find objectionable (except for the lack of flavour and the higher cost).   In recalling my Uni days I remember having a strong preference to Boags Draught even though I was very uneducated in terms of how a beer should taste I preferred the fruitiness which is quite obvious in this brew (it is definitely not as fruity as any English ale but you can’t miss it).  Of the three Premiums, Boags also has the most esters although you have to do a lot of searching to find them (allowing the beer to warm to around 12C helps). In my opinion a slight hint of esters can be a good thing in a lager but I definitely think it has to be subdued and just there as a background flavour to provide a little bit of interest (add complexity).  I don’t drink these beers on a regular basis but it was an interesting exercise to try and appraise them, unfortunately I don’t have the "nasal vocabulary" to describe the particular esters, but Im learning. Do you think that Noonan means "estery" lager yeasts when he suggests Aromatic lager yeasts (as opposed to Neutral lager yeasts) for some of the recipes in New Brewing Lager Beer?? Onto a slightly different but related topic: A couple of months back I made a lager with Saflager S-23, I normally use liquid yeasts and this was the first time I had used this dry yeast, the reason I pitched the Danstar yeast was that the WLP800 yeast I pitched didn’t seem to take hold. The beer has quite a lot of esters which seem way out of place, there is nothing else wrong with the beer just a bready fruity aroma, I’ve noticed a similar aroma with the S-04 ale yeast (which isn’t really out of place in an ale). Has anyone else had a similar aroma experience with S-23? I might have to try drinking it very cold on a hot day so I don’t notice.   I pitched three packets (11g each) into 23L and fermented around 10-12C.  I rehydrated two of the packets, but the first one that went in wasn’t rehydrated, it was only after I pitched the first packet that I realised I probably should rehydrate (as I said I don’t typically use dry yeasts). What makes this a little more interesting is that I then pitched another wort onto the yeast cake and fermented around the same temp 10-11C.  This second beer is really quite clean and has none of the bready fruity aroma of the first (it does have a very slight hint of esters which is quite pleasing). Anyone have a possible explanation?? Cheers Petr Otahal Hobart, Tasmania, Australia Scott Jose says: "I too, am looking for a way to build a 12.2  conical in an economical way." Scott, "economical" is a relative term. If you want a conical that is 100% stainless, then you need to be prepared for the cost. If you’re willing to use cheaper materials (brass, wood, copper, etc.), then you can probably move closer to what I would gather your definition of "economical" is. You also said: "Consider that you will have to come up with a seal for the lid, another $50 for the Zymico bottom dump and $100 for their racking port, and I don’t know how much for their stand kit, it looks like it really starts to add up." Actually, the stand kit comes with a seal for the cone. It also comes with leg extensions to allow transfer into a corny. The last time I looked the leg extensions ($99) were an option on the Fermenator. If the $85 suggested retail for the Konical Stanz-it(TM) is a bit too steep for your budget, then maybe something made of wood or plaster would be more "economical". You could save a bit of money, maybe, by not buying the TMS standard lid and making your own out of acrylic or something of that sort. Maybe if that crazy megalomaniac lady in Texas ever actually develops a conical of her own, then they will finally be "economical". I’ve tallied up what you could build one using Zymico(TM) kits to be around $375, depending on what you pay for shipment of the cone. Your time and labor are not included in that estimate, but research and assembly time, labor, and shipping are usually never included in stories about "how I did it cheaper". Wayne Holder AKA Zymie Long Beach CA http://www.zymico.com Proud sponsor of the HBD AJ says: "The bleach used at water treatement plants is much more concentrated than the bleach you buy at the store. The latter is about 5 "trade percent" and the latter, I think, at least 50." The maximum bleach concentration is 15%.  Most common industrial strength

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