My Brewhouse

If you click on a picture, it should open up into a 4mega-pixel shot.

This post has taken a while---just to load all the pictures without Blogger choking.

Last Saturday, I brewed a Belgian Golden Ale---Daemon Refuge. So, I took the chance to introduce my brew system.

First Slide...

Here we have Long Johnson going out of its hidey hole---yes I do have a floor jack in my garage. The rig was so named by Cheryll because it has four stations instead of the usual three (she may have had other reasons). Obviously, the wheels are a necessity. Two wheels on one end steer and the other end's wheels are fixed. Steerable wheels on both ends is not an improvement---you are warned.

This is the end that's coming out, believe it or not. The motorcycle and couch have already been moved. Blow up the shot and you can see the mess in my garage in hideous detail.

The command center (Oh my, the other side of the garage is messy too). The two gray tubs contain all the with-it parts like hot pads, lids, hop-clearing-tools, etc. The mash rake lays across the brewmaster's chair and the heat exchanger and copper wort-volume-measuring stick are on the side table. After the brew starts, the side table is clear for the log book and lab ware for testing previous batches.

Here it is all assembled (yes I owned all the kegs before cutting them up). The vessels from right to left are: hot liquor (i.e. water) tank, lauter tun (strainer), mash tun (heating/converting), and wort kettle (boiling with hops). You can see the white propane tank and the orange hose going down to the hot water pump. The riser between the hot liquor and lauter tuns feeds hot water to the sparge lid on top of the lauter tun (shown a few pictures down). There is also a power outlet with a switch for the pump and a couple of other outlets for sundry devices like mills and other brew stands.

Here we see two of the three burners--with a high-pressure burner on the left for the kettle and a low pressure burner on the right for the mash tun. These burners are also set on the same level like this for decoction mashing (boiling the decoction usually take place on the left). The low-pressure burner was my original homebrew setup when I graduated from (got kicked out of) the kitchen. By the way, the rule is: if the fire doesn't go out it wasn't a boilover.

There is another high-pressure burner under the hot liquor tank. You can see the pump clearly in this picture. It's a little sanitary pump. I used to have a regular Grundfos hot water pump, but the intermittent, very hot water use broke two of them. I recommend that you just buy a hot service sanitary pump and then you'll be ready if you ever need to pump wort (like through the heat exchanger---I use my brewing partner's pump (Kevin) which is normally used to pump wort).

The mash: Still life with rake. I rake the heck out of my mashes because I use a separate lauter tun. Mash should be 12-18 inches in the lauter tun and a single batch of regular strength beer hits the low end of this range in this vessel. Don't stir much at all if you are doing a single step infusion with a screen in the bottom already. Just enough to mix out the dough balls.

Here's the mash resting at a temperature maintenance step. Bubble wrap goes on after the fire goes out and off before it comes on again. It will still get a little crinkly around the lower edge---but it's cheap to replace after a season or two. The ubiquitous bucket of water for the mash rake, et cetera.

The copper works at the bottom of the lauter tun are shown above. The scientific reason for the asymmetry is that a big chunk of it broke off. The cuts on the bottom are pretty thin (cut with dremel disk) so almost nothing gets through. And they point down with room below them so they almost never block (and stay out of the bottom dough).

Here we see the sparge water distribution lid on the left and the goose neck outlet from the lauter tun on the right. The goose neck brings the runnings up higher than the copper works before releasing it to atmospheric pressure so that a suction will not build up on the slots, plug them and collapse the mash bed.

Now it's time for the lauter tun to wear the bubble-wrap party dress. Sometimes there is a little sink to catch the runnings (after going across the atmospheric gap, but for this brew I just let it fall into the kettle and collect. Old School.

I use whole hops, so there is a screen in the kettle (because the outlet valve is not big enough to use a separate hop back. You can see what looks like a stain in the center that is really an experimental copper chore-boy around the intake. The massive pieces of stainless are there to keep the experiment squished down. There's still plenty of little holes for the wort to go out.

Running hot water through the heat exchanger to sanitize it. After a while, and especially if you can't examine it after cleaning, it's safer to just trust to temperature and time to kill unwanted organisms. I usually cast out (when brewing with Kevin) by running out the valve in the kettle into a collection vessel and then pump it through the counterflow heat exchanger to the fermenter. I was doing it by myself (and didn't have said vessel) so it just went directly into the pump. I got away with it, but don't wish to immortalize the operation in pictures. There was lots of trub glued to the hop screen...but not enough to plug it.

All done! Roll it away and put everything back...eventually. Come to MisCon in Missoula, MT for a sample.

Guitar Woah!

Ok, here's a test of your quitar network:
Michael, Michael, Michael

Happy Birthday to a Photograph

Earlier this month in 1945, the US invaded Iwo Jima, which evidently means Sulphur Island. You can certainly see the cinder cone that dominates the island in the background of the assault.
It is even more alarming from the beach where bare flesh was hurled against concrete. For unknown to invasion planners, the Japanese forces were all underground. Most Marines never even saw one---though they could often hear them under their feet.
The Imperial Army was still underneath these guys when they raised our flag on top of the mountain. This is the original E Company flag in the not-famous photograph---taken on February 23, 1945. Later in the day, the picture taken of a replacement flag would became famous around the world, eventually becoming a bronze monument for all Marines.
Before getting to the replacement flag, let's consider this nurse. She flew into the battle and her plane was mortared on the runway during landing. The Marines were digging the enemy out of bunkers cleverly scattered all around the landing zone who waited for the moment to cause the most destruction. They specifically targeted aid workers, everywhere during this battle and others, because the enemy felt that it hurt morale. You know, shoot the wounded on the stretcher and the medics carrying and caring for them. I don't think it worked, but the Imperial soldiers kept at it. This nurse knew all that before she went in.

And now, with a bigger flag, more soldiers, wearing proper head gear, with drive, determination, and a prepared photographer, I give you the photograph. Happy Birthday!

Massacre Postponed

OK, so the Democrat's plan to back stab our troops got hung up in the Senate. But the congressmen(/women) will be back. In the meantime, they've signed the love letter on the left to the folks who've put their life on the line for me.

The latest Democrats have got a lot of work to do to start a massacre in Iraq that will even come close to the one they caused in 1974 by cutting off support to our South Vietnamese allies---about 2 or 3 million short at the moment.

As they say, America is harmless as an enemy and treacherous as a friend. I'm not sure that's really true, but there sure is a lot of evidence for that position of late.

Golf Course Politics

The answer to the question what kind of oil company could lose money would be a government-owned oil company, viz Pemex in Mexico. The same answer would be accurate for a golf course in the middle of very populous San Francisco. How could you loose with all the beautiful people showing up? Maybe the beautiful people prefer to pay higher green fees?
I would say that it is typical of non-entrepreneurial middle-class professionals (and up) to make their fortune on the backs of the poor by providing (or withholding) government services---usually by blaming the entrepreneurial class for the poor's existence while doing so. But if we include all the buying, selling and inventing associated with golf, maybe it makes sense for the San Francisco government to take money from the development of parks (supplied by higher levels of government) to subsidize courses sitting on fabulously expensive real estate.

Too late to turn back now. Play on!
P.S. When people talk about shooting a round of golf, they don't really mean it! They are confusing shooting with hitting.

Over-Reaction

OK, so I was working too much to blog...now I'm playing too much.

This weekend I went to RadCon to get my sci-fi writer fix. I hung out with Larry Niven, Patty Briggs, and a host of others. Saw some video from tv-pilots in the making, and met one of the big editors at Tor and drank her beer and scotch. Sleep is the only thing not scheduled at RadCon.

Sunday, I shot a six-round IPSC pistol match and a Rifle/Pistol side match. So yes, the rifle bought in November has now been shot and cleaned twice. My pistol had some weird hiccups, but the rifle was flawless---only I was the problem there.

Seeking balance in my work/play schedule.

Brew Tech Talk: Lagering

Most beer brewed all over the world is lager beer. What does that mean? Lager. In the end, it means beer that has been stored in cold lockers for drinking later--dating from a time in the past when brewing could not be done in summer because the wild yeast were...well too wild.

By selection over time, a new variant of yeast developed-- bottom-fermenting yeast. Instead of rising to the top to be collected for the next brew, this yeast fell to the bottom out of harms way. It could work at colder temperatures too. Some yeast always stays in suspension, however, and therein lies our tale.

That beer stored away, or lagered, for a period of time was found to taste smoother and more refined. Drinkers began to seek out these beers that were brewed the new way. New in this case refers to a long time ago. What happens to lagered beer?

Backing up, let's consider primary fermentation. Here the yeast gobbles up sugars as fast as it can and injects lots of flavors into the green beer. Trub, parts of proteins, hops, etc., drop out. At the end, and that's how we tell it's the end, most of the yeast drops out too. Now we go to secondary fermentation by racking the beer to another vessel, leaving the trub and settled yeast behind. This may be the start of lagering or it may be just another way to settle the beer before sending to the cellar. One traditional way is to wait until there is 1 percent fermentable sugar left and then bung up the secondary vessel (or transfer it to a closed vessel). Another is to wait until it's done and then transfer it to a closed vessel with a little fermenting beer from a primary.

However we do it, we now have a stable environment with a small amount of no-longer-reproducing yeast slowly working on the fermentation products of the exuberant primary yeast. These few remaining cells will keep the beer safe from bacteria and put fine bubbles in the brew. Less is more in this case.

OK, now we really are in a closed tank for lagering. What are we looking for? Let's ask the Wizard. Read the whole thing.

After lagering, most lager brewers want a reduction in diacetyl (butter flavor), acetaldehyde (apple flavor), and sulfur-based aromas (rotten egg); full carbonation; and an improvement in clarity. Most brewers consider diacetyl reduction to be the key goal of lagering.

Well, OK. How long do you lager? Depends on the beer:

Some beers do benefit from longer aging periods, especially stronger beers. Doppelbocks typically lager for well over two months. Strong beers mellow over time — obvious flavors that are present when the beer is young slowly meld into a complex palate of intriguing, hard-to-describe flavors.

Yeah, hard-to-describe alright. Very few analytical tests can be used to back up the desire to lager a beer, especially for a long time. Human taste can far exceed any instrument that technology has come up with so far.


Now we, the consumers, know that lagered beer tastes better. Naturally, commercial brewers want to get that taste faster and cheaper. Here's more from the Wizard, but not all of these techniques are practical or even desirable:

Time saver number one: In recent years some lager brewers have begun warming the beer between fermentation and lagering, usually from about 50° to 70° F. This process accelerates the conversion of alpha-acetolactate (a compound normally secreted by yeast) to diacetyl and also accelerates the uptake of diacetyl by yeast. Diacetyl reduction is one of the key objectives of lagering, so this technique is used by many brewers, especially brewers in Germany, where this idea originated.

This technique does not make the beer fruity, because fermentation is complete and the yeast have produced all of their fermentation aromas. Many commercial brewers can’t easily employ this method because their cellars are not designed to warm beer; they are designed to keep it cold. Homebrewers, on the other hand, can easily change beer temperature by simply moving it across the house!

To try this method ferment the lager at 50° F, rack the beer to the secondary, and move it to a room temperature area for two to three days. Then chill the beer to 32° to 40° F for lagering. Two weeks of lagering should be long enough for lighter lagers such as pils and helles.
Time saver number two: Yeast contact is a good thing. The key to flavor maturation is yeast. Increasing the contact between yeast and the compounds they are modifying can reduce lagering times. Some people think beechwood chips are just for marketing, but in reality they are a traditional method of improving lager times. Oddly enough, they are such a pain to handle that very few breweries in the world continue this tradition (chip trivia: most American lager brewers in the 1800s used "chip tanks" for lagering).

Another way to increase yeast contact with beer is to use non-flocculent yeast. Although this makes clarification difficult, it does accelerate the aging process. With modern centrifuge technology the clarification issue is less important. After the beer is properly aged, the yeast is removed using centrifugation. This method cannot be practiced at home because a pilot centrifuge costs about $70,000. Sorry!

Time saver number three: The most modern lagering technique combines warming beer to convert alpha-acetolactate to diacetyl and a high yeast-to-beer concentration. First comes centrifuge, then pasteurization. The beer is recirculated through a column filled with yeast for rapid "aging" then filtered. The result is continuous lagering. It reduces lagering time from weeks to about a quarter of a day!

We have a spring megabrew coming up and one idea is to make a Martzen and lager it until our Octoberfest party. How's that for tradition? But what if you are not set up for cold fermentation or lagering? Here's some advice from Brewing Techniques. One item:

Ice is nice: During the 1800s the grandfather of the modern refrigerator, the icebox, was used in industry and home to maintain cool temperatures. The icebox is a very simple device: you simply put a large block of ice in the top compartment and it cools the bottom compartment. It offers no real control of the temperature, however, and as the ice melts, it cools less, which means you have to replenish the ice regularly. Back then, the ice used to stock an icebox came from Mother Nature. During the cold winter months, ice was cut from lakes and stockpiled in caves or sawdust-filled ice houses. Large breweries of that period used this same stockpiling technique to create lagering caves. Similar techniques can be applied, on a smaller scale, at home.

Modern insulating materials can be used to make a brewer's icebox. The carbon-insulated icebox that your grandparents had would be about the right size for a 5-7 gal carboy. Unfortunately, the only place you're likely to find one is in the local antique store, and usually antique means expensive. A more affordable option would be to build an icebox that combines modern insulation with old designs. Plans for these units can often be found in publications like Mother Earth News and Homestead.

I've used a water bath and soda bottles partially filled with water frozen in the refer. Use two sets and put one set in the bath while the other is freezing. I used to change them before and after work.

OK, the bath trick works good for fermentation but is too much of a drag for long time lagering. So you'll need one of the other techniques in the article.

One trick that always works: buy a new refrigerator for the kitchen before the old one breaks! Old one goes to the garage with a temperature controller on it. Have your brewing partner do it too and you get a fermentation and a lagering box--avoid the tedious :) changing of the controller.

Struggle, light seen

OK, I've managed to get Sitemeter going again. Getting everything switched over to the new blogger has been interesting.

My field project that was eating me up is over. So, hopefully, I can get some more posts going. I just shot the rifle I bought in November today, so there's some catching up to do.

This weekend-RadCon.

Obviously, I'm not using enough firepower-as a metaphor, of course.