Brewer's Friend Home Brewing Software

Hops Rhizomes Have Arrived

This year I am planting some new hop varieties out front of the house. The rhizomes for my new Hallertau and Kent Goldings arrived last week. I’ll be posting more information about planting them, designing the trellis, caring for them, harvesting, and using them!

Here is what hops rhizomes look like when they arrive in the mail. They came in a moistened plastic bag.

I’m keeping them in the fridge for now because the weather has not been cooperating. Next week they will go in the ground!

Posted in Hops Growing | No Comments »

Kegging Beer Natural vs Forced Conditioning

Kegging your home brew is a great way to save time. If you like draft beer you will love kegging your own brew. There are two basic methods for conditioning kegged beer. The choice depends on how soon you need the beer or if you want to conserve CO2. With natural conditioning, you prime the beer with priming sugar, keg it, then let it sit for up to two weeks. With force carbonation, there is no priming sugar, and you force the CO2 gas into solution by rocking or shaking the keg.

Natural conditioning:
Siphon the beer into the keg then stir in priming sugar. Seal keg, and attach CO2 line. At this point oxygen is bad for the beer. By purging the head space in the keg, the beer will stay fresh longer. Clear out the head space by venting the keg and replacing with CO2. This venting procedure only needs to be done when the beer is first packaged.

The procedure: turn on gas to pressurize keg, leave for a few minutes, shut off gas, then open release valve on the top of the keg to vent it. Repeat this step a few times to get all the oxygen out of the head space.

The pressure relief valve on the top of a corny keg.

When the head space is purged, shut off the CO2, disconnect the hose, and store the beer for at least ten days. A couple weeks may be necessary. Natural conditioning takes more time but conserves CO2.

Forced carbonation:
Follow the same steps as under ‘natural conditioning’ above, except do not add priming sugar. Put the keg into the fridge to cool it down. After four to eight hours, hook up CO2 again, set regulator to the desired level of carbonation, and open the gas line. Rock the keg for several minutes until no more swishing is audible. It is helpful to orient the keg on its side to maximize surface area the gas can dissolve into. When you no longer detect any swishing or noise coming from the regulator you are almost there. Continue for a few more minutes. Now the beer is saturated with CO2 at the desired level. Shut off the CO2, disconnect the hoses, and store the beer for three days. After that time it is ready to serve. Force carbonating takes less time but uses up more CO2.

A note about light lagers:
I have found that adding priming sugar to light lagers throws off the delicate flavor by adding additional sweetness that takes a long time to subside. There is little active yeast left in a lager given it has fermented longer at colder temperatures. Force carbonation of light lagers yielded better tasting results sooner.

Enjoy your draft beer! Caution – be careful when working with pressurized gases, take care to read instruction manuals and follow directions. Do not drink beer before or during any of these procedures. After you are done, then crack or ‘tap’ a home brew :)

Posted in Kegging and CO2 | 11 Comments »

Beer Styles – SRM Color Chart

NOTE: This chart has been updated with the latest BJCP style guidelines; please see the new chart here: Beer Styles – SRM Color Chart – 2017 Update

Beer comes in a wide range of colors, from yellow golden to amber to opaque black. This chart shows the BJCP beer styles and their SRM colors in bar graph format. SRM stands for ‘Standard Reference Method’, a scale devised by scientists to describe how light or dark a beer is.

Data for this chart comes from the the Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP).

Posted in Beer Styles | 5 Comments »

Introduction to RIMS and HERMS

This article explains the basic difference between RIMS and HERMS systems. Both are advanced setups for home brewers where mash water (wort) is circulated through a heating system. The benefits include clearer wort, higher efficiency, and an impressive looking setup that helps automate the brewing process and leads to consistency.

The difference between RIMS and HERMS comes from the method of heating in order to maintain or change the mash temperature. This is very different from the basic style of mashing, where hot water is infused to raise temperature. With RIMS and HERMS heat is directly applied to the mash water.

We can begin with de-constructing the acronyms RIMS and HERMS.

RIMS is short for Recirculating Infusion Mash System.
HERMS is short for Heat Exchange Recirculating Mash System.

We also need to introduce two additional acronyms: the HLT and the MLT.

The hot liquor tank (HLT) is a kettle, or cooler full of heated water. The mash lauter tun (MLT) is where the grains are mashed, coveted to sweet wort, and lautered.

The MLT in this case is again usually a kettle or cooler, and has a false bottom to allow lautering.

A HERMS will rely on a heat exchanger, in most cases the hot liquor tank (HLT) in which a copper coil is placed, in other cases, another external vessel that is filled with a heating medium (water) in which a copper coil is immersed. The mash water is pumped through this coil, picking up heat from the surrounding water, and returned to the mash lauter tun (MLT).

A RIMS system relies on a form of direct heating where the mash water (wort) is pumped through a small tube in which an electric heating element has been installed. The mash water is pumped through this tube, past the heating element, and heated to the proper temperature prior to returning to the MLT.

Lets get more specific with the components and function of a typical HERMS. As previously stated this system is used to maintain and change the temperature of your mash, so the need for some level of automation is almost a necessity. Whether the HLT is heated with a gas burner, or with an electrical heating element, you have to control the temperature of the HLT water (heating medium) precisely in order to take full advantage of the systems ability. This control is accomplished easier when heating with electricity, where the switching (on/off) of a heating element is done via a simple temperature controller which is wired to the heating element. During operation the controller is reading the HLT water temperature via a temperature probe in the HLT water (heating medium).

To accomplish this with a gas fired HLT would require some additional equipment. This equipment would include items such as a gas solenoid valve to cut the gas to the burner when your target HLT temperature has been reached, as well as a pilot or spark ignition system to automatically re-light the burner when the temperature controller commands gas (heat) through the solenoid valve. Changing the temperature of the mash is as easy as changing the temperature setting on the temperature controller to adjust the temperature of the HLT water.

In this same system the wort is typically recirculated continuously, which is of great benefit to the all grain brewer for a couple reasons. First, you will have little or no temperature variation in your mash due to the constant draining and return of precisely heated mash water to the MLT. Second, you will have superior wort clarity since you are setting up your grain bed (filtration) during the mash while recirculating the wort. **When I say superior wort clarity, I would compare it to looking through a glass of any of the typical American Lagers that have been filtered, it is quite amazing. This recirculating of 150F-160F wort is no easy task for a simple pump, which is why most home brewers have come to rely on the March 809 pumps, which are high temperature, food grade, magnetic impeller pumps. They are a perfect fit for both HERMS and RIMS.

In brief, the RIMS is utilized to accomplish the same outcome as a HERMS, but by a slightly different means. In a RIMS you are passing the mash water directly over an electric heating element that is contained in a small tube with an inlet at one end and an outlet at the other. Controlling the temperature of a RIMS is nearly identical to the HERMS… as it is done with some type of temperature controller connected directly to the heating element. The major difference is that the temperature is measured at the OUTLET of the RIMS heating tube prior to the mash water returning to the MLT. Just as in a HERMS, the RIMS can easily change the temperature of the mash by simply adjusting the temperature on the temperature controller. A RIMS will also generally utilize a constant recirculation of the mash water via a March 809 pump, providing the same benefits to the brewer as it will in a HERMS.

The similarities in these systems are great, and the befits are many. So, why choose one over the other? Some choose the HERMS because it is more energy and equipment efficient. If you are already heating the sparge water in the HLT, why not also use this water as a heating medium? Makes perfect sense right?

Some will choose a RIMS due to the fact that they do not have to change the temperature of a large volume of water in the HLT in order to make temperature corrections, or in some cases (step mashing) large temperature changes. This makes perfect sense as well… though both systems, if used properly, can perform temperature changes, even large ones, quite effectively. The choice is yours!

Posted in Equipment | 10 Comments »

Cleaning and Sanitization Tips

Consistency is the Virtue of Home Brewing
Part 1: Cleanliness

One of the most frequent comments heard about home brewed beers is “this guy brewed a batch of really good beer, this one time…” meaning he never managed to duplicate the feat. Consistency is the first, best virtue of a home brewer. Being able to produce a consistent beer means that when you do change the yeast or grains or hops, you’ll be able to know exactly what that change did to the taste and aroma. And on a personal level, there’s nothing quite as frustrating as brewing a wonderful beer, and then failing to reproduce that first, delicious batch.

Consistency starts with cleanliness. Anything that the water, mash, wort, or beer comes in contact with needs to be cleaned and sanitized, because these elements could carry wild yeasts, mold, or bacteria that can alter the final product. Fermenting beer is a sugar-rich, oxygenated liquid stored in a dark, temperature-controlled environment, perfect for encouraging yeast growth, but also for bacteria and mold. Cleanliness is the first, easiest, and most effective step in keeping unwanted agents out of fermenting beer.

My own exposure to the “clean and sanitize as you go” approach was Boy Scout camping, where the penalty for failing to clean your cookware was a case of the Kybo Quickstep (excessive need for the out house). That’s not a risk in homebrewing, but the practice remains the same. After using a tool (mash tub, boil pot, spoon, siphon, strainer, etc.) it should be cleaned in soapy water and scrubbed as necessary. Both in Scouts and in brewing, we like to keep a bucket on-hand filled with soapy water used exclusively for washing. Any soap suitable for dishwashing can be used, but many brewers favor no-rinse cleansers such as One Step or Star San; these products don’t leave a residue and don’t require additional rinsing, which is a plus. PBW is another popular cleaner used by brewers that helps get rid of stains and grime, but is not a sanitizer and needs to be rinsed off.

After cleaning, the item should be immediately sanitized in a one step sanitizing solution. Again, we kept a second bucket on-hand filled and waiting. A third and optional bucket is empty, having been sanitized beforehand, and works as a ‘catch bucket’ where cleaned, sanitized items can be put without re-contaminating them. Using the catch bucket is optional, some people just soak their items, but it depends if you are using a no rinse sanitizer or a bleach or iodophor solution.

Do not rinse items after they’ve been sanitized; while the water might be sanitized, the taps and hoses it goes through aren’t, and rinsing cleaned items undoes the work of the sanitizer. With bung and corks that should be dry before use, air drying is fine, set on a fresh towel on a clean table. Many new home-brewers make their sanitizing solutions much stronger than necessary, which will leave a residue behind. Until you’re sure of the correct concentration, iodophor is a safer choice than bleach, as its residue is neutralized by exposure to sunlight, while bleach residue is reactivated by exposure to water. Bleach taint is a serious concern for flavor contamination.

When you put away supplies, beware of standing water. Pots and mash tuns should be stored uncovered, upside down, with any spigots open to allow for full drying. Tubing should be given close attention to make sure no pockets of water or beer remain inside when put away. Standing water (or beer) are prime sites for mold growth, and even a small amount of mold in a tube is enough to infect a batch of beer if that tube is used to transfer beer.

There is one other aspect of cleanliness that isn’t addressed above, and that’s maintaining your equipment. Just a small patch of mold is enough to ruin 5 gallons of beer, and a small amount of bacteria can skunk your latest batch. Cracks and scratches in your tubing or food-grade buckets are perfect sites for bacteria to live: they’re nearly airless, inaccessible to cleaning tools, and difficult to fully sanitize. A scratch or crack, especially one that has visible discoloration, is sign that the item shouldn’t be in contact with the beer any more. Cracked or scratched buckets work fine for holding soapy water or sanitizer or as catch buckets, but we don’t want to be pouring wort or beer across their surfaces.

Cleanliness may be next to godliness, but it’s only one part of brewing consistent beer. In the next article, I’ll discuss the role that good record keeping plays in consistent brewing. Like cleanliness, it’s something you do both before and after the boiling, fermenting, and bottling, and like proper sanitation, it’s a good habit to develop early.

Please see the next article in this series on record keeping.

Posted in Brewing | 2 Comments »

Add Thermometer Probe to HLT MLT Cooler

Instructions for adding a thermometer to your hot liquor tank (HLT) or mash lauter tun (MLT). This makes a handy addition, it is cheap to do (~$16), and improves temperature accuracy.

Lets face it, brewing is an art and a science.  Science in itself requires certain controls and measurements to be executed effectively. This is no different with all-grain brewing. To the all-grain brewer temperature measurement and control is of the utmost importance. The following is a simple, efficient and effective way to accurately measure your HLT and more importantly MLT temperatures. The art of building quality brewing equipment is to make it simple, effective and efficient.

This DIY project is targeted at the all-grain brewer who chooses to utilize coolers, whether they be beverage coolers or “cube” coolers, that desire a simple way to measure temperatures inside their vessels without opening them.

Outside view:

Inside view:

Parts you will need:

#5.5 SOLID gum stopper or silicone stopper (Qty 1) – $1

Digital (or dial) probe thermometer with a range of at least 100F – 200F (Qty 1).  Anywhere from $11-$16 on amazon.com (search for TruTemp thermometer or CDN thermometer).

Tools you will need:

3/8” chuck power drill
1” hole saw
3/16” drill bit
Utility knife or file.

Instructions:

Step 1)
Calibrate the thermometer before installing it.

Step 2)
Locate your hole for the thermometer in a place where you can easily read it. There are a few considerations for placement. Make sure it will be submerged below your water level in your HLT and the strike water level in your MLT. Determine the smallest volume of strike water you will use when mashing in, and place the MLT hole below this level. Why? When you pour your strike water into your MLT, you can monitor the temperature as the cooler absorbs some of the heat from the water and when it reaches your strike temperature, mash in. For a 5 gallon all-grain brew you are looking at 2.5-4 gallons of strike water, for a 10 gallon all- grain you will double that amount to 5-8 gallons. Be sure your thermometer will be below these levels!

Drill your 1” hole here through the wall of the cooler. Once the hole is drilled, be sure to remove any rough edges or hanging plastic splinters with a utility knife or file.

Step 3)
You will need to “drill” a small hole through the center of the solid stopper in order to accommodate the probe of the thermometer of your choice. Utilize the 3/16” drill bit to do this, you will not see much of a hole due to the stoppers ability to seal itself off, but it will provide an opening for the thermometer probe.

Step 4)
Place the stopper into the 1” hole that you drilled in the cooler, from the INSIDE. While holding the stopper in the hole, carefully press the thermometer probe into the hole in the center of the stopper from the outside. Sometimes using a food safe lubricant like keg lube can help slide the probe into place.

Step 5)
Test that the fitting is water tight with warm but not boiling water. As always when doing any modifications with your equipment, test it before you brew again! The worst time to realize that you have a leak is when you are in the middle of a brew session with 150-180F water in all of your vessels!

Congratulations, your installation is complete and you are ready to brew!

Posted in Equipment | 11 Comments »

Boot Shaped Beer Glass

Ever since I saw the movie Beerfest, I wanted a boot shaped glass to drink out of. That day has finally arrived. This was a Valentine’s day gift to me from my wife. She is great! It has a Bavarian crest on the front, suitable for the home brew German lagers I intend to load into this sucker.

The beer boot says it is two liters, but it holds more than that. To the top it almost holds three quarters of a gallon which is closer to three liters. In terms of 12 ounce bottles, we are talking over a six pack worth of carrying capacity in one glass. PROST!

If you chug beer out of this glass with the toe pointed up, an air bubble will form causing beer to splash in your face. Towards the end of the night when things are nice and loopy, I can see this design feature being the source of many a good laugh in pubs that serve beer in a boot. The correct drinking technique is to point the toe to either side, instead of up or down.

The movie Beerfest explains the use of the beer boot in detail and it is worth watching at least once.

Posted in Equipment | 2 Comments »

Mashing and Lautering Basic Concepts

Mashing and lautering are terms used in all grain beer brewing to describe how brewers go from malted grain to wort in the kettle.

Mashing is the process of of creating sweet wort. We are lucky because in today’s world we start off with malted grains. Malting is a time intensive process best done on a large commercial scale. Malting prepares the grain for mashing and makes the process simple and easy. Nature pretty much does it for you. Mashing starts by combining malted grains with water at specific temperatures. The grains have to be crushed or milled first to enable the water to seep in. The hot water activates enzymes in the malt which triggers starch in the grain to convert into fermentable sugar. In general, the target temperature is between 150 and 158 F (65-70 C), held for one hour.

Mashing is performed in a container called a mash tun. It could be a modified picnic cooler, a converted keg, a kettle with a false bottom, or even a plain bucket. Heat retention is important and that is why coolers work so well.

Mashes are conducted on a temperature rest schedule. The default mash schedule is generally for one hour, between 150 and 158 F (65-70 C) at a water to grain ratio of 1-2 quarts per pound. For example to get a ratio of 1 quart per pound with 10 pounds of grain, add 10 quarts of water (2.5 gallons).

This site has a mash schedule calculator here which will help you plan infusion style mashing.

Depending on the grain or the type of beer, there may be several temperature levels, called rests, to proceed through. For example a less modified malt (such as Pilsner) may produce a higher yield under a schedule such as: 122F for 20 minutes, 140F for 20 minutes, and finally 155F for 20 minutes. A more advanced approach called decoction mashing involves removing a portion of the mash, boiling it, then re-adding it to the mash. This process of boiling and recombining may be repeated several times during a decoction mash. These advanced schedules are designed for total control over the beer, and compensate for less modified malts. Most malts out there (such as Americal Pale 2-Row) are highly modified and convert easily with the standard one step rest schedule lasting 60 minutes. Advanced brewers explore these more challenging and time intensive mashing techniques to produce a certain style, or fine tune a recipe to be totally authentic.

The mashing process:

1. Start off with your empty mash tun:

2. Add milled grains:

3. Add strike water and let sit for 60 minutes:

Now you are ready to drain the wort, the process called lautering which pretty much does itself if your manifold is well built. Lautering is the process of separating the spent grain husks from the sweet wort. After lautering the sweet wort ends up in the kettle and the boil begins!

Other terminology in mashing:
Crushed grain is also referred to as grist.

Mashing-in is when the water is first added to the grist. This initial water is called the strike water, and is added at a strike temperature to achieve the first rest’s temperature.

Mashing-out is increasing the temperature in the mash tun (through heat or infusing hot water) to 170°F (77°C) which stops the conversion process and makes the wort more viscous.

Sparging is the act of draining water through the grain bed to try to extract additional sugars.

The wort originally collected is called the first runnings.

Wort collected after sparging (if batch sparging) is called the second runnings.

The Vourlof phase is the very first wort that comes out of the mash tun. It is cloudy, and the first few pints are collected and poured back into the mash tun.

Posted in Brewing | 4 Comments »

Beer Styles – Original Gravity and Final Gravity Chart

NOTE: This chart has been updated with the latest BJCP style guidelines; please see the new chart here: Beer Styles – Original Gravity and Final Gravity Chart – 2017 Update

Beer comes in a wide range of malt/hop flavor balance and alcohol level. This chart shows the BJCP beer styles and their original gravity and final gravity in bar graph format.

Original gravity (OG) measures how much sugar is present in the wort before it is fermented. The final gravity (FG) is how much sugar is left over when fermentation is done. For a beer to fit into a certain style, each of these numbers must be within the specified range as the chart depicts.

A lower final gravity indicates a dry or crisp flavor, while a higher final gravity indicates a sweet or malty flavor.

The size of the gap between OG and FG can be used to calculate how much alcohol the beer contains.

Data for this chart comes from the the Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP).

Posted in Beer Styles | 4 Comments »

Order Hops Rhizomes Soon

Thinking of growing hops? Now is the time to start ordering rhizomes for 2009. They sell out fast so order soon. Planting happens in the spring time.

In the first year the yield will be small. Only in the second year does the plant really take off and yield up to several pounds of hops. This is why it pays to get started early with this aspect of the home brewing hobby.

The plants should be put about five feet apart. On farms they are planted in a 7’x7′ grid, but that is mostly to allow room for harvesting equipment. The vines will want to climb, so setting up a trellis is needed if you are not planting near something they can climb up. A length of twine is usually strung from as high as 18 feet to the base of the plant to allow the two strongest shoots to wrap around.

More to come on hops growing at this site!

Sources of rhizomes:
Google search

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