No fixed plans. Not intent upon arriving.
effectiveness of pre boiling water to remove bicarbonate – Home Brew Forums
You can estimate the effect of boiling for decarbonation (removing bicarbonate) by the following formula: boiling will remove all but about 30 to 40 ppm of carbonate-bicarbonate; at the same time, it will remove 3 ppm of calcium for every 5 ppm of carbonate.
IPA Day Returns on August 2, 2012
IPA Day is back! On Aug. 2, 2012, join beer enthusiasts across the globe in a collective toast to one of craft beer’s most iconic styles: India Pale Ale!
In Gordon Strong’s book he recommends putting [left over hops] in glass jars, purging with c02 and freezing. He says they will last better than a year and keep their freshness that way.
The safe range of room-temperature mash pH is about 5.3 to 5.5. That indicates that the pH in the mash is 0.2 to 0.3 units lower, but that doesn’t really matter. The only thing we need to focus on is the ‘room-temperature measurements’.
A 5.4 room-temperature pH is a good all-around target. If you want your beer a little sharper or tarter, aim a little lower (5.2 to 5.3). If you want your dark beers to be a little softer, aim for 5.5. But don’t get carried away with a high pH target. All kinds of things go wrong when you exceed about 5.7 to 5.8. You can be a little low with pH and the beer should taste OK. But it won’t be so good if its a little high.
Using a shot glass that I’ve pre-chilled, it only takes about a tablespoon of wort to fill the glass sufficiently to submerge a normal pH probe. That small amount of wort cools down in a minute in that glass.
If you only fill the small air space with CO₂, it will quickly be absorbed into the beer. You need to keep the CO₂ connected to the keg until it is completely carbonated for the pressure/temp it is at.
In 1984, Jim Koch, founder and brewer of Samuel Adams beers, brewed his first batch of Samuel Adams Boston Lager in his kitchen. Now you can follow in Jim’s footsteps and have your homebrew nationally distributed.
a question about pickling lime v. chalk
I don’t care what the question is; in brewing, baking soda is never the answer.
Usually I dip something in the wort — a temperature probe or a spoon and immediately place a drop on the lens and then flip the cover. I let it cool a bit — as it’s a drop or so it cools rapidly, usually within seconds. The temperature and evaporation problem is solved by doing it this way.
Yeast cell count…Starters…Gravity range
I always chill and decant. After tasting the spent starter wort, I have no desire to have that stuff in my beer. — Denny Conn