On Thu, 24 Nov 2011 16:07:53 -0600, "
wrote:

On Thu, 24 Nov 2011 11:59:56 -0600, -MIKE- wrote:

On 11/24/11 11:57 AM, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:
On Thu, 24 Nov 2011 07:41:25 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
wrote:

m II wrote:
Many times the lack of temperature control makes it bitter. Brewing
too fast changes the flavour.

Natural carbonation happening on the bottle can be dangerous as in the
old days when glass bottles exploded.


Croisan (sp?) brewing is a touchy process. It's still practiced by some
commercial and home brewers today. In yesteryear, more of the home brewing
explosions were a result of the bottles used by home brewers than by the
actual process though. It does create an increase in pressure as the
secondary fermentation takes place, and good bottles are a must, or things
can go bust.

An uncle used to brew root beer in his basement. Evedently, one time he got a
little carried away with the "secondary" fermentation and he had a chain
reaction of bottles exploding. After cleaning up that mess, he always stored
the bottled brew in garbage cans.


I have a home brew kit ready to go, but I have to wait until I have a
couple months of cold weather so I have somewhere cool to store the
bucket while it ferments.

I've thought about it but I'm not supposed to drink alcohol so there is little
point (I'll have some NA beer for turkey dinner in a few minutes). :-(

I used to home brew a lot in 80's & 90's but took the brewery abart
about 6 years ago or so. I'm getting ready to add 360 square ft to
the shop so maybe I'll have room again. Three 15 gallon stainless
steel vessels with screens fitted and drain valves & thermometer
welded in. All 3 have there own 35K BTU burner and they drain from
one vessel to the next as you mash & sparge and boil. Anyway the hops
are pretty much for bittering and the beginning of the mash and mostly
for the nose at the end. The temperature is generally between 150 and
158 F for extracting the sugars. Some step procecdures will start
with a lower temperature but generally with todays grains the low rest
stop isn't necessary. The high temperature destroys the enzymes that
help extract the sugars so when you are ending the mashing process you
actually kick it up to 168-170 F to stop the reaction.

Mike M