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I mentioned in my email last week that I purchased one of those Tap-A-Draft kegging systems for carbonating beer and wine coolers and here are some initial thoughts:

1) I like how it fits nicely in my fridge - not quite like a beer tap at the pub but close enough!

2) I’m a little disappointed in the level of carbonation that you get with the system to be perfectly honest. I like a little more “bubbly” in my beer and to me it tastes a little flat.

3) Each bottle contains the equivalent of 15 bottles of beer so I only have a pint once in a while. You need to add a new CO2 cartridge to dispense the beer and one thing I’ve noticed is that if you let the beer sit in the fridge for a few days between pours you lose the pressure and need to add another CO2 cartridge (this makes sense as the CO2 will dissolve into the beer). At $13 per package of 8 or so cartridges it gets pretty expensive as you are constantly putting in new cartridges.

To increase the level of carbonation in your beer you can “prime” the container by adding some sugar (i.e. as you would if carbonating your beer in the bottle), which is what I plan on trying next. Note that you need a special cap for the plastic bottle, which has a one-way valve so that the bottle doesn’t “blow up” if the pressure gets to be too large.

4) I actually did a taste test this evening where I tried the bottled version of the beer against the Tap-A-Draft version and I noticed that the bottled version had much nicer, creamy taste then the Tap-A-Draft, tasted a little more complex and definitely had more “fizz” to it.

(Note that I did enjoy both so perhaps I’m just being overly picky …

Anyhoo, just some quick thoughts for you on how things are going with my new “toy”as I know some of you were asking me what I thought about it. I’ll be blogging more about it in the coming weeks and would be interested in hearing what your comments are especially if you have one.

According to the place I bought it from they can’t seem to keep them in stock as they’re so popular so I’m definitely not the only one who owns one !

So stay tuned for more …

- Scott

Here are some other discussions on the Web about the Tap-A-Draft that I have found:

Did you know that you can easily calculate the alcohol content of your beer or wine if you know your specific gravity (S.G.) readings at the beginning and end of the beer/wine making process?

To calculate the approximate value of the alcohol content in your beer/wine use the following formula:

Approximate Alcohol Content (%) =

Starting S.G.- Ending S.G.

0.0074

For example:

Starting SG = 1.090
Ending SG = 0.995

% Alcohol = 1.090 - 0.995 = 12.84

0.0074

> You can therefore say that the approximate alcohol content of this batch of wine is 12.84%

Note: This method assumes that difference in specific gravity is solely due to the conversion of sugar into alcohol

Did you know that sulphite is not strong enough to kill bacteria and therefore is of no use in beermaking?

I typically make wine and therefore use a metabisulphite solution to clean my equipment and to date have had no issues with my batches. I should point out though that I’m pretty fussy about keeping my equipment clean, especially when storing it between batches!

I was surprised to read in the cleaning instructions that came with the Brew House beer kit from RJ Spagnols that sulphites shouldn’t be used to clean beer making equipment as they can’t kill bacteria, which will alter the taste of the beer and also opens up the possibility that you’ll get sick from your beer - not good!

I have to say though that I was quite impressed with the cleaning instructions that they included with the kit as they give four cleaning options: Trisodium Phosphate (aka T.S.P. - i.e. the stuff you clean your walls with before you paint them), Diversol (aka Sani-Brew - i.e. the pink solution commonly used in beer/wine making), Bleach (i.e. aka the stuff you use to whiten your shirts) and Iodophor (aka Iodine).

My personal preference is Sani-Brew as it has bleach in it (so I know it’s a good disinfectant) and works well when removing stains from your equipment (especially for your primary - great when you are brewing several different types of wines/beers out of the same container).

Here’s a the page on RJ Spagnol’s website that goes into greater detail about cleaning your equipment as well as the differences between four types of cleansers that they recommend. Definitely worth checking out (even if to serve as a refresher):

www.RJSjspagnols.com/resource_view.asp?HandoutID=44

I realize that cleaning your equipment is one of the least favourite jobs when making beer or wine but consider this interesting thought from RJ Spagnols:

“If you get tired of scrubbing and sanitizing, remember: lapses in sanitation are responsible for 90% of all homebrewing failures. You can avoid them.”

- Scott “The Wine Making Guy”

Thought I would pass along an interesting tidbit of information I learned this morning about home made beer - the easiest way to eliminate the sediment at the bottom of the bottle of home made beer.

As a wine maker I assumed that the sediment was from dead yeast that hadn’t settled out from the fermentation process and that the only way to get rid of the sediment was to filter it - after all, don’t the commercial beer makers filter their beer?

It turns out (after a chat with a fellow customer who I met this morning at one of the local wine making supply store that I frequent) that I was right that the sediment is from dead yeast, but I was wrong in terms of where it came from.

The typical way to carbonate your beer is by adding sugar to your beer before you bottle it (you can also add carbonation tabs to each bottle as well). The sugar re-energizes the yeast in the beer and restarts the fermentation thereby producing carbon dioxide naturally. The sediment that you see in the bottom of the bottle is therefore the dead yeast from this round of fermentation.

The easiest way to avoid this sedimentation, therefore, is to use a different method of adding carbon dioxide to your beer! To do this you’ll need to use a kegging system such as the one used in your local pub or you can purchase one of those “Tap-A-Draft” systems I mentioned in my previous post “Suggestions On How To Carbonate your Beer, Sparkling Wine or Wine Cooler“.

It’s just a matter of time before I purchase the “Tap-A-Draft”!

Honey Blond Ale

For those of you who like a honey beer like Sleeman’s Honey Brown Lager, I think I might have found a kit that you should give a try. RJ Spagnols, who is known for their wine kits also has a line of beer kits called “The Brew House“.

They have a honey beer called “Honey Blonde Ale” that is similar to Sleeman’s but the owner of the store said that if you wanted to “kick it up a notch” to add 1/2 kg of unpasteurized honey along with a kettle full of boiling water to the primary before you added your water and beer wort.

Sounded very interesting so thought I would give it a go. Haven’t made this brand of kit before but it comes highly recommended. If you have any experience with them please leave a comment!

Here are some tasting and technical notes for The Brew House’s Honey Blonde Ale:

STYLES AND HISTORY
A refreshingly smooth, full-bodied ale with a touch of all natural honey to create a slightly sweet finish. Golden in colour, with a rich, soft and round palate, we use pure clover honey to balance the satisfying ale character.

FOOD AND SOCIAL
It pairs extremely well with classic summer fare, such as cold fruit or fresh leaf lettuce salads but also has the resilience to stand up to most strongly flavoured foods like char-grilled meats and pizzas.

Enjoy!

- Scott “The Beer & Wine Making Guy”

I thought I would switch gears for this Blog post as I not only make wine but I also make beer. Mind you, my story from this weekend can easily apply to wine making so if you only make wine read on!

I’m in the process of making a tasty Mexican Cerveza and this is just in time for patio weather in my neck of the woods. Since it is a Mexican beer I wanted to get some Corona bottles - I also figured they would be much easier to clean as they don’t have any labels to deal with.

I’m not sure how bottles are recycled in your part of the world but here in Alberta we have privately owned bottle depots where you bring all of your empties and in return you get your deposit back. I figured this would be the best place to get Corona bottles as they get them every day and I certainly wasn’t disappointed - although I had to explain to them several times why I wanted them as my request was certainly out of the norm.

In any event, we haggled a bit and before too long I was the proud owner of 6 dozen used, sludgy and empty bottles of Corona!

The biggest surprise though came after I started pulling the bottles out of the case as some of them were pretty disgusting - some had big chunks of mold at the bottom while another had a dead mouse! Yuck!

In retrospect I should have taken pictures of some of these bottles for your viewing pleasure but unfortunately I didn’t think of it until just now. You can trust me though when I say that they were pretty gross …

Typically bottle cleaning is the bain of most wine or beer maker’s existence and they typically leave this part to the very last minute but I knew how dirty these bottles were going to be so wanted to plan ahead.

My wife Michelle and I plan on bottling the beer this coming Saturday and wanted to get things done well in advance so came up with a 5-part plan of attack:

Step 1 - Pre-rinse the bottles with a jet bottle washer so that we can clean out the sludge, mold … and dead mice.

Step 2 - Disinfect with “Sani Brew” for 5 days (note typically doing this over night is fine but figured we’d do it longer since we had the time). We have a large primary that a friend donated that so happens to be perfect for holding 6 dozen bottles of beer or 30 bottles of wine. If you don’t have one of these then consider going out and purchasing a big green plastic garbage can.

It’s worth noting that the Sani Brew has bleach in it so you are best to cover your sanitizing bucket with a blanket or towel so you can contain the bleach “aroma”.

Step 3 - Double rinse the bottles with fresh water to get the Sani Brew detergent out of the bottles (remember that Sani Brew has chlorine in it so isn’t exactly digestion friendly and therefore it is definitely worth over doing it on the rinsing part at this stage).

Step 4 - Sterilizing with a metabisulphite solution using a “sulfiter”.

Step 5 - More rinsing then we’re good to go!

(As a side note, I’ve read some posts where people use their oven to disinfect their bottles using heat, however bottles aren’t used to the heating and cooling so will fatigue and break. )

It is also worth pointing out that if you’re saving your used beer or wine bottles for future batches that you can save yourself a lot of grief by rinsing the bottles out with warm clean water shortly after you have used them then storing them upside down in a wine or beer bottle case so that dust (or mice) don’t collect inside them.

Hope this helps. Best of luck!

- Scott “The Wine Making Guy”