Editors crush. Congratulations to the winners in all classes especially the more hotly contended classes. So much work that has to be done before What this really showed to me was the Christmas and still more too come. breadth of styles that Canberra This edition of the ferm has a good Brewers have encompassed. It was selection of articles, some from the web, certainly the first time that a Steinbier was but most from fellow brew club members. entered and I do not believe that we have There is a great article about Dry hopping seen examples of Flemish Reds in our , a couple of funnies and Brother annual competitions before. Google was kind enough to outline the All judging sessions were well attended by events of the Oktoberfest held at Fatboys, judges and stewards, who not only did all which will be a definite designated driver the kitchen work but drove the tired (and in event for me next year. The results of the some cases emotional (Kurtz)) home. ACTABC which was judged over the A big thanks to the organizers, Lionheart previous couple of weeks was astounding, in particular who gave up his house night with the amount of entries exceeding over after night as well as provided snacks. 170, congrates for a very successful event Next off the rank , competition wise is the and to all those that got a place, good luck AABA which is again being held in in the Nationals. The top 3 results for each Canberra at the Canberra Club on Saturday category can be found on the Canberra 13th November. I have been told that the Brewers web site. judges will assess over 200 in this I need another brewer willing to expose event, with, for the first time beers coming him or herself on the cover of the ferm. from Western Australia. The aaba Anyone interested should apply, it only committee here has done a wonderful job cost a couple of thou, and ones food and not only for Canberra but for Australian beverage stocks…………cmon, don’t be brewing in general. afraid. During the month we headed off to Solstices Piazza-Warming and the semi- Cya annual Oktoberfest held near a deserted, Bro Crusher empty swimming pool in Wanniassa. Our Social Secretary will detail these later in The Presidents Sparge the ferm but I would to extend a big thanks from the club all members who participate What a month we have had and what an in these events. Speaking of which the next even bigger month we will have. event is at Kastle Kurtz..the Teach a Friend First of all the ACTAABA. to Brew Day 2004. All are welcome as are A big round of thanks to all who entered new brewers and even those who have and , with 176 entries made this the biggest never brewed or seen a brew. I understand ever. that (Solstice?) will be doing an extract demo for those who would not want to ahng out for the whole AG experience. We have had more members join during trees were a real winner and cooking the month so to you new members a hearty wort over the fire was a must. Alistair was welcome and I hope to meet you on a little quieter, but a couple more beers Thursday. Enough of me for the moment , would loosen his tongue. I will expand on all of the above during my Both Alistair and Dan seemed to work in speech on Thursdays meeting. an archeology field since I was informed that maybe one of the reasons that the Kurtz. knurl wears off my grain mill is because of the silica in the grain. The reason they Brewers of the month knew this is because of evaluating what the mummified stomachs had in them and they can date the silica from the grains…. very interesting Since that day, both Alistair and Dan decided they had to give this grain brewing a go. And so the journey around the wort begins………. First it was essential that they get the equipment to begin, it was fortunate that one of them worked for a local bar in his Alistair Daniel spare time, and so happened to get a couple of surplus kegs (totally legit.;-)) one for the This month’s brewer of the month article is mash, one for the boiler. written about two brewers, Dan and Alistair that I encountered during my mash demo day in September. I don’t think that they have ever actually gone to a Canberra brewers meeting since they started brewing, not because they haven’t wanted too, but because as relatively new members, timing just hasn’t allowed as yet. Dan (the bald guy, sorry Dan) rocked up first and with a couple of grolsh bottles, which I quickly took off his hands and placed in the fridge, seemed quite keen on the whole wort from the grain trick. He mentioned that when he was last at BYOAH, that Colin had mentioned to him that there was a mash demo being Overall picture of their setup conducted at my house on the weekend. The tops were cut out of the kegs and the We stood around talking for a little while spears removed, they were then lovingly and decided it would be best if we create a ground and smoothed for safety issues for taste testing panel of our own, since the the next 4hrs. Although, looking at some of condition of entry was a bottle or two of their photo’s they sent across, I’m left your own , this turned out to be quite a wondering how they kept all of their limbs. success. Dan and Alistair had brewed They seemed to gain valuable insight into already with extract and specialty grain how they wanted to create their and of course honey.. Dan loved the honey lauter/mash tun from my failed attempt at in his beers. the mash day. So a slotted pipe Dan, being a man of the world was most arrangement was decided upon. impressed with how the whole grain process was being conducted. The gum I've been brewing since I finished my honours (a bit of a congratulatory hobby) at the end of 2000.

2. What sort of brewing do you do (eg extract, specialty grain, etc )? Until recently it was extract + grain but now hopefully all-grain

3. What got you into brewing ? Ryka Moore's creations (a friend from Lauter manifold high-school who has now moved to

They said that it was quite an ordeal Melbourne and I think stopped brewing finding some of the hardware, and prices unfortunately) varied considerably. At one shop they said they paid $20 for 300mm of ½” pipe, 4. What is your favorite commercial beer, which they promptly took back after and why ? realising. All of the material was sourced Fav Aussie commercial beer would have to from various hardware and plumbing shops be Little Creatures - strong and without a wealth of experience in the floral hoppy flavour balanced well with a field I felt they did quite well in creating bit of sweetness their monster. Dan and Alistair did have access to a workshop where they work, 5. What would have been your biggest which was put to good use. brewing disaster ? The lauter manifold was constructed from Brewing disaster? hmmm - i did try an ½” copper tubing with standard tee section apple cider from pressed apple juice joints, they aren’t soldered to allow ease of once that was absolutely horrible - I am cleaning. keen to try again but maybe not All this work had a deadline as Dan, (the for a while - not while I can still remember mummy man) had to go back overseas on a the flavour of the last... dig or something (the details are a little fuzzy) so 3 weeks they had to come up 7. Have you got any favorite ingredients ? with an all-grain system, learn how to use I do use honey quite a bit - great for head- it, and create a heathen god. The last one retention and a nice was relatively easy. background flavour It was unfortunate that I couldn’t be there on their maiden voyage into the abyss, but 8. How often would you say you'd brew ? other commitments held me back. I did Well Alistair says that an empty fermenter however receive the recipe and some is a waste of space so we brew photos that were taken during he day. whenever we've bottled the previous one... It seems that everything went all right on the first brew and I recall even seeing a 9. Finally, any tips for a budding new few entries into the ACTABC by them, brewer ? which did quite admirably. A tip for a new brewer? I don't think I They have included their first mash day have enough experience to be and a little write-up of the problems and giving tips but maybe - just keep trying successes they had, but first I’d thought I’d new things out and never be ask them a few questions regarding their afraid of learning from others brewing history.

1. How long have you been brewing for ? Start of brew day : 1030am Sunday 12 September 2004

Recipe for Irish Red : was something else. After the wort was Malt: cooled the drainpipe got clogged with trub 5kg Maltcraft Traditional Ale Malt (3 and no amount of poking about in it would EBC) clear it - in the end I (Dan) had to do the ol' 1kg Weyermann Caramunich II (110-130 blowback method on the pipe and EBC) hopefully I didn't infect it. We are now 50g Cracked Thomas Fawcett & Sons considering some kind of mesh dome or lid Roasted Barley that could go over the top of the pipe for the next brew. mashed for 1.5 hours at 66degC and then sparged with an unknown quantity of hot : water (used jug but lost count of how many 150g Coles Farmland Honey added after refills we made) - mash during sparge was wort was cooled (mistakenly) but never more than 75degC. We felt we took pasteurised in same volume of boiling more time than was actually necessary on water first. the sparge but were happy nonetheless with the result. Specific gravity of wort after chilling to 25degC was 1.062 - we had a total of 20L We realised that our brass fitting for the - and pre-cultured Manchester was soft plastic tube was getting too hot and the pitched at 17:40. tube would become even softer - falling off, so we attached a hosepipe clamp to Throughout the day there were numerous secure it. Alistair had this very cool clamp snags and bread consumed and washed for adjusting the flow of the mashed wort down with many of Alistair's fine extract to a "leaky prostate" (thanks Dr Kurtz for & grain beers. that wonderful analogy). Cheers Wort was sweet and quite dark when we Dan & Al put the boiler on to the gas burner at 15:10.

Hops: Some lite Bittering: 60g Styrian Goldings 5.5% AAU entertainment for full boil (1 hour) Flavouring: 20g German Northern Brewer How to Shower Like a Woman 10.0% AAU for last 20mins of boil Aroma: 10g English Kent Goldings Take off clothing and place it in sectioned (Yakima Chief) 7.0% AAU for last 1 laundry hamper according to lights and minute of boil darks. + 10g English Kent Goldings (Yakima

Chief) 7.0% AAU dry hopped after wort Walk to bathroom wearing long dressing was cooled gown. If you see husband along the way,

cover up any exposed areas. Wort came to boil at 16:00 and we put the fermenter upside down and over the keg to Look at your womanly physique in the sterilise it. A slight boilover occurred mirror - make mental note to do more sit- when we had our backs turned (as is ups always the case) but minimal hoppy gunk was lost (also boiled the copper chiller in Get in the shower. Use face cloth, arm wort in last few minutes of boil). cloth, leg cloth, long loofah, wide loofah,

and pumice stone. The copper chiller worked beautifully.

The drainpipe in the base of the wort boiler Wash your hair once with cucumber and Wash your armpits. sage shampoo with 43 added vitamins. Blow your nose in your hands and let the Wash your hair again to make sure it's water rinse them off. clean. Condition your hair with grapefruit mint Make fart noises (real or artificial) and conditioner enhanced with natural avocado laugh oil. Leave on hair for 15 minutes. at how loud they sound in the shower.

Wash your face with crushed apricot facial Spend majority of time washing privates scrub for 10 minutes until red. and surrounding area.

Wash entire body with ginger nut and jaffa Wash your butt, leaving those coarse butt cake body wash. hairs stuck on the soap.

Rinse conditioner off hair. Shampoo your hair.

Shave armpits and legs. Make a Shampoo Mohawk.

Turn off shower. Pee.

Squeegee off all wet surfaces in shower. Rinse off and get out of shower. Spray mold spots with Tilex. Partially dry off. Fail to notice water on Get out of shower. Dry with towel the size floor because curtain was hanging out of of a small country. Wrap hair in super tub the whole time. absorbent towel. Admire wiener size in mirror again. Check entire body for zits, tweeze hairs. Leave shower curtain open, wet mat on Return to bedroom wearing long dressing floor, light and fan on. gown and towel on head. Return to bedroom with towel around your If you see husband along the way, cover up waist. If you pass wife, pull off towel, any exposed areas. shake wiener at her and make the 'woo- woo' sound again.

How To Shower Like a Man Throw wet towel on bed.

Take off clothes while sitting on the edge Oktoberfest 2004 of the bed and leave them in a pile.

Walk naked to the bathroom. If you see Another year, and already time for wife along the way, shake wiener at her Oktoberfest again. This year Bro Fatboy making the 'woo-woo' sound. (was) kindly volunteered to host the event,

and his shiny new poolside deck was the Look at your manly physique in the mirror. prefect venue. Admire the size of your wiener and scratch your ass. I showed up early to drop off the gear for a

mash demo before heading off to vote. My Get in the shower. civic duty done, I returned to mash in.

Alas, Rod was the only person there to see Wash your face it. ;)

The cooks for the day showed up soon enough, and the kitchen became a hive of activity as Shaun whipped up the batter for fresh spätzle and Christoph kneaded and twisted his amazing pretzels. Dominic scored onion-stirring duty, Richard F. was assigned to esky patrol and Rod was on sparge water watch in the dungeon.

Lunch!

We were all well past due for lunch. I set a couple of kilos of fresh weisswurst and bratwurst simmering, finishing the brats on the barbecue with a Märzen baste. Shaun brought out the molten mass of fresh spätzle with caramelised onions, melted cheese and chopped parlsey. Christine lived up to her name with her magnificent stuffed cabbage rolls, and Christoph’s pretzels were predictably crisp and golden This week on Queer Eye… with a crunchy sprinkle of Maldon salt.

It was mid-afternoon by the time the Fatboy’s potato salad was a rib-sticking masses came round. There was plenty to miracle of saturated fat and carbohydrates. drink with Fatboy’s on tap in the I’d made a batch of fresh Munich mustard fridge and a keg each of Christoph’s the night before with a generous slosh of Amarillo APA, a tasty German dark Christoph’s triple-decocted (one for and a smoked Märzen-style rauchbier. The the mustard, one for me…two for the portable Sodastream adapter ensured a mustard, one…two for me.) Brenda perfect pour every time, and the ice-filled wrapped it all up with a six-pack of her plastic garbage bins served admirably as amazing Captains Flat pickles and chillers. preserves – we had to beat Dominic off with a stick to stop him eating the apple one from the jar with a spoon (as I did with the spicy tomato sauce later that night ;>).

Relaxing after lunch. Can we walk around in our underwear now?

I was still mashing through all of this, ducking into the garage occasionally to batch sparge. The wort had cooled substantially over the afternoon so the boil took a while to get going. As the afternoon Many thanks to Dominic for his generous temperatures dropped the boiler became hospitality, to everybody who brought food the focus of attention as we all huddled and beer, and to everybody who ate and round to keep warm. drank it all! See you again next year!

Other highlights of the day (one of which Cheers! – Bro Google is not true):

− The return of Brother Paddington from Dry hopping Lagers deepest, darkest Peru; By Al Korzonas − Christoph’s low-alcohol witbier - just the thing for breakfast; I did some research on the question of dry hopping in German and Bohemian − John Nagle dancing to Kylie (and other lagers). The primary question Minogue’s ‘Locomotion’; was whether Bohemian Pilsners should be dry hopped or not. − Peeling Bro Not-steppen-anywhere-in- a-hurry-wolf off the floor and putting Since the primary issue was Bohemian him to bed; and Pilsners, I first checked the articles on Pilsner Urquell in Brewing Techniques and − Mike Day drinking Belgian beer from a Zymurgy. "Pilsner Urquell: The " Hoegaarden glass. Can the Apocalypse by Darryl Richman (Zymurgy Volume 14, be far away? Number 2, Summer 1991) describes their processes in great detail yet there is no mention of adding hops to the fermenters. In "The History of Brewing Methods of Pilsner Urquell" (Brewing Techniques Volume 5, Issue 3, May-Aug 1997), Peter Ensminger explicitly states that Pilsner Urquell is not dry hopped.

Several HBD posters (including me) have noted that dry hopped lagers simply do not taste or smell like their commercial equivalents. A Bohemian Pilsner that I foolishly dry hopped turned out to be I called Ralph Olson at Hop Union and slightly grassy and quite estery (hop oils asked him about it. He said he has never contain many different esters) which were heard of dry hopping continental lagers, completely wrong for a Bohemian Pilsner. but would check with his contacts in It was a tasty beer, but nobody would Germany. He called me back and said that mistake it for a Pilsner Urquell clone. even his agent in Germany has never heard Papazian does not dry hop any of his lagers of a German or Bohemian brewer dry in TCJoHB. hopping a lager. Noonan mentions dry hopping in both On the other hand, there are a number of books, but specifically says that it is home brewing authors that advocate dry generally inappropriate for lagers. hopping. Dave Miller dry hops all of his lagers. His claim that Warsteiner is dry In Malting and Brewing Science, dry hopped is what really caused me to email hopping is only mentioned in the same Hubert... the Warsteiner we get here is paragraph with British brewing practices pretty beat up by the time we get it and and cask conditioning. While this book is when I'm in Germany, I tend to drink only primarily about British brewing, they do go the beers that I can't get here (a mistake I into some details about US and continental should correct on my next visit). I had beers and practices. There was no mention theorised that perhaps there is a strong hop of dry hopping in continental lagers. aroma in fresh Warsteiner, but that it fades in transit. Hubert seems to indicate this is DeClerck says about dry hopping: "This probably not the case. practice is frequent in Great Britain for I don't have Dave Line's book, but it has draught beers." been posted in HBD that he does indeed recommend dry hopping lagers, although I sent email to Hubert Hanghofer in at a much lower rate than recommended by Austria asking whether he or his son (who Miller. We should also remember that Line is currently studying at Weihenstephan) was British and British commercial has ever heard of dry hopping of brewers no doubt influenced his methods. continental lagers. I haven't gotten a confirmation from his son, but Hubert Finally, in "Designing Great Beers," Ray agrees with me that continental lagers do Daniels (in the chapter summary page) not appear to be dry hopped by any of the says that Continental Pilsners may or may brewers and believes that Warsteiner (a not be dry hopped. However, it is beer that Dave Miller claims is dry important to remember that Daniels’ recipe hopped) is not dry hopped. Hubert also recommendations are statistically derived quoted a section from the "EBC Manual of from the 1993 and 1994 AHA National Good Practice" in which it is stated that Homebrew Competition second round whole hop oils do not produce a recipes and therefore are at the mercy of "satisfactory flavour" The book errors made by the entrants. I suspect that specifically mentions "raw hop, tobacco Miller's (errant) recommendation to dry and grassy" notes. It is also interesting to hop lagers could very well be the reason note that Hubert mentioned that Narziss that judges in the 1st round of the `93 and (who wrote "Abriss der Bierbrauerei" -- `94 nationals chose to pass 8 dry hopped what Hubert calls "our bible") describes Pilsners into the second round. In dry hopping during lagering of . summary, I believe it is safe to assume that My understanding is that the everyday dry hopping should be reserved for Altbiers in Duesseldorf are not dry hopped American and English . Duesseldorf's these days... only the special batches made "Sticke" (which is sometimes dry hopped for their loyal customers (called with Spalt hops) and the Trappist ale "Sticke") are dry hopped by some of the "Orval" (which is dry hopped with East brewers. Kent Goldings) are two notable exceptions from Germany and Belgium, respectively. ------(c) Copyright 1998 Al Korzonas All Rights Reserved

Al Korzonas, Palos Hills, IL [email protected] http://www.brewinfo.com/brewinfo/

FOR EVERYTHING ELSE…

− 50 grotty James Squires bottles – free.

− Getting your niece to spend her Saturday scrubbing them out with bleach - $25.

− Waiting til she’s done before paying her with those ‘An Hour Of My Time’ gift certificates she forgot she gave you for Xmas last year – priceless. ;) The next meeting of the Canberra Brewers will be on

Thursday 2 December 2004

at the Griffin Centre in Civic. On the agenda:

ƒ Xmas party ƒ Drinkin’

The doors will open at 7:30pm (honestly, they really will this time) and official business will start at 7:45pm sharp.