Mr. Wizard
Setting the Record Straight on Mash pH
There are some answers that I write where I know that I am stepping into a gray area, and my very brief sidebar about pH jumped square in the middle of the
Mash pH Importance
Mash pH is extremely important. Enzyme activity is a function of pH and all enzymes are only active in a relatively narrow range around their optimum pH. In the case of mashing,
Water Filtration
The answer to this question depends on what type of water filtration that you are planning to use. Carbon filtration is the most common type of home water filtration. Carbon filters contain
Transferring Hop Trub to the Fermenter
Right or wrong, I long ago viewed the production of beer to include many steps where things are modified, separated and moved to the next step of the operation. The malting process,
No-Sparge Brewing
I am definitely a subscriber to the idea that keeping things simple is a benefit to many things that brewers do in the pursuit of great beer. Simplifying things can have a
Combating Astringency
All is not lost when a batch of beer is spotted that may eventually be ascribed with the scarlet letter “A” for astringency. The key with this statement is that the beer
Scaling Up Recipes
The hard part about answering this question involves determining IBUs in a beer. For the moment, let’s ignore the elephant in the room and pretend that that is not so difficult for
Scaling Down Recipes
I have been designing beers using math since I first learned how to calculate a brew 25 years ago. There is something rewarding in the formality that goes into crunching numbers and
Kettle Souring with a Heating Element
Kettle sours have become quite popular with commercial craft brewers who want to brew sour beers without turning their breweries into funk factories and the technique really works quite well. It’s also
Homebrew Spoils Quickly
The primary cause of oxidized beer is the introduction of air to beer after the initial stages of fermentation. It is very easy to simply state that oxidation can be minimized by
Bottle Conditioned Sediment
Well Steve, my answer to your question is partially based on facts and partially on opinion, so let’s see if I can clear things up about this cloudy topic. Brewer’s yeast does
CO2 Tank Placement
This question has a very direct answer; it makes no difference at all if you put your CO2 tank inside or outside of your kegerator. Locating the CO2 inside of the kegerator
