Parisian Essence

Was doing a bit of research on an "antique" brewing ingredient, "Parisian Essence." Now, Parisian Essence is a Caramel type III food coloring and is frequently used in beer manufacture to control Beer Colour. What I wanted to know is how to spec it for use in a Brewing Program. Simple question, a coupe of hours of internet research later and a few beers and I have an answer:

Parisian Essence is a Caramel Class III (E1150c) product. The composition of Caramel III is more ore less as follows,

Composition: Plain ammonia caramel, Class III
Appearance: Dark brown viscous liquid
Odour: Characteristic odour
Analysis
Colour (EBC): [approx.] 33,000
pH: 5
Extract (litre°/kg): 245.1
Total Apparent Solids (%): 65.5
(source:http://www.murphyandson.co.uk/datasheets/tech_caramel.pdf)

So, to add this to a brewing program like Beersmith, I entered it as  "Grain" thus:
Name: Parisian Browning Essence, Origin: Australia, Type: Adjunct, Color: 33000 EBC, Potential: 1.046 SG, Max %: 0.1%, Inventory: 0.1 kg, Price: 17.00 €/kg. The tricky part was working out the Potential but somehow through various websites that I can't recall now, ended up with the above.

If you don't have access to Parisian Essence or some similar Browning additive, you can DIY it on your own. This seems to be the standard, 'go to' recipe getting around the net. I made this once before but didn't take the blackening far enough at.


Parisian Essence (source)
Preparation time: 15 to 30 minutes

Ingredients
1 cup sugar
1 cup hot water

Method
1. Melt 1 cup of sugar in a medium heavy saucepan, over a low heat.
2. Stir constantly until sugar is burnt black and smoky. Use of an exhaust fan is highly
recommended.
3. Remove from the heat and allow to cool a little.
4. Add 1 cup of hot water a drop at a time.
5. Be sure to add the hot water very slowly, to prevent spurting.
6. Continue adding the water until the syrup is smooth.
7. After all the water is added, stir again over low heat until the burnt sugar becomes a
thin dark liquid.
8. When cool, pour into a bottle.

Recipe Notes
Parisian essence will keep for years and the intense heat under which it is cooked destroys all
sweetness. A few drops will go a long way. Use this to darken gravy, fruit cakes and for staining
fabrics for various craft projects.


Until next time,
It's Your Shout, Mate!

Real Ale, Medieval Style

The are a number of issues that relate to Medieval Brewing that bug me and seem to be missed or feintly addresses by recreationists. Whilst some seemingly scholarly work has been done replete with references here and there the problem at heart is one of not understanding the social dynamic in which the activities of brewing were taking place.

It is widely acknowledged that much of the brewing was carried out by womenfolk. That much is clear. What is not so clear is how alewives brewed, managed temperatures and times in the brewhouse, or if this was ever of any concern to them, in the first place? The reason for this, I feel is that most of the modern hobby brewers doing research into period brewing, like me are men, yet unlike me, they have no background in the household or kitchen arts. I believe such a background is essential for trying to unravel some of the brewing mysteries of the past.

The Brewers House
Lets take a look at some plates purportedly representing domestic brewing, perhaps, in the Middle Ages (medieval times)...

This first image depicts what is supposed to be a Master Brewer, who appears to be a man (monk?). Here there are a few point worth noting. First is the well outside; next is the smallish fire with chimney, which appears to heat part of the base of the tun; third the large tun appears to be mostly made of wood, and has a built in mash seive; then, there are what appears to be hops on the floor at the brewer's feet and distilling apparatus on the shelves behind. 

Such a sweet little arrangement don't you think? I want one!

So, here's a question, where are the buckets and the fermenters? Where is the fuel? Is the fuel wood or coal? Is this an accurate depiction of medieval brewing at all?

Is this next picture, the gender is right, AND I believe the arrangements are also accurate. Here we see a fire place. Next to it is a large tun and at its base what appears to be a metal pot. We know that these could have been made of bronze, copper, iron or pottery. This leads uy to the question, Is the tun directly heated by the fire, If so, how? Was the water heated in the pot and then added in periodic additions to the tun? Is this tun used for mashing at all? Or, is it just for grain storage? I suspect it is for grain storage, as indicated by the rake sitting on top of what ever is in the tun.

We also see the alewife tipping fluid into another tun. This appears to be a mash tun and the alewife appears to be making a hot water addition. Think about this for a minute. The boil kettle and the pail used to transfer the water to the tun are about the same size, but nowhere near the same size as the mash tun. To me this indicates a step mash process that is dictated by the size of the equipment on hand AND the ability of the alewife to lift and move volumes of water. It is my conjecture that the kettle and pail would have been not much more than 20L, roughly 5 gallons, in volume.

Next, we see in the foreground, a smaller tun with boards supporting a basket. this basket would have been used to separate the spent grain from the wort, and after cooling the wort would have been pitched with Barm and transfered to the open kegs for fermentation. What we don't see here is Hops, which indicates to me that this space was dedicated to the brewing of fresh ale.

Ale and Beer

Prior to the 1500's, in England, beer and ale were two decidedly different drinks. Both were made with malted grain however ale was generally made without the addition of supplementary flavourings, whilst beer tended to include various gruit (grout) concoctions in its manufacture. It seems also that another defining feature was that beer also tended to involve a post-mash boil, necessitating additional  equipment.

Another interesting fact seems to be that in the later part of the middle ages attempts were brought to bear to regulate Ale manufacture in-so-far as defining what could and couldn't be included in ale. This seems to mirror similar development in Europe, in relation to beer. It is worth noting that this led to a situation where ale brewers who sold product to the public were not allowed to brew beer and vice versa. It is unclear if this delineation also found its way into private manor houses although historic record seems to indicate that at least in the King's household, such division did exist.

Medieval Time and Kitchen Timings

One of the intriguing points often neglected by people curious about period brewing is the concept of time and how it was measured, if it ever was. We know that the concept of Time, its passing and the need to be mindful of it in the kitchen, existed well before the middle ages, but how did medieval cooks or brewers "know" how long to leave the mash so that a sweet wort could be extracted from the malted grains?

We know that such devices as Clepsydrae (water clocks), Sundials, candle clocks, and even sand-filled Hour Glasses did exist however, by and far, such devices were usually far too expensive for the typical brewer's house. We know that in many places there were churches or monasteries near enough that when they sounded the bells for Prime, Tierce, Sext, None, etc. the community would hear it. We also know that monks would often chant set prayers or psalms to mark of short periods of approximately the same time. It was well know at the time that the day was divided into 12 portions, so in combination of the church bells and a stick in the ground it would have been relatively easy to estimate the gross passage of time.

However, there were also other ways for kitchen cooks or brewers to calculate time. For example occasionally reference to a furlongsway (the time it takes to walk an eighth of a mile, 2.5 min) or a milesway (time to walk a mile, 20 min based on 3 miles to the hour) but such measurements are almost pointless near a fire unless you had a very practiced knowledge of the passing of such a portion of time or some hapless waif that was at your beck and call.

It is my conjecture that cooks knew how long it too to boil and egg, how long it took to bake a loaf of bread, how long it took to boil a set amount of water and that these would have been the reference measures that any good alewife or brewer of the times would have known like the back of their hand. Household brewing would not have occurred in isolation of the activities of the rest of the house, especially the kitchen.

Determining temperature without a thermometer

Another facet of interest that gets panhandled away is the concept of medieval step mashing and uncertainty in accurately assessing and hitting designated temperature steps AND why medieval brewers may have even bothered with this. 

From the picture above, it is clear that not all medieval brewers may have had access to a heated cauldron and crane in which they could gradually raise the mash temperature and control the exposure of the mash to heat. This concept in of itself is ludicrous, so much so that it would seem to be a very rational basis for discounting step mashing altogether. The question here is why would medieval brewers need access to such large equipment and precision control? 

The simple answer is that they didn't such equipment was far too expensive, not to mention unwieldy.  How many hobby brewers today, would think to use a crane to move a pot of hot liquid off of a fire and then back onto it, without spilling the liquid inside of it? Crazy? 

No, the smart answer is to move the fire. (Check this video to see how some northern brewers have solved this issue for their brewed over an open fire system.)

Given the equipment constraints of medieval brewers it is logical and sensible to consider an alternative brewing senario, that of a stepwise mashing schedule borne out of necessity and practicality. It is not too difficult to conjecture that brewers of old understood that by brewing in a certain way produced better ale and the better the process and the more diligently it was followed, the better the final product.

First, most detractors of this idea point out, rightly so, that in medieval times they did not have thermometers. But one doesn't need a thermometer to know heat and to estimate it with a reasonable degree of accuracy, at least for what was required in a kitchen or in an early brewery. What follows is a table of associations that anyone with a semblance of intelligence could determine for themselves.

Term	Temp °C	Descriptors
Frozen	0°	Ice appears in the water or it is solid
Very Cold	10°	noticeably cold to the touch
Cool	30°	slightly cool to the touch
Tepid	37°	neutral, blood warm, warmth of mother's milk
Warm	40°	slightly warm to the touch
Hot	55°	uncomfortably warm, will turn skin red
Scalding	67°	too hot to touch without risk of injury
Simmer	76°	water surface begins to shimmer and move
Slow Boil	90°	noticeable small bubbles forming and rising in the water
Rolling Boil	100°	noticeably large and explosive bubbles rapidly rising to the surface

Now, can we comfortably say that brewers in medieval times had common knowledge of the benefits of resting at specific temperatures? Notably 40-45°C, 50-55°C, 62-65°c, 68-72°C and, 76°C.

No. No we can't, but we can't discount it either, just because it might have been based on undocumented, experiential trial and error knowledge. Let's face it, they did not know about Yeast per se but know that to get a ferment going they needed to pitch good, fresh barm into the cool wort, and if it was too hot, it didn't ferment. So here's where I open my mouth to change feet, so to speak...

Of the brewing and mashing of malted grain to make ale
What follows is my considered opinion on how an alewife would have typically made an ale using the tools available. Consider the following brewhouse...

From the picture above we have small water additions being made to a mash tun. While it is not entirely true that when you add two equal volumes of water to each other, volumes at different temperature, that the resultant temperature will be midway between both, because of temperature losses to the system and the surrounds, for our purposes here, we'll consider it thus.

Extenuating factors: in the brewhouse above there is a fire burning, gradually increasing the ambient temperature, and the temperature of all containers in the room. Most of the containers in the room are made of wood. Let us consider that the heat losses to the tun and other wooden utensils is less than 2-3°C especially with a good fire heating everything up along the way. 

Let us also define  the size of a bucket or pail as 3 imperial gallons, 13.6 (or so) liters, and that the ambient temperature of the grain is around 13°C - it's cold at night when there's no fire in the brewhouse.  Let us also consider the possibility that there's an old bucket hanging around that leaks a little and it runs empty in about the same time that it takes to bake a loaf of bread, or thers a stick outside with a nominally calibrated shadow path that somehow corresponds with the local church bells; (I like the leaky bucket idea myself.) 

So, let's begin:

1. Draw one pail of clear water and set it to warm on the fire
2. Into the tun place one pail of malted grain
3. When the water is slightly cool and not quite blood warm, splash it over the grain in the tun to make thick gruel    --- (guesstimated temp should be somewhere around 24°C, Acidulation Rest)
4. Draw a fresh pail of clear water and set it to boil
5. When the water begins to leap and tumble, add one pail of roasted malt grain (amber) and the boiling water to the tun, stir well
6. Allow the mash to steep, for the time it takes to bake a loaf of daily* bread, or for a double milesway    --- (guesstimated temp should be somewhere around 55°C, Protein Rest)
7. After this, draw one pail of clear water and again set it to boil
8. When the water begins to leap and tumble, add it to the gruel and stir well
9. Allow the mash to steep, for the time it takes to bake a loaf of daily* bread, or for a double milesway    --- (guesstimated temp should be somewhere around 68°C, Amylase/Sacharification Rest)
10. After this, draw one pail of clear water and again set it to boil
11. When the water begins to leap and tumble, add it to the gruel and stir well
12. Allow the mash to steep, for the time it takes to bake a loaf of daily* bread, or for a double milesway. The mash should now be too hot to touch    --- (guesstimated temp should be somewhere around 75°C, Mash Out/Denaturing Enzyme Activity)
13. Arrange a wicker or reed basket over a small barrel, line with fresh clean straw and ladle the hot mash into the basket until the barrel is full
14. Repeat until all the grain has been removed from the mash
15. Cover with a linen cloth and set the barrels of young ale aside to cool
16. When cool, add fresh barm to each barrel, mix well and transfer the young ale to barrels to age
17. Check the barrels each day and collect the barm that rises to the surface
18. When the barm stops rising the ale is ready to taste. If it is good it is ready to serve.

* just playing a little with words and images here, ignore the floury (sic.) bits if you wish.

A few final comments should be inserted here as well. The forst two steps, why would any alewife of medieval times bother with them, and not go directly to a higher temp? 

First, malted grains weren't as modified in medieval times as they are now, thus requiring more effort to manage the proteins. Next, some conjecture lies in the idea that without a boil, the proteins needed to be more readily available in liquid form to maximise the healthfulness of the drink. 

Thirdly, many cooks of old dealing with grains and and dried pulses knew the value of allowing them to steep in warm water prior to cooking as this directly improved the cooking process, thus it is not such a significant leap of faith to consider that low temperature steeping of the grain would have been considered a necessary first step, however above we have two grain additions, one steeped and one not It seems to be an accepted fact that roasted grain was used as well as unroasted grains in the mash. 

Its also quite possible that the water may have been heated to just warm, approx. 40°C placed into the tun and a second batch drawn and heated prior adding the whole grain bill then leaving it to steep. This is the great thing about experimentation with relatively unknown ye olde worlde processes. 

So there you have it, this is my personal interpretation and rationalisations around what might constitute a (early) medieval ale brewing process. 

Until next time,

It's Your Shout, Mate!

____________________

References (in no particular order)

Medieval Brewing

http://www.regia.org/brewing.htm accessed on 2013.02.10

http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/brewing.html accessed on 2013.02.10

http://www.germanbeerinstitute.com/history.html accessed on 2013.02.10

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~pwp/tofi/medieval_english_ale.html accessed on 2013.02.10

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinheitsgebot accessed on 2013.02.10

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_beer accessed on 2013.02.11

http://www.brewery.org/brewery/library/MedievalFH.html accessed on 2013.0211

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/medny/roces2.html accessed on 2013.02.12

http://mbhp.forgottensea.org/ accessed on 2012.02.13

http://byo.com/stories/issue/item/1357-searching-for-medieval-ale accessed on 2013.02.13

http://www.avista.org/2012/09/purchase-afj-special-issue-on-medieval-brewing/ accessed on 2013.02.13

http://www.love2brew.com/Articles.asp?ID=379 accessed on 2013.02.13

http://zythophile.wordpress.com/2009/10/19/how-to-brew-like-an-anglo-norman-knight/#more-537 accessed on 2013.02.13

Medieval Timekeeping

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_timekeeping_devices accessed on 2013.02.11

http://www.quora.com/How-did-people-in-the-Middle-Ages-tell-time accessed on 2013.02.11

http://www.troynovant.com/Farrell-A/Essays/Medieval-Timekeeping.html accessed on 2013.02.11

http://www.eleanorfitzalan.co.uk/miscellaneous/medieval-timekeeping/ accessed on 2013.02.11

http://lists.ansteorra.org/pipermail/ansteorra-ansteorra.org/1999-June/024417.html accessed on 20.02.11

http://www.manor.frodelius.com/Classes/TheDatingGame.pdf accessed 2013.02.11

Ancient Egyptian Beer Manufacture, The Tomb of Ty

I was watching Sam Calagione's foray into Celebrity Braumeister Stardom - "Brew Masters" and saw them exploring an Ancient Egyptian Tomb, the Tomb of Ty.

How about that an ancient egyptian brewer was called "Ty." I'm called "T." And we both make beer! Must be destiny. BTW, I used to drink Tea and Beer in Inner Mongolia, but that's another story.

So, I looked this guy up.

Turns out he had quite the wall of hieroglyphs.

Check it out... (source: http://www.osirisnet.net/mastabas/ty/e_ty_04.htm)

Brewing of beer : Registers 5 and 6 

An activity fundamental to the daily life, the manufacture of ancient Egyptian beer is however still not fully understood. No tomb includes a complete illustration of the - long - process, and the explanations proposed for it are from scenes coming from different places. Even a series of representations as outstanding as those found in Ty is no exception to the rule. 
"It is certain that ancient Egyptian beer was made using bread and a fragrant liquid; the mixture was brewed on a filter and the liquid collected was the one that was drunk under the name of beer (heneqet). P. Montet firstly assumed that this liquid was made from dates." (Vandier) 

Register 5 (Line drawing and photo : MO-R5) 

This is the first of the two registers dedicated to the manufacture of beer. The beginning of the scene is located on the right: a man stands withdrawing the contents from a very large jar, laying horizontally on several supports. It seems to contain something made with grain, probably cereals germinated under special conditions known as malting (see image opposite). Below, a kneeling man is in the process of (8) "spreading" this malted grain, which has the effect of stopping the germination. The scene is described thus: "kneading the uncooked bread". In front of him another person is occupied (6) "moulding the loaf" to form oblong lumps, which are transported on a tray. In front, is a man who, leaning forwards, stirs a mixture in a large container, which rests on a pedestal. The scene is described by the word (5) "dnt", which Montet has not included, but which according to Wörterbuch 5, 464-2 could mean "soaking", probably referring to the soaking in water of the previously moulded lumps of bread, and to mix it in the deep container to make a liquefied dough, later seen being poured from a jar. If this is the case, it seems difficult to see why the dough had to be moulded into the shape of bread. 
At the left end of the register, some moulds are heated, and the scene looks like the one of the manufacture of bread, but the vessels are not 'bedjas', as for the bakery: they represent beer vessels ("sSt" or setchet), these are wider and not as deep. It is a man who, this time, stirs the ashes, whilst protecting his face. The legend (1) specifies: "firing the beer vessel". In front of him another man takes a vessel, withdrawing it (presumably with hand protection), the legend above (2) states: "taking the bread-dough". Behind him, one of his companions pours the now fluid dough into one the moulds which has just left the oven. The legend (3) explains: "pouring the dough". The cooking could not be too intense, because of the risk of destroying the malt enzymes. The dough having been very fluid, the breads were more friable, which facilitated their subsequent crumbling. 

Register 6 (Line drawing and photo : MO-R6) 

The bread, having been manufactured, the actual brewing can begin. The loaves are crumbled and the fragments soaked in a large wicker container, with water and the rest of the uncooked bread, the mixture being stirred by two men. The basket sits on a large pot fitted with a flared spout in which the mixture flows when it is sufficiently fine. On the left, the mash is added from jar. The (4) "scribe of the warehouse", with his work instruments under his arm, stimulates the brewers with the words (5) "make it ready!" to the workers in front of him, and (3) "make it quickly!" to those behind him. This is to encourage them not to waste time because some of the ingredients were quite perishable. The first text (1) says: "straining" (or filtering the brew), the second (2) is "pouring the mash", ("sgnn" =mash).

A man seated on the right of the brewers adds a final touch to the jars which are going to receive the beer, whilst checking the coating inside one of them (see image opposite). The containers are then raised vertically (as seen to the right) in a support. In this next scene can be seen one of the brewers pouring the previous preparation in one them, using a vessel with a spout, text (7): "filling the jars". Immediately, another worker closes the container using a flat plug, which will be topped with a cone made of clay (both are black). The action is described (8) as: "closing the jars". 
Above, to the left, a man sits in front of four closed jars; his is (6): "guaranteeing the authenticity" by labelling the jars, indicating the quality the beverage, place and date of manufacture.

__________

How about that? Not a complete process by any means but interesting none the less. Well, that's all for now.

Until next time,

It's Your Shout, Mate!

Making Beer in the Tropics

 Making Beer in the Tropics

(Brewing Beer in Vietnam)

Tsc Tempest, DCA along with Peter'sExtra, founded the Hanoi Handcrafted – Brewers Guild in Hanoi, Vietnam. He served as Guild Master from October 2009 to June 2012. Since then he has, along with fellow Australian, Aidan Schultz, founded HobbyBrau Hamburg, group of expat and German hobby brewers, based in Hamburg, Germany. They can be found on Facebook.

*This document first published, 2011.12.07 as a pdf for distribution within the Hanoi Handcrafted - Brewers Guild.

Introduction

Temperature control during fermentation is one of the core challenges facing any home brewer.

Unlike most of our friends in the home brewing world, keeping things warm enough is not a problem in the tropics. Far from it, for the tropical home brewer, the problem is trying to keep the fermenter cool enough so that the yeast doesn’t race away like some ‘Chain Reaction’ Catastrophe.

In the tropics for much of the year, ambient temperatures exceed the optimal brewing range for Ale Yeast, and without dedicated refrigeration, Lagering is a mere pipedream.

It is important for any brewer to understand the environment in which they brew. This starts with gaining an understanding of local geography and weather conditions.

This document is primarily focused on Vietnam, and in particularly, Hanoi, but the general principles are applicable to similar tropical environments.

Vietnam

Vietnam is describe variously as, ‘tropical monsoonal,’ and, ‘humid semi-tropical.’ What does this mean? Basically, it’s warm, year round and moist, two great things that allow mold, and wild yeasts to flourish in abundance. It also means that perishable things ‘go off’ or deteriorate rather quickly.

Let’s have a look at the following chart posted on Wikipedia,

Vietnam

Climate chart

J F M A M J J A S O N D 19 20 12 27 21 13 39 24 18 80 29 21 198 32 22 240 33 25 322 32 26 345 32 25 250 31 24 99 28 23 44 25 19 21 21 16 Average max. and min. temperatures in °C Precipitation totals in mm Source: "The Climate of Vietnam". The Embassy of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam in the United Kingdom..

Ale Yeasts tend to like living in a temperature range between 16 and 24 deg. C. Looking at the above chart, average ambient temperatures that are conducive to making Ales are from November through to March, with November and March tipping the ‘it’s a bit too warm’ scale.

This means that for approx. 8 months (2/3rds) of the year, it’s too warm to make beer and let the stuff ferment at ambient temperature.

If we delve into this further, localizing on Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, we get the following, 

[from "The Climate of Vietnam". The Embassy of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam in the United Kingdom]

Hanoi
Month	Rainfall (mm)		Temperature (Celsius)
	Average monthly	Ave no of days with 1mm	Average daily		Lowest recorded	Highest recorded
			min	max
Jan	19	8	12	20	6	33
Feb	27	13	13	21	7	35
Mar	39	14	18	24	11	37
Apr	80	15	21	29	10	38
May	198	16	22	32	15	42
Jun	240	14	25	33	20	39
Jul	322	16	26	32	23	40
Aug	345	17	25	32	21	39
Sep	250	13	24	31	18	37
Oct	99	9	23	28	14	37
Nov	44	8	19	25	8	36
Dec	21	7	16	21	7	37

And…

Ho Chi Minh
Month	Rainfall (mm)		Temperature (Celsius)
	Average monthly	Ave no of days with 1mm	Average daily		Lowest recorded	Highest recorded
			min	max
Jan	14	3	21	32	13	37
Feb	4	2	22	33	15	38
Mar	12	2	23	34	19	39
Apr	42	5	24	34	20	40
May	220	15	25	33	21	39
Jun	331	22	24	32	22	38
Jul	313	23	25	31	20	35
Aug	267	20	24	32	19	34
Sep	334	21	23	31	21	35
Oct	268	20	23	31	20	34
Nov	115	12	22	30	18	35
Dec	56	8	22	31	15	36

From these we can see that in many months of the year, day time temperatures can exceed 30 deg. C, even when at the same time of year, night time temperatures can go below 15 deg. C.

That’s a challenge for any brewer.

Legal Issues

Every country has it’s own laws or regulations regarding the making and distribution of various types of alcohol. In this, Vietnam is no different.

The relevant Vietnamese Government Regulations that Home Brewers in Vietnam should be aware of are:

• Liquor Production and Trading
• Labeling Goods
• Food Hygiene & Safety
• Environmental Protection
• Guidelines for Vietnam Beer Industry (offsite pdf)

Basically, in Vietnam, it’s legal to brew as much alcohol as you like, as long as you neither trade nor sell it. So, that’s got personal and party consumption down pat.

Having said that many people seem to play free and loose with the regulations due to a couple of caveats. One, foreign faces seem to be able to get away with, ‘stuff.’ Second, the regulatory authorities don’t seem to place much emphasis on targeting small-scale operations for punitive punishments such as fines or confiscations, unless they draw too much attention to themselves from 'concerned locals.'

This means that, short of any highly publicized crackdown, the manufacture of beer for distribution at charity bazaars and the occasional, ‘featured homebrew’ at some pub more than likely will not attract any interest. 

Be that as it may, I do not advise you to explore becoming a home-based craftbrewer for cash, unless you are willing to process all the relevant legal entity paperwork.

Make beer.

Share it with your friends.

Give some away while fundraising for charity.

Have fun.

Controlling Fermentation

There are a number of options available to the Home Brewer in Vietnam. These range from small batch brewing; using (salted) ice baths; building cold boxes; re-tasking refrigerators or chest freezers; to air conditioning a small room or large insulated cupboard.

For the small-scale home brewer, or someone just starting out, the water bath/ice bucket method is the most cost effective and practical means of controlling fermentation.

Fermenters

There are a number of different options available for the home brewer for fermenters.

• 19L plastic drinking water bottles – source from water suppliers
• 20L plastic, wide mouth, storage bottles – source from Plastic Str.
• 10L glass wide mouth bottles – Source from markets and street side vendors
• Stainless Steel Pots – use your existing brewing kettle
• Plastic basins – source from markets
• Custom built coolship – source from stainless steel and /or copper workers

Gas Traps

Generally not available. However, a rubber bung, or carefully made hole in a lid, and plastic tubing exiting into a glass/jar/pot of water will more than adequately do the job. Rubber Bungs can be sourced from Scientific and Chemical supply outlets. 

The Water Bath Method (or Swamp Method)

This involves filling a bath or basin with cold tap water, placing the fermenter into the water bath and periodically refreshing the warmed water with more cold water.

The Ice Bath Method

As temperatures increase, the Water Bath Method can be modified as it may be necessary to add some ice cubes to assist with keeping the temperature within a suitable range.  Salting ice causes it to melt but also reduces the overall temperature of the bath by several degrees.

Adding a temperature probe with alarm can greatly increase temperature control during hotter days without having to hover over the fermenter.

Cool Box Method

Thick pieces of foam board are readily available and many vendors will knock up a box and deliver it for a small additional fee. You then place ice in the box to cool it down and then put your fermenter inside the box. The foam acts as an insulator and this helps keep the inside temperature of the box more stable and cool. Whilst relatively cheap, it’s not very durable. Silver insulation mat can also be purchased which has the ability to reflect light and heat, thus increasing cooling efficiency by about 3-5 degrees. This can be placed both on the inside and outside of a foam box to increase its durability. Lastly, ice melts. The boxes are usually not waterproof, so placement should be somewhere where water can easily drain away.

Refrigerator/Chest Freezer Method

The attraction of this method is the ability to use a dedicated fridge/freezer for fermentation, crash chilling and service. It is the basis of the home brewer’s ‘ideal’ piece of kit, “The Kegorator.” Brand new Chest freezers are relatively cheap in Vietnam, and temperature controllers can be bought, but it might be better to bring in a dedicated controller from OS.

Air Conditioned Room or Cupboard Method

It makes no sense to air condition an entire room just for your fermenter, and A/C units are rarely, if ever, installed in bathrooms or under stairwells. As such, a moderately small storage space, equipped with a portable, personal A/C unit may also do the trick. Getting a hold of one of these units, however may prove difficult.

Ice Box Method

A long time a go, before electric refrigerators existed, people used ice boxes. Basically this an insulated, wooden cupboard, lined with metal. The top has a hinged lid and supported metal box with an air gap between the metal box and the hinged lid. This is where a bar of ice would be placed. The metal box would also be fitted with a drain pipe and tube for melted ice runoff. Underneath in the main cabinet there would be one or two shelves and again, a drain pipe for removing condensate. With careful use, ice boxes could keep temperatures down around 3-8 degrees depending on the ambient temperature of the room.

Brewing Equipment

Some basic brewing equipment is not that hard to find in Vietnam. But much of the small, niceties are either difficult to get or impossible, short of bringing into the country with you.

Pots, burners, cooktops, basins, colanders, cloth, stirrers, jugs, ladles, scales, fermentation bottles, ice, bottles, etc. are readily available.

Thermometers, timers, chemicals, sanitizers, etc. are a bit more difficult to find.

Gas traps, Conical fermenters, siphons (auto siphons) bottling trees, cappers, caps, mini keg bungs, etc. need to pretty much brought in from overseas.

Some equipment can be manufactured, but it’s a case of finding someone you trust and then sticking with them, regardless of the price.

‘The Herald of Change’ Pilot Brewery

‘The Herald of Change’ (THC) Brewery is the name of my personal Handcrafted Home Brewery. As a response to interest from several people interested in starting to brew at home, I developed a kit of equipment suitable for the starting out home brewer. Basically, it was a ‘personal shopper’ type arrangement. I’d go out and buy the kit, get custom pieces made, assemble it together and pass it on to the new, starting brewer as a Guild Service.

This kit pretty much included the following:

:- a 16 L heavy based stainless steel pot with matching lid

:- custom made stainless steel basket [the ‘Bag’]

:- custom made stainless steel funnel

:- a large plastic basin

:- stainless steel spatula with long handle, flattened out to be used as a stirring/mash paddle

:- a 10 L glass bottle with plastic lid for use as a fermenter, and

:- a bottle of Providone Iodine (10% solution) Idophore substitute.

Nowadays, I’d suibstitute a 20 L wide necked, plastic water storage bottle for the glass fermenter. It has a little more volume, is unbreakable, easily cleaned and handled. The additional volume allows for maximizing the output of the Pilot Brewery so that 3 dozen ‘standard’ bottles of beer can be made, with careful manipulation of the brewing process and recipe.

Let’s now take a look at a typical home brew recipe and pull it to bits. You could follow this recipe and be able to make perfectly good beer. From there it’s up to you as to how you tweak it for your own personal taste.

THC Pilot Brewery Bitter

Ingredients

12L Water

1.75 kg Malt (Crushed)

30.9g Hops (Pellets)

500 ml Yeast Starter

Additional (Optional)

Crushed Ice

Salt

Water

Quality beer is made from quality water., and different waters affect the way beer brews. In Hanoi, there are three quality brands of water. These are, Laska, La Vie, and Kimboi. Laska is a soft water and is very suitable for making pale ales and blonde lagers. La Vie is a medium soft water, which is quite suitable for making red and brown ales, and brown lagers. Kimboi is the hardest, ‘recommended for use in making beer’ water and is suitable for porters, stouts, schwartzbier etc.

There is another water called Vinh Hao, however it is too ‘hard’ to be considered for making beer. The Hanoi tap water varies in quality. It is at borderline high, for arsenic concentration, and depending on where you are in the city, is at risk of contamination from other bacterial, chemical and gross biological pathogens. It is highly, recommended that you use either Laska, La Vie or Kimboi as your water source for making quality home brewed beer.

Malt

Malt and hops can be bought in Hanoi, it’s just depends on where and how much. By far the cheapest source is from Vietnamese-based maltster that imports Australian Barley, and then produces their own pale malt. However, this needs to be bought  in large quantities, usually 200-300+ kg of malt at a time.

Smaller quantities, at a higher premium can be bought from Goldmalt (34G Tran Phu). I’m guessing that if you are able to form a relationship with some of the other, ‘microbreweries’ in Hanoi, you might be able to source from them.

Malted wheat is difficult to get, and as of this writing, a source of normal whole wheat has not been found.

Adjuncts & Extracts

Oatmeal can be got rolled/flaked and steel cut. Rice is readily available, and with a little effort and detective work, Rice hulls can also be found. The only malt extract that is currently available is in 500g tubs of Rice Malt/Syrup, from China. Golden Syrup, Black Treacle, Honey, dark brown sugar, glucose can be sourced with a little effort, and Lactose would need to be brought in as it is generally not available.

A selection of malts and hops available from Goldmalt, 34G Tran Phu – Hanoi

Hops

There are a few suppliers of Hops and Hop Extract. But, again the issue comes down to quantity and the availability of different hop varieties is limited. Goldmalt will sell Czech Saaz & Sladek hop pellets. Eresson Beer (9 Pham Hung, Cau Giay), also indicated that they’d be willing to supply hop pellets and hop Extract. A source for hop flowers has yet to be found.

Yeast

Goldmalt has indicated that they’d be willing to supply live brewery yeast on 6 day’s notice. Yeast can also be cultivated from Cooper’s Ales, and a few Belgium bottle conditioned beers. Short of that, you’d need to bring yeast in, or have it shipped.

Crushed Ice

5 kg bags of ice can be usually bought from local minimarts. There are also a few bar ice vendors around. One is located near the Hanoi water tower.

Equipment

THC Pilot Brewery Kit, Thermometer, Stovetop (Electric Hotplate or Gas Burner)

You can use my brewery kit, or cobble together something on your own. This recipe uses the Australian Brew In A Bag (BIAB) technique. As such the amount of equipment needed is minimal, compared to other methods.

Basically, you need a pot, a bag, a heat source, a stirrer, a bucket, thermometer, a filter, a way to cool the wort, and a fermenter.

Optional Equipment

Malt mill, towel or blanket, small white saucer, spoon, large bucket, 1 L ladle, small watering bucket with rose, plastic colander, cheesecloth or kitchen paper towel, kitchen timer, trivet (wire cake/pot stand), kitchen plastic wrap, bottling wand, plastic tubing, S.G meter and 250ml measuring cylinder, or ATC refractometer.

Very useful brewing tools: Measuring Cylinder, Safety Glasses, Thermometer, S.G. Meter, pH Tape, Mini-scale

The Pot

You’ll need a pot big enough to take all your water and your grain. Whilst you only need one pot,  a second identical sized and shaped pot makes it easier to transfer the mash, filter the wort and ferment it. More on this later.

The Bag

In the BIAB method, a special bag is used that is heat resistant up to 80 dg. C is strong, fine meshed and durable. As such cotton/muslin is thought to break down too quickly as to be cost effective.  An alternative is to custom make a fine meshed bucket that sits inside your pot. This has the advantage that it can be used in a number of ways, especially if coupled with a large custom made funnel.

The Heat Source

There are as many different home brewers as there are ways of brewing and spaces in which to brew. Most who start out, brew in their kitchen, or bathroom. For those who live in a hotel, the only option is the Coffee Pot Method.

As such, they usually have access to a kitchen stove 3-4 gas burner with or without electric hob; or 2 burner gas stovetop; or a single plate electric, induction or halogen heating element. Some go so far as to buy a single burner gas ring or high btu gas burner. These instructions were put together assuming a 3 burner gas stove with single electric hob.

The Stirrer

A stirrer is needed for making sure the grains are moved about during mashing in to avoid doughballs. It’s also needed later after the boil to vigorously create a whirlpool.

The Bucket

A bucket is an essential item in your brewery. It can be used for many things. Here, it needs to be the same capacity as your pot.

The Thermometer

As mentioned previously the control of temperature in brewing is critical to your success as a brewer, as such, a good thermometer is absolutely essential. 

One can estimate temperature roughly by sight and touch to some extent, but it depends on personal experience, expertise and tolerance to heat…

• Freezing – 0°C (Ice)

• Beer Cold – 4°:6°C (Normal Fridge Temperature)

• Chilly – 10°C (feels Cold on the back of your hand)

• Cool – less than 35°C (feels not warm enough)

• Lukewarm – 37°C (Body Temperature, Not cold, Not warm, Neutral)

• Warm – 40°:50°C (Feels Warm, Comfortable to the touch)

• Very Warm, Scalding – 50°:60°C (Uncomfortably warm)

• Hot! – 70°:80°C deg. (Too Hot to touch)

• Simmering – 90°C (Small visible bubbles, surface movement)

• Boiling Water – 100°C (Large rolling bubbles breaking the surface)

• Boiling Wort – 112°:115°C (Vigorous Rolling Boil)

A thermometer is a far better option and can usually be bought in a scientific supplies store (Trang Tien Str.)

The Mash Filter

There are several different ways to filter your mash. Here we are using a very fine meshed stainless steel basket which acts kinda like a lauter tun false bottom. A fabric brew bag will also do a similar thing, just lift it up and let it drain. Some home brewers attach taps to their pots and then use stainless steel braid or copper pipe manifolds to filter the Mash, relying on the grain bead to do most of the filtering. With “The Bag” you just lift it up, suspend it, and let it drip dry.

The Boiled Wort Filter

There are also several ways to filter the boiled wort. The Finns make a brew called Sahti where they use well layered juniper branches as a filter for the mash, and then later the spent grain and juniper branches for filtering the wort. Some home brewers use a tea towel, muslin cloth, cotton nappies etc. to filter the hops out of the boiled wort. Others sandwich cotton material or kitchen towel between two colanders and suspend that over a bucket. Still others ‘teabag’ their hops in a cloth bag. As home brewers get more ambitious, they eventually go on to “Whirlpooling” their boiling wort and carefully syphoning of the settled and clear green beer.

Cooling Method

Here you have two choices, cool quickly, or cool slowly. There are pros and cons to both. I’ll let you look that up for yourself.

If you choose not to cool then it is probably best to follow the Aussie No Chill Method [ANC], carefully and to the letter. I’ve not really looked for any ‘Cubes’ in Hanoi, but I daresay they can be found and most likely in Plastic Str.

‘Filled Cube.’  [source: http://hyperfox.info’webalbum03’finalproducttransferredtocubetocoolovernight.jpg]

However, the other method that appears to be working is to clean a sterilize a second pot, transfer the green beer to it, cover and leave in a draft free area overnight. You could also transfer the hot wort to a heat resistant HDPE food grade container and screw down the lid tightly. 

Where the ANC method has the advantage lies in the ability to exclude all air from the container. In some discussions some home brewers mention kegging the green beer and purging with CO2 but that is beyond the scope of this document.

If you choose to cool the there are several options that can be relatively easily implemented, such as Ice Bath Method, Coolship Method, Immersion Chiller Method.

Ice Bath Method

Here a second pot really comes in handy. Place the pot on a trivet, in the middle of a 55cm dia. Basin. Surround the pot with ice. Salt the ice, Pour the hot green beer into the iced pot, put the lid on the pot, and top up the basin with cold water. With 10 kg of ice, 5 L cold water and approx. 16 L of wort it should take roughly 3-6 hours for the wort to hit around 23 deg.

The Coolship Method

A variation on the above, where you use a 20L capacity custom built stainless steel or copper pot to hold the wort. Instead of 10kg of ice, 5 kg is used and after about 50-60 min. the water ice mixed is replaced. The advantage of this is that the time to cool the wort is much faster than for the Ice Bath Method.  If custom making this, go to Hang Thiec Str. I’d have it made up rectangular, and get a second larger box made from the same material made to use in stead of a circular basin.

Immersion Chiller Method

This uses a coil of copper pipe, garden hose and tap water to chill the wort. This is probably by far the most common method used by home brewer. Copper Pipe can be got in Hang Thiec Str.

Fermenters

Most home brewers use plastic 19 L water demijohns. In Hanoi, the water companies take a bit of a dim view on getting empty, dirty demijohns back and frequently wont take them or may refuse to return paid deposits. In this case it is better to buy wide mouth water barrels from plastic Str. and use those.  Glass barrels in smaller capacities can also be bought, but the tend to be fragile and less forgiving of the occasional bump.

     

Other Equipment

It is very, very easy to get carried away in the accessory purchasing race. More. Bigger. Better. Shiny! I have come to the realization that once you exceed the capacity of your existing system to do exactly what you want, when you want to, and how you want to, then it’s time to upgrade.

Sterilization

A brief comment on sterilizing stuff. The kit includes a bottle of lodine. A moderate to firm, half second squirt will deliver approx. 5ml of lodine. If you fill up your pot or basin, then 3 to  5 good squirts, respectively, should do the trick.

First wash everything that is to come into contact with your boiled wort.

Wash with normal soap or detergent (some prefer dishwasher tables) rinse a minimum of 1 + 3 times. The first time removes the soap, the next 3 should, if properly performed, remove up to 95-99% of any residuals, hence the '3 times rinse' rule.

Next immerse utensils, and containers in iodized water (between approx. 1-10  ml iodine per L of water) for a minimum of 10 min. Drain. No need to rinse.

There are alternatives, such as spraying and wiping with ‘Con 90’ denatured Ethanol, or soaking in a 10% bleach solution then rinsing. Or Sodium Hydroxide NaOH (Caustic Soda) or Sodium Metabisulphite (Irritant).

I recommend 10% Providone Iodine or 90° Ethyl Alcohol.

Procedure for making an All Grain Beer

1. Put all water into the pot

2. [Strike] Raise water temperature to around 40-45 deg. C.   

3. Rain crushed malt into the water, stir well and rest for 5 – 10 min. This is called a β-Glucanase Rest. It helps to soften the cell walls and make the starches more available, thus increasing Extraction Efficiency. The mixture is now known as a Mash

4. [Mashing] Bring temperature up to 65-68 deg. C

5. Remove from heat source and wrap pot in towel or blanket and allow to rest for 1-2hrs. This allows the enzymes in the grain to convert the starches into sugars, and is known as a Saccharification Rest.

Alternatively, if you are confident in your electric hob you can rest the pot on the lowest heat setting and periodically stir the mash.

6. [Iodine Test] Place a teaspoon of mash liquid into a white saucer and apply a couple of drops of lodine. lf the iodine does not change colour, then Mashing is complete.

7. Bring Mash Temp up to 78 deg. C  This ensures the dissolved sugars stay in the liquor and not on the grains.

8. [Lautering] Gently lift the stainless steel bag from the pot, allow the bulk of the liquor to drain off and then upend the stainless steel funnel in the pot, underneath the bag. Leave the bag on inverted funnel to drip dry.  The separated liquor is now called wort (pron. wert or wirt.)

Optional Refinement Step, lf wort is too cloudy for your liking, heat back up to 78 deg. C transfer to a bucket and gently ladle over the grain that’s resting in the pot on top of the chimney funnel.

9. [Boil] Bring the wort to a rolling boil. Set kitchen timer for 30min. Place the chimney funnel on the pot so it looks like a little hat - this helps control the rate of evaporation and also refluxes some of the evaporated, 'stuff' back into the boiling wort.

10. [Hop Additions] Add two thirds of the hop pellets to the wort, place in a cloth bag if you like,  and set kitchen timer for 50 min.

11. Add remainder of the hop pellets, in another bag if you like, and set timer to 5 min.

12. [Hop Separation - Whirlpooling] When the boil has finished, give the wort a vigorous stir, while it is still on the heat, if there is sufficient heat the whirlpool should start to bubble up and down the liquid funnel of the whirlpool making it turn faster. [Funnel Effect discovered by guild member and co-founder, Peter Lentes, ‘PetersExtra’.] Do this for 10-15 seconds or so and then switch off the heat, leaving the hot wort to settle for about 10-15 min.  Once settled, Syphon the clear wort into a sterilized bucket.

13. [Hop Separation – Alternative] Place kitchen towel, or tea towels, etc. between two colanders sit them on top of the inverted stainless steel funnel, in a bucket and pour the wort slowly through the filter. Also worth considering, experiment with using the stainless steel bag (and cloth hop bags) to try and keep the wort as clear as possible.

14. [Cooling] Choose one of the cooling methods as previously listed and bring the wort down to yeast pitching temperature. Ideally, you will have prepared a yeast starter, have some live brewery yeast, or have yeast from a previous brew, ready to be pitched into the cooled wort.

Cooling via homemade coolship using two 55 cm dia. Basins separated by ice.

15. [Fermentation] When wort is at approx. 20 deg. C  (less than 24 deg. And more thn 16 deg. ) aerate wort and transfer it to a sterilized fermenter by tipping it from a moderate height through a colander or the stainless steel bag held by the inverted stainless steel funnel.

Make sure to keep 10% of the un-yeasted wort by volume for use as a Primer later. This is called Kraeusening.  Remove the bag or colander and funnel from the fermenter then pitch the yeast – give it a good shake before doing so, so as to 'wake up' the yeast; which should be at the same temperature as the wort.

16. Place cover on fermenter and put away into a dark, temperature stable location. You may need to consider on of the solutions explored in the Controlling Fermentation Section, earlier.

17. [Clean Up] lts best to wash as you go, but all equipment should be washed and rinsed before putting it away - don't leave it till the next day. If you use the immersion chiller method for cooling your wort, save the cooling water for use in clean up.

18. Monitor the fermentation, particularly the ambient temperature and take corrective measures where necessary. In the first few days activity should be very noticeable.

After about 3 days when the peak seems to have slowed a little, you can, if you so choose to, transfer to a new sterilized fermenter making sure to remove any yeast cake still on top and remove the fermented wort from the sediment on the bottom. The fermented wort is now known as green beer.

Place the cleaned, green beer, into the sterilized fermenter to continue fermenting out approx. 2-10 days depending on room temperature and desired final gravity.  It is believed by some, that it is better to have the green beer, 'off the primary' fermentation as close as possible to the end of peak activity (High Kraeusen) and put to a secondary so as the dead yeasts arising from the first rapid ferment do not impart off flavours to the beer. Others say that this is not an issue for home brewers like it is for commercial breweries due to the mass and volume of beer being produced. Still others advocate leaving the primary running undisturbed for four weeks, so that the yeast has a chance to clean up any diacetyl naturally,  thus improving the overall beer quality. This is an ongoing point of debate and conjecture. Look into it and do what you feel you are comfortable with.

19. [Bottling] Carefully decant the green beer off the fermentation lees into clean, sterilized bucket. [Bottle the lees for pitching into the next brew. This can be done a maximum of six times before needing to start a new batch.]

Add the primer that was kept from the brew day and then syphon via a bottling tube, or hose, into clean, sterilized bottles. Cap & clean, any spills, cover with an old towel and store in a temperature stable place for 2-4 weeks (or longer).  Should any bottles explode, the towel will stop broken glass from going all over the place. Better still, PET bottles are now available in stores selling beer, so recycle some of those.

20. [Dispensing] Place aged, bottle conditioned beer, undisturbed, into a fridge for 2-7 days (longer to assist settling). When serving, do not shake the bottle, open it and decant to a serving jug, being careful not to transfer sediment - the sediment will only make it a little cloudy but not affect the taste.

This is an Ale. Ales are traditionally flatter than Lagers so a little gas loss here without creating too much head is acceptable. Pour from the serving jug into glasses and share.

Until next time,

Its Your Shout, Mate!

__________________

 Related Documents:

Bia Hoi Style Guide

Recipe: Vietnamese Bia Hoi