Toxxyc
New and loving it
Good morning everyone! So this weekend was a weekend just like any other, with some beers here and there (and a few very good Gilroys as well, but that's off topic), and again the topic came up of alcohol free beer. Now we all know it - beer brewed and boiled to drive off alcohol and all that, and we also all know the issue with these beers. The flavour (and specially the hop profile) is pretty much ruined. But now I've been thinking about something else - why not hop the beer during the post-ferment boil while the alcohol is boiling off? Hear me out...
Post-ferment boil, most hop aromas are boiled off in about 5 minutes. Flavour is boiled off in about 15 minutes, and after that I dunno what happens. This is what I read up online doing some research. So here's my idea:
1. Make a no-hop beer. Basically mash the grains and don't do a full boil. In other words you'll be left with a low-gravity wort after a very short sanitizing boil. This wort will be more in volume, obviously, so you'll adjust for this when you mash.
2. Ferment this low-gravity wort to completion. This should happen relatively quickly since it's a low gravity, and it won't stress out the yeast.
3. Post-ferment, you dump this low-ABV beer in your boiling kettle, ready for the boil. Here you'll do the boil you would have needed to get to your target gravity pre-ferment.
4. Boil. During this boil, you do your hop additions according to the full schedule. According to this site: http://www.goodeatsfanpage.com/season13/alcohol/alcohol_trans.htm you should be able to boil out 75% of the ABV in the beer in an hour. Extrapolating that percentages give around 15% ABV remaining of the original amount after a 90 minute boil. You can even do a longer boil if need be to remove more. 150 minute boil and you're left with 5% of the ABV.
Now if you had a lekker low ABV from the low starting gravity to begin with, say around the 3% mark, you'll be ending up with 0.45% ABV in a 90-minute boil. 0.15% in a 150 minute boil. That's not a lot. Do your hop additions here and unless I'm mistaken, you'll be in your target IBUs and so on without the long-boil flavour of hops in your beer, which is a trademark of post-ferment boiled beers, is it not?
Am I missing something here or can it really be done as simply as this? If so, I'm going to do a little test run with this on a small batch (split batch, probably my first AG/BIAB brew) and see what I can come up with. It'll have to be force carbonated obviously (or re-yeasted and some carbonating sugar added), which I don't have access to, so that's why I'm asking. Am I missing something here or can it really be as easy as this?
I know there are options to brew a low-ABV beer using a very light grain bill from the start, but that's not what I'm after. Brews like those are generally very weak in flavour and while it does have a low ABV (and a very low calorie content), it's not exactly what I'm after. I want a fuller malt flavour.
Post-ferment boil, most hop aromas are boiled off in about 5 minutes. Flavour is boiled off in about 15 minutes, and after that I dunno what happens. This is what I read up online doing some research. So here's my idea:
1. Make a no-hop beer. Basically mash the grains and don't do a full boil. In other words you'll be left with a low-gravity wort after a very short sanitizing boil. This wort will be more in volume, obviously, so you'll adjust for this when you mash.
2. Ferment this low-gravity wort to completion. This should happen relatively quickly since it's a low gravity, and it won't stress out the yeast.
3. Post-ferment, you dump this low-ABV beer in your boiling kettle, ready for the boil. Here you'll do the boil you would have needed to get to your target gravity pre-ferment.
4. Boil. During this boil, you do your hop additions according to the full schedule. According to this site: http://www.goodeatsfanpage.com/season13/alcohol/alcohol_trans.htm you should be able to boil out 75% of the ABV in the beer in an hour. Extrapolating that percentages give around 15% ABV remaining of the original amount after a 90 minute boil. You can even do a longer boil if need be to remove more. 150 minute boil and you're left with 5% of the ABV.
Now if you had a lekker low ABV from the low starting gravity to begin with, say around the 3% mark, you'll be ending up with 0.45% ABV in a 90-minute boil. 0.15% in a 150 minute boil. That's not a lot. Do your hop additions here and unless I'm mistaken, you'll be in your target IBUs and so on without the long-boil flavour of hops in your beer, which is a trademark of post-ferment boiled beers, is it not?
Am I missing something here or can it really be done as simply as this? If so, I'm going to do a little test run with this on a small batch (split batch, probably my first AG/BIAB brew) and see what I can come up with. It'll have to be force carbonated obviously (or re-yeasted and some carbonating sugar added), which I don't have access to, so that's why I'm asking. Am I missing something here or can it really be as easy as this?
I know there are options to brew a low-ABV beer using a very light grain bill from the start, but that's not what I'm after. Brews like those are generally very weak in flavour and while it does have a low ABV (and a very low calorie content), it's not exactly what I'm after. I want a fuller malt flavour.