whats with the bottle hype?

[Brew_4iT]

The whole concept could be psychosomatic, but maybe their is some truth to it. Force carbing from a gas is synthesized not created by living organisms naturally. If we look at foods that are processed and synthesized many people believe all natural organic products taste better and are better for the body.

 

[RDWHAHB]

Do you have a source for this romantic vision of bottle carbing besides anecdotal experience? As Weizenwerks said, beer head is pretty much determined by the mash and the nature of proteins that make it into the beer.

No,it's not simplistic as all that. I just simplified it to make things short-n-sweet. Long winded doesn't cut it with most folks. I just notice a bit of difference between force carbed & bottle carbed.

So no, you don't have a source? Let's hear the long version. If it were true, then you realize you can prime a keg, right?

 

[deadscott]

I do both. I bottle still more than I keg. I mostly use my kezzer as a fermentation chamber rather than kegging. Bottling is a pain but I like the benefits of it more. It gives longer storage life, more protability, and I am not only limited to the beers I have on draft. In the winter when I do not need the keezer for contolling temp I will keep a few on draft as well. In the end it is a personal choice. Do what best suits your needs.

 

[unionrdr]

So no, you don't have a source? Let's hear the long version. If it were true, then you realize you can prime a keg, right?

Just full of spit & vinegar,aren't we? It's a culmination of what I've learned so far,as I've been saying. Yes,you can use a keg to prime in as if it were a big bottle. Another version of bulk priming. But force carbing doesn't go that way. See the post above. Force carbing is a more synthetic way of doing it. Bottle carbing is more natural & organic,taking a longer period of time to achieve the desired result. I think that this is where the finer bubbles,Thicker head come in. Over & above proteins retained in solution after the proteins that do settle out when the wort is quickly chilled to pitch temp. Like my 9th grade math teacher had posted above the chalk board,"do your own thing,but don't stop me from doing mine". both ways is true. E tu,brutette.

 

[JasonToews]

you also gotta think, if you ever make imperial stouts or barleywines etc, you should age them.

 

[certaut]

I try to bottle a 12 from every batch, sometimes after racking to the keg I put 1tsp of sugar in the bottles and fill with the pre-carbed from the keg. I also counter pressure fill sometimes.
I have been thinking to rack to a keg with priming sugar in it and just fill a few bottles from it, and let the keg do it the German way

 

[cimirie]

I don't necessarily support the "thicker head" comment by uniondr, but he's 100% right on prime carbing producing smaller bubbles. This phenomena has been recognized in the sparkling wine community for years. Sommeliers can instantly tell if a sparkling wine uses "method champaignoise" (which is our prime carb method, plus some liquid nitro to freeze solution to remove the yeast) or forced carbonation. I took a wine class not too long ago and was able to see for myself. It is a fact.

That being said, Im not concerned how big my bubbles are. I bottle only when I'm out of keg space or I brew something that would be a slow mover (experimental, high abv, very sweet, etc).

 

[copyright1997]

I have been thinking to rack to a keg with priming sugar in it and just fill a few bottles from it, and let the keg do it the German way

This is what I did on my last batch. Did primary only, then racked to keg with some priming sugar (solution) already in the keg. Then applied a bit of gas/vented the air and used the beverage out to my bottle filler and did one case of 16 ounce bottles. Left both the bottles and keg in the basement at about 65 degrees to allow the natural carbonation to occur. I did this because I wanted some bottles to take to fiends, etc. Worked fine, and I intend to use this process again for some other batches.

 

[Mpavlik22]

Unionrdr, do you keg yourself? I see in your profile it says "no kegs yet"?

 

[RDWHAHB]

Just full of spit & vinegar,aren't we? It's a culmination of what I've learned so far,as I've been saying. Yes,you can use a keg to prime in as if it were a big bottle. Another version of bulk priming. But force carbing doesn't go that way. See the post above. Force carbing is a more synthetic way of doing it. Bottle carbing is more natural & organic,taking a longer period of time to achieve the desired result. I think that this is where the finer bubbles,Thicker head come in. Over & above proteins retained in solution after the proteins that do settle out when the wort is quickly chilled to pitch temp. Like my 9th grade math teacher had posted above the chalk board,"do your own thing,but don't stop me from doing mine". both ways is true. E tu,brutette.

Not trying to be nasty. And I certainly not trying to stop you from doing your own thing. Nobody is stabbing Ceasar....

However, I do think your claims are false. Just because it is natural and organic does not mean you will get a different bubble size. I believe dissolved CO2 is dissolved CO2. I would love to see sources contrary. Do you believe "bulk aging"/priming a keg give you smaller bubbles and thicker head? Or just bottle conditioning?

 

[dwarven_stout]

The whole concept could be psychosomatic, but maybe their is some truth to it. Force carbing from a gas is synthesized not created by living organisms naturally. If we look at foods that are processed and synthesized many people believe all natural organic products taste better and are better for the body.

That phenomenon is actually old enough and widespread enough to have earned its own titled logical fallacy- the appeal to nature.

 

[emjay]

You don't really need to be a chemist to know the bubble size thing is a myth. High school chemistry, if you can recall it, is sufficient. Think about how molecules arrange themselves (COMPLETELY SEPARATED) when they are in solution - this isn't going to change based on where the the CO2 comes from. Then, when you crack open the bottle and release the pressure, they will have *identical* starting points.

Not to just ignore the poster above... I don't even really doubt you saw one sparkling wine with bigger bubbles than the other. There are definitely things that CAN influence how the molecules clump together when coming out of solution... but the source of the CO2 is not one of them. The most obvious one would probably be the AMOUNT of CO2 in solution, since this influences the way the molecules arrange themselves. Since it would have required two different wines to *see* the difference, there really isn't a single variable being controlled for.

 

[emjay]

The whole natural vs synthetic argument has absolutely no merit.

Just ask any avid root beer brewer!

 

[dwarven_stout]

I don't necessarily support the "thicker head" comment by uniondr, but he's 100% right on prime carbing producing smaller bubbles. This phenomena has been recognized in the sparkling wine community for years. Sommeliers can instantly tell if a sparkling wine uses "method champaignoise" (which is our prime carb method, plus some liquid nitro to freeze solution to remove the yeast) or forced carbonation. I took a wine class not too long ago and was able to see for myself. It is a fact.

I'm actually curious now. Can you point me towards a food science paper or anything like that? I want to know if they properly controlled for variables (i.e. same batches, same recipes, one bottle finished and one forced, to the same CO2 volume).

I will point out that wine grapes have very little, if any, protein. Wine depends (in my understanding) on dissolved minerals and carbohydrates to support a bubble structure. Beer on the other hand utilizes proteins, which is why your mash matters, and why adding carapils or flaked grains tends to help head. That fact alone makes it difficult to compare beer and wine.

 

[Mpavlik22]

Check out this article about half way down:

http://ithacork.com/2010/05/04/malt-monday-for-your-eyes-only/

 

[Pascal]

I love kegging, I was so sick of bottling. However (and no joke) I ran out of CO2 as I read this thread..... Now I have lots of keg beer and none I can drink! Damit!

 

[emjay]

Check out this article about half way down:

http://ithacork.com/2010/05/04/malt-monday-for-your-eyes-only/

Exactly the kind of thing that's needed.

The fact is, when the beer is under pressure, the CO2 is dissolved in the beer. This means that the CO2 molecules are evenly dispersed in a very consistent pattern with all the other molecules in the beer, regardless of how it gets there. It's only when the pressure is released (by opening the bottle), that the CO2 molecules come out of solution and group together to form visible bubbles (each one of which is made up of an enormous amount of individual molecules). Given this fact, how can it possibly make a difference whether the CO2 was put into solution using one method or another? Simply put, it can't.

 

[Weizenwerks]

Stouts and porters are also served via nitrogen/CO2 mix where the nitrogen has smaller bubbles than CO2 by design.

 

[eltorrente]

Kegging systems are a luxury that are sure nice to have. The main advantage, for me, is that I can bottle up the remainder of a tapped keg to make room for another beer. I know exactly how it's carbonated and how it will taste at a particular carb level. It just gives me flexibility, but of course it's more money to get setup, and it isn't really required for great beer.

 

[emjay]

Stouts and porters are also served via nitrogen/CO2 mix where the nitrogen has smaller bubbles than CO2 by design.

Not quite.

Beers served with nitrogen or beergas DO have smaller bubbles, but for a different reason - it's the stout tap that does it, by way of a restrictor plate with tiny holes in it which the beer is forced through, making the bubbles smaller.

The restrictor plate adds a lot of resistance to the tap, and so it requires a much higher PSI in order to force the beer through it. If you just increased the PSI using pure carbon dioxide, you'd end up overcarbonating the beers like crazy.

THAT is why nitrogen is used in such cases - it doesn't really dissolve in the beer at all, so it can be used to provide the additional PSI required to force the beer through the stout tap. In fact, "still" (uncarbonated) beverages such as wine can be served on tap using nitrogen without having any bubbles at all. Theoretically you could use any insoluble gas to accomplish it, and indeed I believe wine taps sometimes use argon instead of nitrogen.

 

[gr8shandini]

Stouts and porters are also served via nitrogen/CO2 mix where the nitrogen has smaller bubbles than CO2 by design.

At the pressures used in a keg of stout (I've never heard of a porter on N2, by the way), the nitrogen is largely insoluble and thus, no N2 bubbles are formed. Instead, the stout faucet produces the characteristic head by mechanically restricting the bubble size by forcing the beer through a small orifice. I don't have an N2 system, but serve my stouts on a hand pump with a "sparkler" attachment. I get a very similar result even though my beer has never seen N2 since the beginning of primary.

As for the question of bubble size in kegs vs. bottles, it all comes down to technique. Typically, a proper pour from a bottle is more "violent" than a draw from a keg. Since the CO2 comes out of solution faster, the bubbles don't have as much time to form and are smaller as a result.

However, you can counteract this effect on a keg system by pouring most of a glass and then just barely cracking the tap open to produce some foam. I find that it has a bit of a chain reaction effect where it will rapidly knock a bit of CO2 out of the beer that you've already poured as well, giving you a nice, dense head with small bubbles.

All in all, I have found zero difference between beers that were bottle conditioned, kegged and force carbed, kegged and primed, and bottled from either type of keg.

 

[bonzombiekitty]

I don't know of homebrewer that amortizes their equipment cost into the cost of their beer. It's ingredients only. For kegging, the equipment is another expenditure much like brew kettles and such, but once you have it, it's cheaper.

Is it? Bottles are free. Caps cost at most $1 per batch, and priming sugar costs maybe $0.50 per batch. That's $1.50/batch. Factor in an additional 50 cents for the extra effort, and that's $2/batch. Capper and bottling wand cost maybe $25 total.

Assuming you got lucky and spent $30 on tank, regulator, and faucet. $50 on a mini fridge (though personally I'd be buying bigger fridge). Then let's say $50 on ONE keg, you're up to $130. Minus $25, that's $115. It'd take more than 55 batches to recoup the cost, and that's ignoring the cost of running an extra fridge (assuming you are putting a few bottles in your regular fridge at a time).

If we assume $40/year to run the extra fridge, that's another 20 batches per year. For me, my costs wouldn't get recouped based on that. Heck, even if the fridge only cost $20/year to run, I'd only barely recoup THAT cost, and that's assuming I don't decide to do any bottling from the keg.

If someone is going out and buying new kegging equipment for the major components, they're missing the point. Plenty of used equipment around for great prices.

Not so much from what I can find. I can find plenty of cheap fridges, but cheap kegs and CO2 equipment are hard to come by, and I live in a big city. I think there was only one CO2/keg set up I could find that I thought was a good deal, but that would have meant driving all the way to Delaware.

Granted, I can find some cheaper small keg fridges that use single tap towers, but that's not what I personally want. I want a larger fridge so I can put three taps on, and use it for other purposes.

 

[cimirie]

I'm actually curious now. Can you point me towards a food science paper or anything like that? I want to know if they properly controlled for variables (i.e. same batches, same recipes, one bottle finished and one forced, to the same CO2 volume).

I will point out that wine grapes have very little, if any, protein. Wine depends (in my understanding) on dissolved minerals and carbohydrates to support a bubble structure. Beer on the other hand utilizes proteins, which is why your mash matters, and why adding carapils or flaked grains tends to help head. That fact alone makes it difficult to compare beer and wine.

As I said, I observed this in a wine class. Nobody was too concerned about scientific journals and documentation. We just saw with our own eyes.

But, I realize that wouldn't hold up to the scientific brewers, so I started digging. Interestingly enough, this idea has been widely held for so long (and visually qualified by wine experts), but until recently, no studies have ever been performed: how is bubble size determined.

There is a French team working on it and an American team. Neither has published any findings. But the French team believes bubble size to be determined by salts and proteins present in the wine, coupled with carb method.

So, I will retract my statement of "it's a fact.". In the same manner, cries of "impossible" have to do the same.

 

[Cosper123]

you also gotta think, if you ever make imperial stouts or barleywines etc, you should age them.

Which you do in the carboy before moving to keg...