http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/default.htm en Master Brewers Association of the America 2012 The Technical Quarterly is an online journal. It features both reviewed and nonreviewed papers covering wide technical aspects of brewing ingredients, the brewing process, brewing by-products, environmental considerations in breweries, beer packaging, and beer flavor and physical stability. Authors: George Agius, Jonathan Crawshaw, and Bart Schuurman Hess. During cleaning in place (CIP) of brewery equipment, there are several instances where the flow of the cleaning solution is limited. In these situations, there is little mechanical action imparted by the circulating cleaning solution to help remove soils. In some extreme cases, the flow could be so limited that some areas of the surface may not be wetted by the cleaning solution. Increasing the flow by increasing the size of CIP pumps is often not practical and the remaining combination of chemical action, time, and temperature may not be sufficient to completely remove all soils from the surface. In critical areas, the remaining soils may become a source of microbiological infection. The addition of hydrogen peroxide to the circulating CIP solution has been effectively employed over a number of equipment surfaces to achieve consistent cleaning, including the lauter tun, brew kettle, whirlpool, wort loop, centrifuge, and plate heat exchangers. The improved cleaning of the surfaces has been verified by visual inspection and the cleaning performance has remained consistent over a period of several months. The decomposition of the hydrogen peroxide in alkaline media into water and oxygen is thought to create micro-bubbling through nucleation, that generates surface mechanical action to help dislodge the soils and also increase the surface contact area of the cleaning solution. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-0928-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-0928-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST Author: Michael J. Lewis. Brewers invest heavily in the technology and creativity required to convert barley into beer, but they fail to go the last mile: brewers' influence is largely absent at the crucial moment when the consumer meets the beer at the bar. As a result, almost all beer, whether craft brewed or made by the national brewers, is served in the ugly, nondescript "shaker" glass, or straight-sided pint, that fails in every dimension to promote and support the product. The same glass is used throughout the bar and restaurant trade to serve water, soda, iced tea, and milk; this assures beer of similar low-level commodity status instead of the premium status it deserves. Furthermore, other beverages are not necessarily compatible with beer service. In recent travels abroad, the author observed a very different bar scene of splendid beer presentation that he characterizes here as the Majestic Pint. This paper explores why American brewers should go the last mile in bar service to achieve a similar goal. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1002-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1002-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST Author: Reginald C. Agu. A steeping regime of 8 h used in steeping Penthouse hull-less barley or wheat was adequate to modify the endosperm materials of both cereals during malting. The malted samples gave higher friability scores for Penthouse hull-less malt, but lower friability scores for Istabraq wheat malt. Penthouse hull-less malt also gave smaller number of whole grains when compared with the higher number of whole grains obtained from wheat malt. Rapid visco-analysis (RVA) results also confirmed the effectiveness of the very short steeping cycle (8 h) because the peak viscosities of the malts were low, especially after day 5 and 6 germination. Improved mash filtration rates obtained from the worts of hull-less barley and wheat malts further confirmed the effectiveness of the short steep used in malt production. Improved filtration rate is indicative of adequate modification of endosperm materials which resulted in both malts giving high fermentable extracts (FE) and predicted spirit yield (PSY) on day 5 germination. The PSY result obtained for day 5 malted Penthouse hull-less barley (445 LA/t dry) – 8 h steep was much higher than the 434.1 LA/t obtained for day 5 malted Penthouse hull-less barley (standard steep). On the other hand, the PSY value of 431.4 LA/t dry obtained for wheat malt on day 5-germination time (8 h steep) is high and comparable to 433.1 LA/t dry obtained when standard steeping was used to obtain malt from Penthouse hull-less barley. Wort or fermented wort viscosity of Penthouse hull-less malt was much lower than those of wheat malt. Although wheat malt gave excellent PSY results, which are similar to those obtainable from good quality malted barley, its wort and fermented wort viscosities are high. These results show that while malt PSY may be high, the residual viscosity may also be high. High residual viscosity is indicative of sub-optimal hydrolysis of substrates present in the grain. In this regard, PSY on its own is not a major indicator of malt quality. The results of this and previous studies have unequivocally confirmed that adjusting the malting conditions for hull-less cereals, with a much shorter steeping cycle (8 h), will produce good quality malt from such cereals. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1003-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1003-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST Author: Karl J. Siebert. This presentation was made on the occasion of the presentation of the MBAA Award of Merit to Karl Siebert. He reviewed some of the research he was involved in during more than 40 years of brewing-related work. This included: demonstrations that disc centrifuges damage yeast by chipping off pieces of cell wall and that these inhibit clarification and filterability, the mechanism of protein-polyphenol haze formation, the manner of operation of silica and PVPP chillproofing, visual perception of turbidity, the mechanism of acid astringency, and the nature of the stimulation of fermentation by trub and other particles. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1008-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1008-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST Authors: John Stewart and Molly Browning. It is becoming increasingly popular for wineries to use micro-oxygenation machines on wine held in tanks to mimic the results of oak barrel maturation. The process of micro-oxygenation (Mox) involves a micro-oxygenation unit that takes sterile oxygen from a bulk tank or compressor and injects it into a liquid through a diffusion stone at a very low dosing rate, ranging from 0.5 mL/L/month to 2 mL/L/month. It is claimed that this process oxidizes tannins and creates a softer, more rounded wine similar to what is found after oak barrel aging. Because an increasing number of breweries are now aging beer in oak barrels, it was sought to determine if micro-oxygenation could be used to achieve similar results with beer. An oatmeal stout was aged under four different conditions including barrel aging and micro-oxygenation for a period of 2 months. A series of analyses of polyphenolic and ester compounds as well as professional brewery taste panels were performed to compare these maturation techniques. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1009-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1009-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST Authors: Paul Schwarz, Scott Heisel, and Richard Horsley. Barley was introduced to North America by European colonists beginning in the early 17th century. However, the development of both barley cultivation and brewing in North America was quite different from what occurred in Europe, and some misconceptions persist even today. A unique difference is that 6-rowed barley remained the primary form in the U.S. until the latter half of the 20th century. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1011-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1011-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST Authors: Koji Nakazawa and Yuichi Nakamura. Yeast activity has been investigated on the basis of the proportion of viable cells and the physiological status and function of viable cells, and many variables have been devised to evaluate yeast viability and vitality. Among these methods is the oxygen consumption method, which makes it possible to keep track of specific yeast vitality to some degree by measuring the oxygen consumption rate at a set temperature over a fixed period of time. However, it has been considered difficult to keep exact track of slight differences in yeast vitality in the brewing environment. We investigated whether it was possible to use the oxygen consumption rate in our breweries to predict yeast vitality and the progress of fermentation, with the goal of achieving stable management of the fermentation. As a result, oxygen consumption rate was different in the physical conditions of yeast and handling conditions, and the rate decreased when the yeast was stored for a few days. The rate was controllable by changing temperature conditions in the wort cooling process. In the 500 kL industrial scale study, it was confirmed that by increasing the wort temperature, the yeast stored for a long time achieved an oxygen consumption rate equivalent to the yeast collected on the test day, and the fermentation had good performance. These findings suggest that the rate of oxygen uptake can evaluate yeast vitality and manage fermentation. It is important to control oxygen uptake conditions according to the behavior of yeast. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1012-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1012-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST Authors: Graham G. Stewart and James P. Murray. Brewing has two closely related primary objectives: to produce quality and potable beers in the most efficient and cost effective manner. Of the five basic brewing production stages, a number have developed into a more efficient process and many of these developments have resulted in cost savings. Unlike many manufacturing operations, brewing has a long and proud tradition and a major part of this tradition is focussed on "a slow cold process." This prolonged processing time largely focuses (not entirely) upon maturation because "a slow maturation process" usually (but not always) produces consistent palatable beer, but at a cost! Inflation (including labor and management, raw materials, utilities, equipment, capital, and real estate costs) and diverse taxation initiatives have necessitated brewing companies to rigorously examine their overheads (fixed and variable). Research into all relevant areas of the technical aspects of brewing has enabled development of more efficient procedures and at the same time brew beer with consistency, drinkability, quality, and stability. Although much of this research and development on process efficiency has been largely successful some relevant areas still require further attention. http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1016-01.htm http://www.mbaa.com/TechQuarterly/Abstracts/2012/TQ-49-3-1016-01.htm Tue, 20 Nov 2012 10:00:00 CST