Brewing: Which temperature should I ferment ale beer at? I want to brew beer and I wonder which temperature I should ferment it at?
I want to brew ales like IPA and Pale Ale.

What difference does different fermentation temperatures have on the beer? Are there different temperatures needed when brewing different kinds of beers with different yeasts?

Short answer: 17-20C (62-68F) is good for ales.

The temperature of fermentation is exceedingly important for the final beer.  Too low (< 15C) can cause the ale yeast to go dormant, stalling the process.  While a high temperature (> 25C) can cause a rapid ferment, where the yeast creates excess esters and fusel alcohols.

Yeast also generate their own warmth during fermentation.  A commonly cited value is that the ferment is around 3C above ambient temperatures.

There are exceptions to this of course.  Some beers ("Saison" for example) are fermented much warmer.


Why do lagers get made in tropical climates? Lagers traditionally were made in the colder months and stored (lagered) in caves. As lager yeast prefers a colder fermentation and conditioning temperature than ales, why is lager regularly made in hot, tropical climates around the world instead of more temperature tolerant ales, or just imported?

On a tour around the Tiger Brewery in Singapore where the average temperature is 30 deg C, the guide mentioned the brewery started in 1932 and used a "tropical lagering process". The guide wasn't sure of details, and I haven't found details elsewhere on this process.

Is it a simple matter of economics, that it's cheaper to brew lager locally even with climate control than to import, or is there a way to successfully brew lagers at high temperatures?

It's just marketing.

Lager fermentations are very clean so it tends to be a beer you want to drink in a warm and humid climate.  The breweries want to make beer that will sell very well locally, and that just happens to be lagers.

At a commercial scale brewers are investing in temperature control regardless of ale or lager, so it's not a significant expense or savings one way or another.  So since they're spending the money anyway, might as well brew what people will buy more of.

From the consumer perspective, it's cheaper to buy from a local company than it is to buy an imported beer in most cases.  So the local beer sells better than the import.


Elder flower champagne best to use natural yeast or add a wine yeast? I have had much success making Elder Flower champagne in the past by adding the flower heads to large container of water, add sugar and little lemon for taste and leave for 2-4 weeks to ferment before filtering and bottling up in screw top bottles to get fermentation in the bottle and add some fizz to the drink.

I have always used the natural yeast that occur on the elder flower and produce a 4-5% alcoholic drink. Just wondering if anyone had any advice on using any store bought yeast for obtaining higher % of alcohol and what side effects this might have on the taste etc.

Many thanks

I will try to answer your questions to the best of my ability.

Your description of your earlier wine makes me question you:
Have you used a hydrometer to calculate the alcohol percentage of your earlier wines?

If your wine tasted sweet after fermentation, it means your wine wasn't finished fermenting. If you bottle the wine and let it stay in room temperature with unfermented wine, then you may create bottle bombs.

Comparison between wild yeast and adding wine yeast:

Duration of Fermentation: Naturally occurring wild yeast will use longer time than wine yeast. Adding Wine yeast is a lot faster, and will substantially reduce the fermentation time.
Taste: The taste is subjective, where wine yeast may create a safer and cleaner taste, meanwhile wild yeast and other bacteria may produce 'unwanted flavors' or 'wanted flavors'. Everything depends on what you want. I don't know enough about the specific tastes to tell you here.
Alcohol percentage: I recommend using a hydrometer before and after fermentation to calculate the alcohol percentage of your wine. Adding wine yeast will eat up all the sugar in your wine very fast. 1-2 weeks, while wild yeast may use several months. Everything depends on how much yeast is present in the fermentation, temperature and how much sugar is in the unfermented wine.

Wild yeast takes time to grow into a culture which can eat up all the sugar, where wine yeast usually already has ~1 billion cells in the package.


Alcoholic popsicle recommendations? Popsicles bring home the idea of warmer days and entertainment amongst friends. During our self isolation moments we want to make the best of the moment of those fun days (like being on a beach), but in reality staying home because of the Covid-19 situation.

Does anyone have any recommendations to make on alcoholic popsicles? Is there a particular mould that works best for keeping it colder longer? Any ideas are welcome.

Would appropriate a recipe in any answers (even via a link).

Any personal experiences would make a recommendation so much more meaningful!

Dirty Pirate Popsicles

I honestly have never made this one. Some time back a friend of mine made these for a backyard barbecue. They were quite delicious. However not being quite as hard as ice, we had to down it relatively quick. The ones in the picture were similar to my friend’s popsicles.

  Ingredients

  2 1/2 cups Diet Coke™

  1/3 cup Captain Morgan™ original spiced rum

  1/3/cup Kahlúa™

My friend told me that using Diet Coke worked better than the regular coke.

Wanting to make some for a nice form of distraction, I wanted to find out if a particular shape of popsicle would stay harder longer. Here is what I found out.

  Slightly flat Coke will produce a popsicle that stays frozen longer. To quickly and manually flatten out the carbonation, empty out enough Coke from a 2-liter bottle to leave a 3-inch space from top of bottle to top of coke. Place cap back on and shake vigorously for 10 seconds. Set aside to leave bubbles to subside. - Dirty Pirate Popsicle

The following is taken from Quora:

  Do Ice shapes matter? If so, which shape of Ice keeps my drink colder the longest?

  The larger the surface area, the faster the ice will melt. A cube of ice will last longer than a flat slab of ice of the same mass. The shape with the smallest surface area per volume is a sphere.

  A spherical piece of ice would melt slower than any other shape. There are moulds available to make spherical ice cubes, and they are favoured by some people who use them in alcoholic drinks because they take longer to water down the beverage.

That is right round popsicle moulds work best for any alcoholic popsicles!


Why changes taste of beer when transported by plane? I observed the following. When I was in Brazil I drank some craft beer, which I liked. I bought some bottles and took them with me to Europe. When I opened the bottles here the taste was terrible. Some months later I was revisited by my Brazilian friends who discovered some other nice beer in my town. So they took some bottles to Brazil where they made the same bad taste experience.

What happened? The bottles were transported in suitcases (stored in the cold, but not frozen store of the plane) and reached their destination closed and assumed in best condition. I do not suppose any effect of light, temperature or pressure. Even vibrations must have been low because the bottles were covered by clothing. There must have been some impact to the beer which I do not understand.

If your craft beer is unfiltered, unpasteurised beer with live yeast, then any kind of transport could alter its flavour profile.

Other variables that could effect its flavour are:

changes in altitude (not during flight)
no resting after transport (depending on yeast content up to two weeks)
bottling problems (oxygen in bottleneck)
difference between drinking and ambient temperature (e.g. beers taste different in summer and winter)
olfactory changes (flu, humidity, ambient smells)
drinking method (glass or bottle make a taste difference)
transporting bottles that are not so fresh (closer to their exp. date)

Pure speculation/unlikely:

cosmic radiation
altitude changes during flight irreversible

Any of the above mentioned changes in temperature as well as choosing a glass instead of a bottle etc. effect CO² in various ways. This results in a different drinking sensation (the tingling in the nose; try "smelling" the CO² and compare with a flat beer) and different taste (pH).

Humidity, climate, season could alter your perception. An imperial stout for instance takes you over the edge in summer while you would feel perfectly fine in winter.

Ambient temperature has an immense effect on the beer. It effects nearly everything from how much CO² is released upon opening the bottles to what the perfect drinking temperature is. The drinking temperature has an immense effect on how strong hops, sugars and alcohol taste.

Such changes in taste are not unheard of and more likely to occur in strong, malty beers. Flights are not necessary to have such an effect. Any long-distance transport would do.

To test if the beer has actually changed during transport, you could try transporting it back.


Will certain types of beer get me more drunk more quickly? Assuming we're comparing equivalent amounts of alcohol, do certain beers get you inebriated more quickly or slowly? Does the amount of fizz make a difference?

The process of becoming drunk involves becoming dehydrated. So the higher the ABV, and less water you're taking on, the faster you'll feel the effects.

This is why shots get you drunk very quickly: there is little to no extra water in the mix. Other ingredients can add to this affect, and as I've personally noticed, some beers can produce very different "drunk experiences" than others - just like being drunk off wine, beer, shots, or mixed drinks can produce different results.

So, absolutely if you drank half a beer with twice the ABV while your friend drank 1 beer with half the ABV, you'd probably feel drunk faster than him. Assuming you're drinking at the same pace. Less water.


Who made commercialization of beer possible Who was the person or company that made beer selling commercial .

The answer is probably the dawn of human civilization.  Beer was probably one of the first consumables ever commercialized.  We can find commercial receipts for the sale of beer dating back over 4,000 years (Alulu beer receipt, 2050 BC) and advertisements for beer from even further back (Ebla Tablets, 2500-2250 BC)

Hammurabi's Code from ~1750 BC has several sections detailing punishments for bartenders who try to short-change their customers.

Realistically, beer has probably been a commercial product for longer than it hasn't.


Are there any good uses for beer that has sat in my growler for too long? I usually try to drink all of the beer in my growler over the course of two nights. While the second serving is usually a good bit less stellar than the first it's usually still quite drinkable.

However, because I almost always plan to drink it over two nights, sometimes the second half of the growler gets left a few days longer. After that it's basically undrinkable.

Usually I snag Imperial Stouts, or other high gravity brews (currently I have a Southern Tier Creme Brulee ripening in the fridge :().

Is there a good use for this spoiled beer or should I just pour it out? I was wondering if beer bread was a good idea or not.

Supposedly washing your hair with it has some nice effects,
and people have found other creative uses:
How to make good use of flat, leftover beer from your Christmas party.

However, if it is only a few days old and has been in the fridge, it's unlikely that it's done much more than go completely flat, so any use that doesn't require it to be carbonated would be fitting. -- I'd go for the bread.


How can I diagnose dirty taps from drinking a beer? There's a restaurant I've visited several times where the food is good, but the draught beer often tastes... off. It's hard to describe exactly how the taste is wrong, but the word "musty" comes to mind.

I know it's not the natural taste of the beer because the effect applies to beers I'm familiar with the taste of, such as Sam Adams Boston Lager and Yuengling Lager. It's can't just be a single bad keg, either, because it happened with different beers and on different days (weeks if not months apart from each other).

A friend suggested to me that the restaurant probably had dirty taps, but only based on my description of what happened (basically what I said above) and wasn't able to give me any more information than that. Is it possible to trace the cause of a bad-tasting beer to dirty taps just from drinking it, and if so, how?

Yes, tap lines that aren't cleaned regularly (every few weeks at least) are susceptible to infection, and you can detect these infections by taste or smell alone.  Common bacteria involved are Pediococcus acidilactici and and Lactobacillus which Tasting Beer describes as having a buttery or "goaty, sweat socks" like aroma/flavor.  I think that probably aligns pretty closely with your "musty" description.

Is it serious?  In the sense that it can cause illness, no, at least not these organisms.  These are probiotic bacteria similar to what are advertised in some yogurt.  However, given that it does speak poorly to the maintenance routines of this establishment, I wouldn't blame you for not wanting to continue to opt for the draft beer, if for no other reason than that it doesn't taste very good.

Lastly, it might be worth a quick friendly word to management.  They may not realize that they need to clean their tap lines more frequently, or not realize that it isn't being done.  It's an easily fixable problem and if they do take steps to fix it, everyone will be better off.


Why does Guinness have a special pouring process / bottle, while other stouts do not? Guinness is sold in bottles and cans with special nitrogen widgets; the taps are specially rigged to have a two-step pouring process; heck, there's even a certificate given to people who learn how to "pour the perfect pint" at the Guinness factory in Dublin.  My question is: what makes Guinness so special? Why aren't these tactics used by other stout (or similar variants) producers?

Guinness is "carbonated" with nitrogen, where most beers use carbon dioxide. This requires different hardware, bottling equipment, etc.

If you've ever witnessed the appearance of a perfectly poured Guinness, and paid more than $5 USD for it, you'll understand why. It's partly about presentation. As one of the oldest beers on the market, it requires us to jump through some hoops to ensure we are enjoying it correctly. In short: I think it's mostly marketing!


In which country might you find a scorpion in your wine? In which country might you find a scorpion in your wine?

Every country has its own tradition to serve wine; someone asked me that question but I didn't find the answer yet.

Relating to wine, I suspect that the right answer is none.

On the contrary, I read about vodka being quite popular: e.g. see here, here (same producer), here and here


What's the definition of beer? What defines beer? Specifically, what's a definition of beer that allows this to be classed as one:

  Snake Venom is the world’s strongest beer as of 24 October 2013, coming in at 67.5%. It is dark amber in colour with no carbonation due to the high ABV. Unlike the previous Armageddon, the alcohol is not masked in Snake Venom. It is highly present yet it still tastes like a beer with a good degree of hop profile. Each batch is tested by the brewery before bottling and random batches are tested externally.

An alcohol content of 67.5% is not something I would associate with beer. So, why is this considered one and not a spirit?

Dictionary.com defines beer as

  an alcoholic beverage made by brewing and fermentation from cereals, usually malted barley, and flavored with hops and the like for a slightly bitter taste.

This is not a very restrictive definition and would seem to also apply to whisky if you add some hops to it. So, is there a better one?

Snake Venom is beer not a spirit because spirits are distilled. Beer is technically not distilled.

As the definition you cited says, beer is the product of fermenting sugar derived from cereal grain which is dissolved in water. So water + grain + yeast = beer. The grain has to undergo a saccharification process where the carbohydrate chains (starches) in the grain are transformed into sugar (glucose, fructose, sucrose, maltose...) which is then converted into alcohol by yeast. Fermentable sugar is extracted from barley through malting and mashing. The yeast is generally added to the wort (unfermented sugary water) manually by the brewer or wild yeast can fall into the beer from the air.

Other processes may be involved with fermenting other grains. For example, in sake brewing, koji (a type of mold) is grown on rice (and soybeans) before fermentation in order to convert starches into fermentable sugars, as rice does not contain the enzymes needed to convert its starches into sugars (note: sake is generally not consider beer, but there are beers made with significant quantities of rice, up to 100% rice beer is possible).

Hops is not a necessary ingredient in beer, and beer was made for thousands of years before people started adding hops to it.

These strong beers like Snake Venom are generally brewed to this high ABV level through freeze "distillation." This isn't really distillation, because no heat is involved, so people still call them beers. But this is a concentration process similar to distillation. Alcohol has a lower freezing point than water, so when you freeze beer, you can remove the ice and you're left with a more concentrated beer. This is the process used in the German eisbock style. The brewers also start with a high ABV beer, using special ingredients (sugar sources other than malt, like table sugar) along with strains of yeast that can tolerate high levels of alcohol and still continue to live and ferment. This process can be somewhat difficult and expensive, so it gets attention. In my opinion it's a novelty, but I guess people like it, because they sell a lot of it.


What's a good beer to have with curry? This question might still be too broad, as there are different styles of curry. But let's say a lamb korma.

Would it the spicyness change the selection? - Ie a tasty, but not spicy curry, vs a burn your mouth curry.

In general, the rule of thumb for spicy or intensely flavorful foods is that you want hop-forward beers. The high bitterness of something like an IPA will have a slight numbing effect on your palate, cutting the intensity of spicy foods and allowing you to appreciate the complexity of a dish more than you could if you were simply overwhelmed by capsaicin.


Pronunciation of Abt (as in St. Bernardus Abt 12) How do you pronounce the "Abt" in St. Bernardus Abt 12?

I'm interested in the proper pronunciation as well as whether there is potentially a pronunciation that may be more prevalent in the US.

Abt is abbot in Dutch. You can hear a couple people pronounce it on Forvo, but in the States I'd just say abbot. The top two examples are German. If you scroll down there is one Dutch speaker. For anyone unfamiliar with St. Bernardus or how a monk relates to a beer, it's an abbey beer.

Additionally, the 12 in the name seems to refer to the beers gravity. In the Belgian degree system, specific gravity is converted to degrees by subtracting 1 from the number and multiplying by 100 (there's a little history on St. Bernardus if you scroll down to pg. 305). So if the final gravity is 1.012 (PDF for clone recipe), crunch the numbers and you end up with 12 degrees.


Why are dubbels generally dark while most tripels are not? In my experience, dubbels are often fairly dark, brown ales, while tripels are much clearer and lighter (of colour).

Why is that?

Color tends to come primarily from the malt bill used (darker roasted malts lending darker color to a beer).  In the case of Belgian beers, a "candi" sugar (derived from beets) may used as an additive, and different styles use different types of candi sugars.  For dubbels in particular, the candi is a darker variety, made with a (more) substantial dose of molasses, which would darken the beer further.  A tripel uses a candi with less molasses.


Wine fermentation in steel tank When fermenting wine in a steel tank, should one put on the lid or should one leave it open?

Now as I understand, if it's open to oxygen, the yeast will multiply much faster and so the fermentation could kick on really fast.

But can the yeasts still multiply if the lid is on (with a pumped up silicon tube but I left 20 cm or so air between the must and the lid)?

Your biggest worry with an open fermentor is contamination.
If you've added potassium or sodium metabisulfide to the wine must, you should be safe against most wine spoiling bacteria.  However, it is advisable to cover the fermentation vessel.  See this post about open fermentation.


Rakija – a moonshine from the Balkan I heard something about the moonshine called “rakija“, which is strongly represented in the Balkans. So my questions are:

What kinds of rakija do exist?
How are the made?
How strong is rakija (how much alcohol does it have)?
If someone have any experiences drinking rakija, you may include it in your answer (optional).

Rakia or Rakija is the collective term for fruit brandy popular in the Balkans.

Wikipedia has this to say about Rakija:

  Rakia or Rakija is the collective term for fruit brandy popular in the Balkans. The alcohol content of rakia is normally 40% ABV, but home-produced rakia can be stronger (typically 50%).

  Common flavours are šljivovica, produced from plums, kajsija, produced from apricots, or grozdova/lozova in Bulgaria (raki rrushi in Albania), or "lozovača" or "komovica" in Croatia, Montenegro, Serbia and Bosnia produced from grapes, the same as "Zivania" in Cyprus. Fruits less commonly used are peaches, apples, pears, cherries, figs, blackberries, and quince. Similar spirits are produced in Romania, Moldova, Poland, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Russia and the Caucasus. In Albania, rakia is most commonly made out of grapes in mild climate regions and out of plums (and sometimes out of mulberry or walnuts) in colder climate areas.

  Plum and grape rakia are sometimes mixed with other ingredients, such as herbs, honey, sour cherries and walnuts, after distillation. A popular home-made variant in Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Macedonia, and Serbia is rakia produced from mixed fruits. In the Istrian and Dalmatian regions of Croatia, rakija tends to be home-made exclusively from grapes, where the drink is also known locally as trapa or grappa (the latter name also being used in Italy).

  Normally, rakia is colorless, unless herbs or other ingredients are added. Some types of rakia are kept in wooden barrels (oak or mulberry) for extra aroma and a golden color.

  It is supposed to be drunk from special small glasses which hold from 30 to 50 ml.

  Greek ouzo (from grape) and tsipouro (from pomace), Turkish rakı (from sun dried grapes) and arak in Lebanon and Levant region differ from rakia as they are redistilled with some herbs (commonly anise). Some tsipouro in Greece is made without anise in the same manner as pomace rakia (or pomace brandy). "Boğma rakı" in Turkey (common name of the domestic raki which is produced at homes and villages) is similar to rakia in the Balkans.

Slivovitz is a fruit brandy made from damson plums. The primary producers are Bosnia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Slovakia. The usual proof of private-produced slivovice is over 50% of alcohol in the final product, commercially available mass-produced slivovice is proofed less.

  Šljivovica is the national drink of Serbia in domestic production for centuries, and plum is the national fruit. Šljivovica has a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO). Plum and its products are of great importance to Serbs and are a part of numerous traditional customs. A Serbian meal usually starts or ends with plum products and Šljivovica is served as an apéritif. A saying goes that the best place to build a house is where a plum tree grows the best. Traditionally, Šljivovica (commonly referred to as "rakija") is connected to a Serbian culture as a drink used at all important rites of passage (birth, baptism, military service, marriage, death, etc.). It is used in the Serbian Orthodox patron saint celebration, slava. It is used in numerous folk remedies, and is given certain degree of respect above all other alcoholic drinks. The fertile region of Šumadija in central Serbia is particularly known for its plums and Šljivovica. In 2004, over 400 000 litres of Šljivovica was produced in Serbia.

Here follows a few sources on how to make some Raki (Brandy).

Making Rakija – The Basics:

  Making rakija involves five main stages: harvest, preparation for fermentation, fermentation, distillation and aging & storage.

How to Make Rakia (Ракия):

  Select a Fruit. Rakia is typically made from fruit, so the first thing you need to do is choose one. Grape and plum rakias are the two most traditional varieties, but Bulgarians make rakia out of whatever is readily available and cheap – apple, pear, peach, apricot, and cherry rakias are all popular in certain parts of the country. Other varieties are made less frequently.
  Pick and Gather the Fruit. Once you’ve selected a fruit, you have to “pick” it. Picking a fruit is often as simple as going to the market and buying as much of it as you need. But grape vines and fruit trees grow aplenty in Bulgaria, and most Bulgarians hand-pick the fruit they use to make rakia. With grapes, this means waiting until the right time in fall and bringing together friends and family for a grape-picking weekend. With other fruits, Bulgarians typically wait until the fruit is slightly overripe and then they shake the fruit out of the tree by vigorously shaking the branches and/or swatting at the branches with a long stick. Only the fruit ripe enough to make rakia falls out of the tree, after which it is all collected.
  Make Juice. Once you’ve collected the fruit, you mash it up, make juice, and dump it into a large barrel. The mashing process can be done by machine or the old-fashioned way – by foot.
  Measure the Sugar Content and Add Dissolved Sugar as Necessary. After the fruit has been mashed into juice, you measure the concentration of sugar in the juice with a saccharometer (захаромер). An ideal reading for making rakia is 23°, and a sugary water solution of approximately three pounds of sugar to every gallon of water should be added to the mash until the ideal sugar level is attained.
  Stir the Juice and Allow it to Ferment. The fruit juice will settle to the bottom, and the fruit skins will harden and float to the top of the mash. To make sure the juice ferments, it is necessary to push the fruit skins down and stir the juice once daily. The amount of time for proper fermentation depends in large part on the weather, but fermentation generally takes around three weeks. You might notice that thousands upon thousands of fruit flies are attracted to the mash. Don’t fret. Believe it or not, fruit flies assist greatly in the fermentation process. As a matter of fact, the Bulgarian word for fruit fly, муха-винарка, takes its name from the Bulgarian word for wine, вино, and literally translates to wine fly. Not surprisingly, more than one Bulgarian friend of mine hopes someday to be reincarnated as a муха-винарка.
  Distill the Fermented Juice. Distillation day is one of the most enjoyable days of the entire process; it is the day when rakia begins to flow. There isn’t much to the distillation process, although some people do a double distillation while others only do a single distillation. Regardless, the initial steps are the same. The mash is dumped into a still, which is sealed with a flour mixture to insure the still is air tight, and then a fire is lit under the still and distillation commences. Then you sit and wait. It typically takes about an hour before the first alcohol fumes begin to separate from the mash. This steam then makes its way through the sealed pipes before working its way through a cooling condenser and emerging as rakia. As the alcohol collects, measurements are taken. When I made rakia, we did a double distillation. On the first distillation, our rakia started with an alcohol content of around 60%, and we stopped the distillation when the alcohol content dropped to 20%. We then emptied and cleaned the still, dumped the alcohol we had produced into the still, and started a second distillation. On the second distillation, our rakia started with an alcohol content of 75%, and we stopped the distillation when the alcohol content dropped to 40%. The finished product was a potent 124 proof rakia (62% alcohol).

  Age the Rakia. Once distillation is complete, your rakia is ready to drink. Some Bulgarians do nothing more, but most prefer to age and dilute their rakia to make it more pleasurable to drink. Rakia may be diluted by adding distilled water until the desired alcohol percentage is attained. It may be aged as long and in whatever manner you see fit, but most Bulgarians only age their rakia long enough to give it some color and a little taste. We aged our rakia in oak chips for a month and added distilled water to make it more drinkable at 90 proof (45% alcohol).
  Enjoy. Of course, the final step of the rakia making process is drinking it and sharing it with friends. Хайде наздраве!

How to Make Homemade Brandy (with pictures).

The Making of Traditional Croatian Rakia Brandy (YouTube video).

Making Rakia with a Bulgarian Master (Youtube Video).

I once tried some quince brandy (Srpska Trojka Quince Brandy) and although I found it a great drink, I also admit that because of the quince one has to have an acquired taste for it. Plum Rakia would definitely be my next one to try.


Is there something special about Corona that makes it suitable for adding a slice of lime? Corona, and some other beers, tend to go well with a slice of lemon inside. Is there something particular about the style of beer, or is this a marketing thing?

I would say it's the light body, low maltiness and low bitterness that make it amenable to citrus additions (and perhaps other additions.)

The low flavor and bitterness means:

if you choose to add something, you need only a little of it before you can taste/smell the addition
there's less "interference" from the flavors of the beer so the addition tastes cleaner

Contrast with adding citrus to a Czech Pils for example. You'd have to add much more juice - the bitterness and malt backbone of the beer would compete with the citrus additions.


What do people mean when they ask for "A strong one"? I've never been onto a bar, but on TV and in films, there is often a scene when the main character is a little sullen, or stressed, and he goes into a bar, and asks for "a strong one". I think this means something with a high alcohol content, but what type of alcohol are they referring to? Whiskey? Gin, Beer? Vodka?

Generally this means the customer wants more liquor and less soda/mixer/ice/whatever than is called for in the recipe.


What sort of flavours distinguish ultra-high IBU beers from other high IBU beers? When I've drunk high-IBU beers such as Mikkeller's Hop Burn High (labelled as 300 IBU) I've been able to taste and smell the hops, but I'd be hard pressed to say that it was e.g. 6 times as bitter as a 50 IBU beer.

So I was wondering if there is something about the beer that I'm missing that would indicate that it was a 300 IBU beer?  Or is this more of a marketing thing when breweries label beers with such high numbers?

The brewery really needs to indicate how they get the 300 IBU measurement. Most just work it out from the hops they add using hop bitterness calculators, rather than it being an actual measurement of the bittering compounds in the beer. For highly hopped beers, the calculated IBUs can be far off compared to reality - above around 100 IBUs it becomes more and more difficult to increase the IBUs of the beer.

The isomerized alpha acids that give the bitterness are only marginally soluble in wort (they are hydrophobic), and their solubility decreases as more is dissolved: solubility decreases with lower pH and dissolving the iso-acids lowers the pH, so solubility is self-limiting.

Thus, labels with over 100 IBUs should not be considered accurate, unless the brewer has specifically measured the IBUs in the beer, rather than guessed them from the hop regime.


Would a beer still be good after being cold then hot then cold again? My main question is really, I guess - how resilient is beer? I have some beer in my refrigerator that was cold when I bought it. I couldn't bring it home quickly due to having to visit my fiancee's grandmother in the hospital (short notice). It got pretty warm sitting out in the car and I have it refrigerated again. My roommate took one out to drink it, but fell asleep before he opened it - therefore, it got warm (room temperature) again. If I were to put it back in the refrigerator a third time, would the beer still be safe to drink? Would there be any quality loss?

There should be no reason why beer would lose any quality from being left out at room temperature then being re-cooled.
During the brewing and distribution process beer is exposed to a wide range of temperatures numerous times.
Some specialist beers may include "adjuncts" or additional ingredients (fruit, honey etc...) that may be affect quality with a temperature range (none spring to mind).  However normal beer made with malt, hops & water should be fine.
Exposure to sunlight is more likely to affect beer than temperature.


Why would wine sellers need to broach the cask? I don't know if wine merchants still broach the cask in 2021, but why would they? Aren't casks manufactured with a spigot that a seller can just turn on, as shown below? I embolded the phrase below.

broker [14]

Broker has no connection with the
past tense of break. It comes from Anglo-
Norman brocour ‘small trader’, but its ultimate
origin is not clear. A variant Anglo-Norman
form abrocour has fuelled speculation as to a
link with Spanish alboroque ‘sealing of a
bargain’ and Portuguese alborcar ‘barter’,
which are presumably of Arabic origin (the al- representing
the Arabic definite article); but
other etymologists have sought to link the word
with broach, as if the underlying sense were
‘someone who sells wine from [that is, by
broaching] the cask’, and hence any ‘retailer’.

Word Origins (2005 2e) by John Ayto. p 77 Left column.

I believe that during aging, spigots aren’t inserted into the casks. I’m guessing that plugs are more reliable, allow tighter storage and are cheaper.


What's the difference between normal beer and trappist? What's the difference between normal beer and trappist? Is there any difference in flavour or brewing style?

Trappist beers are all abbey beers, but not all abbey beers are trappist. It's a bit like champagne, it's a protected product name to designate a certain type of classical brewn beers.Trappist is the enumeration of beers brew within the walls of an abbey inhabitted by the Trappist monks of the Tre Fontane.

Currently (Okt. 2015) there are 11 recognized trappists, of which 10 are actively producing:

Six Belgian trappists:

Chimay
Orval
Westmalle
Westvleteren (St. Sixtus)
Achel (St.  Benedictus of the Achelse kluis)
Rochefort

Netherlands:

La Trappe (Brouwerij de Koningshoeven)
Zundert (Brouwerij Abdij Maria Toevlucht)

Austria:

Stift Engelszell

Italy:

Tre Fontane Abbey

United States of America:

Spencer

There's also one aspiring Trappist brewery in the US named St. Joseph’s Abbey.

There are some strict rules to obtain "Authentic Trappiste Product":

The beer must be brewed within the walls of a Trappist monastery,
either by the monks themselves or under their supervision.
The brewery must be of secondary importance within the monastery and
it should witness to the business practices proper to a monastic way
of life
The brewery is not intended to be a profit-making venture.  The
income covers the living expenses of the monks and the maintenance
of the buildings and grounds.  Whatever remains is donated to
charity for social work and to help persons in need.

There are some standardized naming conventions, for instance the Double (orginally used by Westmalle) is a brown ale which has an alcohol level of around 7%.

The Tripple is another name first used by Westmalle, which are often blond and have an alcohol level of about 8% to 10%.

For future reference you can always visit the Trappiste website here.


Does a session beer have to be below a specific ABV? Does anyone know if a "session beer" has to be below a specific ABV to qualify as a session beer?

Like many beer terms, "session beer" is not rigorously defined.  Several groups have tried, though:

The Brewers Association (PDF) called it 4.0-5.1% ABV
Beer Advocate calls it less than 5%
The Session Beer Project calls it 4.5%.

Really, though, if you call something a session beer, most people will understand that to mean something you could easily drink several of in a session (ie, lighter and more mild than a "big" beer).


Is there a wide variation amongst specific styles? A few years ago I moved to a bigger city where the craft beer selection got quite a bit broader from where I was living previously. For a while it was like being a kid in a candy store with so many different beers to choose from.

Then as I got more experienced with beer I started getting more of an idea of the different styles that are out there, and what each of these styles tends to be like. What I noticed after a while was that if I tried 2-3 different examples of the same style, while I could quantitatively say that one was better than another, for the most part they would all taste similar.

So this brought into question the 'craft beer obsession' that I had been riding for a while. I began to think that, maybe, at some point a chocolate stout is pretty much just a chocolate stout, an ipa is pretty much just an ipa, and whether you're drinking an ipa from here or there, you're basically getting the same experience.

So with that said I wonder:

is there any type of objective measure of the variation amongst specific styles?
outside of esoteric beers that aren't commonly available, is 'trying as many as you can' really worth it?

When you're designing a recipe in software like Beersmith or Brewtoad they give you ranges for each style, so when you select a style you can tailor your recipe to be in the "acceptable range" for that style.  Obviously just hitting the numbers isn't going to make the correct beer, but these are quantitative numeric measures of variation over a style.

These dimensions are:

Original/Final Gravity (Sugar in the beer before and after fermentation)
SRM (Measure of Color)
ABV
IBU (International Bitterness Units)

These don't describe a ton about the actual flavor of the beer, just things like color, strength, body/sweetness, bitterness.  Note that while the ABV is tied to the difference between gravities, final gravity is and independent measure of the "dryness" of the beer.  Color and Bitterness are also totally independent of the others so you can have beers at the light color and bitter end but sweet, or dry and dark.

You can also check the BJCP guides which are for competitions to see what the "ideal" qualities of a given style are and then numerically grade a beer based on how well it meets those descriptions.  But they do describe what's allowed as variance for being considered "on style".

Of course plenty of brewers just don't care about that sort of thing and make beers how they like.

It's obviously opinion at this point but I think there's value in trying many different beers even though they may be in a style you've had a ton of before.  Each beer is different and those subtle differences may be the differences that really make you like one beer over another.  Maybe not a ton of the same thing in the same session...

According to untapp'd I've tried 85 IPAs, though the actual number is much higher than that.  Some have tasted like feet and onions, some have tasted amazing.  But as many as I've had if I see some IPAs on a menu and kind of want to drink an IPA, I've got nothing to lose by trying the one I've never had before...it might be really good.


How should I convince my mom that my beer isn't poison? I recently picked up a Mr. Beer DIY Northwest Pale Ale Beer Brewing Kit, and when I told my Mom I was brewing some homemade beer. She said she wouldn't drink it because it might be poison. Is there any why to explain to my mom that my beer would be quite safe to drink?

I think the first step in attempting to change a belief of another person is always to understand why they hold that view. That can even help with determining how likely you are to be successful. For example, if her concern is that you may be actively trying to poison her, you're probably not very likely to change her mind. But if instead her concern is just that you may screw up something and produce a contaminated and therefore unsafe drink, that may be easier to handle. But you would use a different argument than if her concern was that you obtained the ingredients from an untrusted source.

To address the latter two options, the simplest way may just be too brew your beer, drink in on several occasions, and then have your continued health be the evidence that it's not poisonous. This has the added benefit of checking it first to make sure it tastes reasonably good (poisonous or not if it doesn't come out well you may want to wait till next time to have her try it).

Attacking it from a more logical perspective, there are a few other arguments you can make:

Beer was, for quite some time, a product that was made more because it was safe to drink than because it was tasty. Not being able to trust their water sources, brewing beer was a way to make a drink that was not only less likely to make your sick but also an important source of nutrition.
From the research I've done, I couldn't find any instance of someone becoming dangerously sick from homebrew. Maybe the occasional upset stomach or bathroom problems but as long as you're being reasonable about cleaning and sanitizing the equipment an infected batch is almost certainly just a matter of it tasting bad, not a matter of your health.
A big part of the reason for the above points is that the alcohol produced during fermentation should be enough to inhibit the growth of any dangerous microorganisms. That should hold true for even extremely low ABV beers (<1%).

Unless you're using dirty, hand-me-down equipment and either aren't cleaning it or aren't properly sanitizing it, you shouldn't be able to end up with anything dangerous*. Even then you're more likely to just end up with something you don't like. Long story short, if it tastes and smells good, you'll be fine.

* One caveat here: bottle grenades are a serious issue and can be dangerous. Make sure you clean and sanitize your bottles well and don't bottle until your beer has reached its final gravity. That said, this is more of a physical safety issue than something that makes the beer unsafe to drink.


How is gluten-free beer made? I have a friend who is Celiac and can only drink gluten-free beer. How on earth is it made?

These beers are made with non-gluten containing grains such as millet, rice, corn, or buckwheat as opposed to glutenous grains like rye, barley, or wheat.

As a side note, I recommend your friend give Omission Beer a try. I had it once on accident at a social event. I couldn't tell the difference between it and the real thing until I got home and looked it up online.


What cocktails would be good mixed with Nanaimo Bar Cream? An Ontario-based whisky distillery has created a new “Nanaimo Bar Cream” liqueur which is reportedly “flying off shelves” across the country. Here in BC liqueur has just arrived on the shelves.
I would like to serve it in a cocktail at our Christmas dinner. My father-in-law is from Nanaimo, BC.

Forty Creek Whisky first launched its new Nanaimo Bar-flavoured liqueur locally in September before expanding it across the country in October. Already, inventory in B.C. is hard to find.
The flavours include hints of wafer, coconut, chocolate and rich custard, says Allard.
Nanaimo Bar Cream liqueur is available at 100 BC Liquor Stores and approximately 200 private liquor stores in the province, according to Forty Creek.
Given the success of the product, the distillery hopes to make the dessert liqueur a permanent addition to its portfolio. - Canadian whisky distillery launches Nanaimo Bar liqueur

Although it may be served straight and neat, I would like to serve it in a cocktail. Any recommendations would be welcome.
Also any food pairings recommendations would be greatly appreciated also, avoiding the obvious one: Nanaimo Bar

FORTY CREEK - NANAIMO BAR CREAM

One idea may be to make an affogato with the liquor poured on a mild-taste ice cream portion, for example cream (fior di latte) or custard ice cream.

An affogato or more traditionally known as "affogato al caffe" (Italian for "drowned") is an Italian coffee-based dessert. It usually takes the form of a scoop of fior di latte or vanilla gelato or ice cream topped or "drowned" with a shot of hot espresso. Some variations also include a shot of amaretto, Bicerin, Kahlua, or other liqueur.
Variety of Affogato
Though restaurants and cafes in Italy categorize the affogato as a dessert, some restaurants and cafes outside of Italy categorize it as a beverage. Whether a dessert or beverage, restaurants and cafes usually serve the affogato in a tall narrowing glass, allowing the fior di latte, vanilla gelato, or ice cream melt and combine with espresso into the hollowed space in the bottom of the glass. Occasionally, coconut, berries, honeycomb and multiple flavors of ice cream are added. A biscotti or cookie can also be served and enjoyed along side this beverage. Affogatos are often enjoyed as a post-meal coffee dessert combo eaten and or drank with a spoon or straw.
While the recipe of the affogato is more or less standard in Italy, consisting of a scoop of vanilla gelato topped with a shot of espresso, variations exist in European and American restaurants.
In French, it is known as "gelato al fior di latte" with the translation to English "flower of milk". Typically the ingredients in the ice cream includes dairy, starch, and sugar. It is popular in countries where they dress it with chocolate syrup, cantuccini, or biscotti to provide extra flavors.

Now one proper recipe! For four cups.

4 egg yolks
4 spoons of sugar
2 spoons of flour
2 spoons of potato starch
700 ml of milk
100 ml of Nanaimo Bar Cream
cocoa powder

Meanwhile milk gets to boiling temperature in a pan, beat properly the yolks with the sugar, then add the flour, the starch and stir and mix well. Then add the Nanaimo Bar Cream to the mixture. Pour the mixture in the milk pan on low heat and carry on stirring until the cream get dense.
Pour into four cups and cool at room temperature first, then in the fridge. When cooled, sprinkle cocoa and serve!


How long does it take before the taste 'flies away' It is said that the taste 'flies away' from an opened beer, and if the bottle is left open too long, it doesn't taste good next day.

Has it actually been measured how long it takes before the taste 'flies away'?

I would say that it has to do more with carbonation than anything else. Like soda, beer goes flat after a while and tastes bad (or not as good) when the carbonation is gone. Some beers have more carbonation than others, so I don't think you can accurately measure this, it really depends on the brew.

Oxidation (exposure to air) also may negatively impact the flavor. Of course, I wouldn't recommend exposing a beer to air for weeks and then drinking it due to various health concerns and I can't say I've ever tried it, nor do I want to.


What is so special about Guinness DRAUGHT? I haven't heard a lot about the DRAUGHT (Guinness) in terms of its taste. But my brother insists to say that DRAUGHT is the queen of the Guinness.

But I found nothing special, indeed, I find it rather too watered down.

It is worth the hype or just a fad?

Guinness Draft is an Irish Dry Stout, a session beer, with alcohol by volume at 4.2%. It is intended that you can sit and drink several pints without becoming overly intoxicated. Compare that with Bud Light, which is 4.3%. Guinness has much more flavor than Bud Light, or any other similar American Light Lager beers.

If you compare it with Guinness Extra Stout (5.6% abv) or Guinness Foreign Extra Stout (7.5% abv) or any Russian Imperial Stout like Victory Storm King (9.1%) or Stone RIS (10.6% abv), then, yes, it will taste "watered down" by comparison. But you would be comparing apples with watermelons.


Does anyone know what this vintage aluminum container was called and used for? Hello. I found this aluminum container in a  recycling bin.
It is about 8 inches tall and 5 inches wide at the bottom.
Someone told me its called a growler and was used to take home beer from a bar,
but I don't know if that's accurate.
Thanks!

I suspect it is a vintage milk jug if you picture search on Google "vintage aluminum milk jug" you'll get a lot of similar hits. Every growler I've seen has been glass although I'm no expert.


by-volume/by-weight conversion formula Okay, because I have nothing better to do on a Friday night (i.e., my carboys are all currently fermenting), I've decided to fiddle a little bit with math.

I know that 0% alcohol by weight (ABW) is also 0% alcohol by volume (ABV), and I know that 100% ABW is 100% ABV. I also know that, in between those two extremes, the relationship is not linear (e.g., 3.2% ABW is approximately 4.0% ABV). However, any web-site calculator that I see pretty much performs the calculation as linear.

I've been fiddling with my TI-89 from high school, and I think that I have it figured out. Assuming ethyl alcohol has a density of .789 kg/l and water has a density of 1 kg/l and assuming that water and alcohol are the only substances in an alcoholic beverage (which I know isn't true), the formula is:

ABV = ABW ÷ (.211 · ABW + .789)

The problem is that I can't confirm my formula. I'm searching Google and can't find much on the topic. Well… I can find plenty of calculators, but they all seem to be using a linear formula.

So… is this formula correct?

EDIT: So, I've done a little more tweaking on this (after I already got the accepted answer). I already made the assumption that the density of water is 1 kg/l. The density that I used for ethyl alcohol was for 20°C. At that same temperature, water has a density of approximately .99823 kg/l and not 1 kg/l. Using this, I arrived at a different formula that's probably more accurate (at 20°C, that is):

ABV = (99823 · ABW) ÷ (20923 · ABW + 78945)

EDIT: Please see AlkonMikko's comment.

I'm a Chemical Engineer and it frustrates me that everywhere on the internet appears to be using this linear approximation. Yeah it's probably okay for hobby brewers, but for anyone actually interested in solving the problem for example use in software design or higher ABV products, this approximation is really not good enough.

This is actually a ridiculously complicated subject and it all boils down to the fact that at a molecular level, water and ethanol interact with one another with what are known as hydrogen bonds. Now you can just use an empirical lookup table or regress a tonne of data, but if you're interested in the root of this problem you should do some research into what are known as equations of state. In particular UNIQUAC for ethanol-water mixtures. It get's even worse when you realise that these equations of state describe gaseous behaviour remarkably well, but require additional thought to be applied to liquids.

People dedicate their entire lives into perfecting a generalised equation of state to describe the interactions between all chemical components. ANYWAY I digress...

I've done some number crunching myself using UNIQUAC and have come up with the following simple formula. Like yours above, it's only applicable to ethanol-water mixtures, and I've only validated this equation up to an ABV of 50% so be weary of going higher. This equation has an R-Squared value of 1.

ABW = 0.1893*ABV*ABV + 0.7918*ABV + 0.0002

Try it yourself :)


Shrove Tuesday - what alcohol can I serve with my pancakes? So,  we have shrove tuesday.  But what should we serve with our pancakes?  I am thinking a nice cognac .

If you don't know how to make a pancake, you can learn here.  Then add the drink of your choice.  What is your choice?

Some people might like wine with their pancakes on Shrove Tuesday.

Seeing that Shrove Tuesday is the day before Lent, please allow me to make two recommendations.

My first recommendation would be mead. Mead would be a fitting drink to ease the knowledge that tomorrow is the start of the traditional 40 days of fasting.

My second drink would be a nice good bottle of Rauchbier or "smoke beer". In today's way of fasting during Lent alcohol is no longer a forbidden food, so any left over could be consumed during Lent.

  Rauchbier, or “smoke beer,” is made using malts that have been dried over fire—-thus gaining the smoky taste of cured meats like ham and bacon. At one time all beers malts were produced over fire, but in medieval Bavaria beers of this type came to be associated with Lent when the rich, smoky tones of meat were dearly missed. There is, of course, an official blessing for beer (“Bless, O Lord, this creature beer . . . ”) which one may safely assume is more efficacious in the original Latin: ” Benedic, Domine, creaturam istam cerevisiae, quam ex adipe frumenti producere dignatus es: ut sit remedium salutare humano generi, et praesta per invocationem nominis tui sancti; ut, quicumque ex ea biberint, sanitatem corpus et animae tutelam percipiant. Per Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen.” - Ten Weird, Wonderful Foods for Lent


Why should beer be kept in the fridge? Beer is usually found in fridges in shops and supermarkets. At home, you would store it in the fridge as well before drinking. On the other hand, many liquor shops have stacks of beer cans outside fridges, and beer in kegs isn't usually refrigerated when it's transported.

What are the benefits of keeping beer refrigerated? Which kinds of beer should/must be refrigerated and which ones don't need to be?

Beer should be chilled to the proper serving temperature, which may vary according to ingredients and brewing methods, and even most of those are not set in stone, but can also vary according to taste.

Guinness, for example, has a specific serving temperature related to how it was traditionally stored in Ireland (Kegs in the "cold" room, which was often just a room carved out of the hill behind the pub or similar).

As far a why grocery and convenience stores keep it chilled, it's basically appealing to the "grab and go" drinker, who intends on consuming it in the very near future, or with a short transport. Often they are slightly higher price than if you were to go to a liquor store.

Liquor stores have much larger selection and inventory, and refrigerating everything would be cost prohibitive. The price is generally slightly less than the grab and go locations, although many liqour stores still keep some of the more popular and mainstream beers in the cooler as well.

For most commercially available beers, you can cool, warm and recool several times with minimal to no changes to taste. Some craft and/or home brews may be affected more by this process, but I don't know if there is any kind of a list available.


What's a good way to train your palate? Everyone knows how to drink beer, but it seems like it's an acquired skill to be able to differentiate (and articulate) different flavors.  Whereas someone just turning 21 might say "this beer tastes... dark", a more experienced drinker might describe it as "nutty and chocolatey, with mocha overtones and black currents in the aftertaste."

What are some good strategies for moving from the first quote to the second?  That is to say, how does one train their palate for beer tasting?

Flights!

I didn't know much about beers until I moved to San Diego, where I was introduced to beer flights:

Somehow, I'd never heard of or seen them!

A flight is 4 or 5 small servings of beer, typically in 4.5- to 5-oz. glasses, usually served on a "paddle." At least in San Diego, a flight costs as much as a pint on draught, so often it's a no-brainer to get flights if you want to taste a variety of beers. When you order a flight, you of course get to choose what 4 or 5 beers you'd like to have. I often select similar beers—a set of stouts and porters—or a bunch of IPAs (and doubles)—so I can really get a chance to taste what distinguishes specific brands and subtypes.

When a friend of mine flew in from New York (also never having heard of flights), he was enthusiastic about getting two flights and sharing all 10—doing blind tests on one another. He went from saying, before we got to the bar, "All beer tastes the same to me—I can only taste dark or light," to, "Oh man, I didn't know I was even capable of tasting such little differences!"

So, beer flights are an effective yet casual and fun way to get yourself or anyone to appreciate the multifarious tastes of beers.

I think trying to start with all the ingredients, brewing processes, and the (dizzying) gamut of terminologies for all the subtle tastes, might be like teaching someone to drive by starting with the difference between torque and horsepower—they can't fully appreciate the meaning of words until they've experienced the sensations they describe. By contrasting beers side-by-side, we build an internal, as-of-yet-wordless "vocabulary" of tastes, e.g "This beer has more of... that thing, whatever it's called, than this one," and then we learn terminology (and ingredients and processes) as a means of filling those voids in words for senses we've experienced. Otherwise, we're storing abstract definitions, which we don't retain very well.


What steps in the brewing process affect alcohol levels? Why do some beers have high alcohol levels and some have low ones? Is the alcohol content something that can be changed for any specific brew, and the brewer sets it at a specific level on purpose? Or is the alcohol level something that is achieved in combination with other factors in the brewing process (so for example, a particular taste will always coincide with a specific alcohol level)?

Beer is an alcoholic beverage produced by the saccharification of starch and fermentation of the resulting sugar. The starch and saccharification enzymes are often derived from malted cereal grains, most commonly malted barley and malted wheat.

It can be influinced and is often influenced during the brewing process, by adding sugar (which gets transformed into alcohol) at certain phases during the brewing process. Several beers first get brewn on a barrel and then after a few weeks put onto a bottle after which sugar may be added. Adding the sugar causes a seconds fermentation which will result in a higher alcohol level.

Often deeper tastes as experienced with for instance a La Trappe, Rocherfort 10 or Westvleteren are the effect of the higher alcohol level. While alcohol certainly plays a role in the beer's taste, spices and herbs are also important for the beer's taste body.


Sangria left out overnight I made some sangria for a party - Spanish red, brandy, triple sec, peach schnapps, orange slices, lemon slices, strawberries, pineapple, generic tropical juice - and have accidentally left it out on the table while I was busy out dancing while under its influence. I know that as a rule, sangria that isn't on the table with some ice in it should be kept refrigerated, so my question is whether the leftovers are drinkable having been out for around 24 hours?

Well, I had a sip of it out of curiosity, and it tasted great, so I finished off what was left. No ill health effects to report so it would appear it was fine! I will say that the fruit looked slightly worse for wear so I didn't eat any of it, but otherwise the drink was delicious.


How can I find beer or wine shops online in India? I am a passionate traveller, and this is all I ever wanted. But the only problem I face in the new place is finding the beer shop. Is there any way of finding one without any hassle? My journey is always incomplete without beer.

Yes, finding a nearby beer shop or nearby wine shop is hassle free now all because of Nearbytheka.com.

NearbyTheka is India’s first online portal where you can locate the list of nearby beer shops, pubs, bars, wine shops, cafes, and thekas close to your location just within a click. All you need just to search your existing location through GPS and explore the nearby beer shops, just like that.

The motto of NearbyTheka is to provide a hassle-free way out to search nearby wine shops. Along with that, they believe to provide a platform for all daaru lovers to spice up their life with the list of nearby thekas, yummiest nearby chakna, nearby cafes, pubs, bars and daaru party theme merchandise with the latest daarubaaz trends at amazing prices.


What's a good beer to go with lasagna? What beer sort would pair good with lasagna, and other sorts of food with high tomato content?

What makes the taste of that beer compose good with the taste of lasagna/tomatoes?

Thinking about a tomato pasta, I get acids, strong aromas, and a lingering mouthfeel.  Based on this, I would lean towards a Flanders Red or Flanders Brown / Oud Bruin, depending on the acidity of the sauce (the red for more acid, the brown for less).  These beers tends toward a wine-like experience, with their own acids and richness.  You won't have a lot of hop presence, which would battle the aromas of the food, and the sour characters of a Flanders Red would compliment a strong tomato sauce.  Alternately, perhaps a English-style brown ale, for its low bitterness and malt profile.


Beer with honey, beer with cinnamon A while ago on a visit to Tallinn I visited the medieval-style restaurant Olde Hansa. There they had two very good kinds of beer: one with honey and one with cinnamon.

Do such beers exist elsewhere, in particular, in bottled versions?

There are several beers with honey, some of them are quite famous.

For example the ones I know are from Belgium and France:

"Barbãr" and "Barbãr Bok" from the Levebvre brewery
"Bière des ours" from the brewery "La Binchoise"
"Bière de miel biologique" from the Dupont brewery
"Véliocasse" from the brewery "La bière du Vexin"

The easiest to find are probably the ones from the Levebvre brewery.

I don't know any beer with cinnamon but I'm quite sure that it exists.


What is the benefit of organic red wine? Red wine is a rich wellspring of a polyphenol called resveratrol, which goes about as a cancer prevention agent. It shields the cells of the body from harm and avoids perpetual infections. These cell reinforcements assume a noteworthy part in the anticipation of disease, including colorectal growth and lung malignancy.

Recent studies suggest that resveratrol found in red wine and red grapes may help in preventing age related memory loss.

As indicated by the discoveries of the diary Nature, wine restrains the union of endothelin-1, a supermolecule to blame of the operating of fats on the dividers of veins prompting to arterial sclerosis. Wine, in addition, has giant amounts of procyanidins, a category of phenols. that assume a section within the oxidization of cholesterol, decrease the danger of gas ailments.

What is the benefit of organic red wine over non-organic red wine?

Your question is a little vague. I'm assuming by the nature of your question, you mean the health benefits as opposed to the environmental benefits. Having been growing organic wine grapes for 18 years I think I can address both issues. I might have a more controversial view than most people, but in the end I don't think it makes a lot of difference to drink Organic wine vs. traditional farming from a health perspective.

Grapes are grown, generally, in a dry and hot climate. California, Australia, Spain, Italy. Because of this, there are usually less problems with rot and mildew on grape vines. The two biggest problems are powdery mildew and botrytis. There are some insect problems, but generally they are not a big deal. Compared to other crops like lettuce, strawberries, potatoes, the amount of fertilizer and spraying is minimal.

So, what I am trying to say is that amount of chemicals sprayed on grapevines is already at a low level compared to many other foods you might consume. Here is my controversial take on Organic vs. Traditional wine making. Growers will actually spray MORE chemicals on their grapes they are just "organic" just because the Organic chemicals are not as effective. That means more tractors, more people contributing to pollution in and around the vineyard.

On top of that, in the USA, "Organic Wine" is different than in Europe. In Europe, it means that grapes were grown organically. In the USA, it means that they were grown organically AND do not use sulfites. Which the Europeans have known to help preserve wine for thousands of years and are naturally occurring during the fermentation process. (BTW, sulfites are also a nasty chemical in large amounts). There are way more sulfites on your pre-packaged salad and raisins than there are in wine.

REMEMBER, you are consuming a beverage that contains about 14% of a known carcinogen, namely Ethanol. So expecting your drink to have these huge health benefits is kind of a false flag.

You have to ask yourself why there isn't a lot more Organic wine on the market? A fellow grower told me that it doesn't make economical sense. It costs way more money to grow them vs. traditional or just grow Organic grapes and not have to do all the record keeping, which takes a lot of time and money. High quality growers, for the most part are a thoughtful bunch and really don't want to spray non-organic chemicals and winemakers use non-organic chemicals in the winery.

So, here is my recommendation. I really don't think there is a huge environmental or health edge for Organic wine. High volume, low priced wines will generally have more chemicals in them. If you can find an Organic red wine that you like and you can afford, got for it. If you can spend a little more money, say $20 or more for a bottle of wine, those wines probably came from grapes that were babied way more than a box wine grapes and probably have less chemicals in them in general. In fact as you go up the price curve it's generally known they have less and less chemical inputs. So, the more you can spend, the less chemicals will probably be in your wine.

(And to blow your mind, many wines are not vegetarian! And you have no way to find out.)


What's this white floating sediment in my bottles of twisted tea? Okay so I purchased 2 six packs of bottles each bottle containing different amounts of  this whitish colored sediment at the bottom of the bottle all of which aren't expired, if shaked well will dissappear. Anyone know what it is and is it safe to drink?

If the bottles have not been tampered with, the brew is perfectly safe to drink. Sediment can be formed by several factors including ingredients, filtering, temperature, and conditioning/storage...

  What are the ingredients in Twisted Tea?
  Our delicious Twisted Tea products include a malt base made from beer, tea, natural flavors, and sugar. - Twisted Tea FAQs

  After taking the firkin out of “cold storage” (should never be colder then 45 degrees F if for any appreciable length of time), you then want to bring the cask up to cellar/serving temperature of 51 – 56 degrees F. At this rising temperature, the finings are most effective in attracting yeast and together they SLOWLY sink to the bottom forming a bed of sediment. Pic(k) of the Week: Sam Adams fenced-in

  Blue Hills King's Kolsch is an imperial version of the style, packing an ABV of 7.25 percent. The beer pours a dark chestnut into a tulip glass. It's unfiltered; chunks of sediment swirl and drift slowly to the bottom. Baked bread and faint flowers form the nose. New Paulaner Bar at TD Garden; new beer offerings in the arena

You likely noticed this when you pulled a cold one out of the fridge. You are more than likely seeing some sort of combination of yeast, tea, and sugar which is corroborated by the solubility....


What is the source of the plum flavor in (this) plum porter? I had a plum porter lately, it has a really intense plum flavor and aroma and even a bit of plums in the taste, so I thought there were some plum products in it. However, there is nothing in ingredients list which could give the plum note to the drink.
How does the plum falvor originate here?

I contacted the brewery and they replied that

To get the plum flavour we use a natural plum extract.

Curious that it's not on the ingredients list.
PS. It's St.Peter's Plum Porter.


What spirit goes best with lasagna? My mom's favorite dinner is lasagna with salad, garlic bread, and cheese cake. I make this for her every twice a year; her birthday and Mother's day. What spirit goes best with this dinner?

Not a spirit, but I would serve red wine. In particular a Barbera d'Alba or maybe a Chianti. Red Italian wine seems appropriate and those two are good with pasta in my opinion. It does depend a bit on the kind of lasagna. I'm assuming the standard red tomato sauce kind.


When was non alcoholic wine first invented? I am trying to find out when in history grape juice or non-alcoholic wine was first used?

Any ideas?

I'm sure the "Ancients" drank grape juice. It was probably a delicious treat when it was in season when the grapes were ripe in the Fall. I love drinking the juice from my wine grapes, it's very good! But, without filtration or sulfites, there was no way to store grape juice without spontaneous fermentation, even after boiling it. Eventually something would turn it into wine or vinegar. So, you always ended up with wine whether they wanted it or not. So, yes, they probably drank grape juice, but only for a short period after harvest time.


What kind of cocktail would Gin Mare be best suited for? Recently, I started paying more attention to the shelf of the "forbidden bottles" in pub's.
I saw lots of time, a gin called Mare (reference here), which seems to be a very good bottle, with a particular "mediterranean" taste.

Except the classic gin tonic, is there some cocktail who enhance this particular gin?

I have not tasted that gin*, but from the description of the botanicals ("rosemary, thyme, olive, and basil") it seems to be crying out for savory rather than sweet. It sounds like a red snapper would be good (essentially a bloody mary with gin instead of vodka). Also sounds like a classic or dirty martini might be nice, depending on the vermouth on hand.

*yet... judging by the rave reviews I will have to try it soon!


Why have distinct styles of Scotch clustered in different regions of Scotland? I've noticed the tendency for different regions of Scotland to produce malt whiskies that tend to be similar in character, and I wonder how this came to be.

That the distilling methods from each region are different is clear enough, but the question is is this because different distilling methods arose naturally out of each region, historically, and became static once they had established themselves, or something else?

Much of it has to do with the material they used to dry the grain. If the distillery traditionally used peat (because it worked well, was widely available, and cheap, the smell made its way into the spirits (this is why the Islay area has such a concentration of “peaty” whiskies.

Much of the flavor and color comes from how the distillery ages the whisky. One of the casks of choice these days is American white oak. Bourbon distillers in the US are only allowed to use a cask once. Scotland distilleries will buy the used casks and reuse them several more times. The best whiskies tend to be aged 12 or more years in ex-bourbon casks (first run of whisky).


Why is it important to have foam on a beer? I've seen people complain when served a beer without foam. Equally, getting a glass full of foam is no use.

When serving a beer, how much is the right amount of foam and why is this important?

Most importantly, a good head helps release the aromas of the beer, especially the hops. Aroma is everything for enjoyment of a good brew. When enjoying a super-hoppy IPA, you should always use a glass that provides a large surface area for aromatics to rise from.

It can also provide the a pleasant mouth feel. Stouts definitely benefit from a thick, silky head.

And lastly, it's eye candy.

As for the right amount of head, it varies. Generally in an average pint glass you want 1-2 finger-widths of head. Some hefeweizens and wit beers are best with a bit more.


Can you make "herbal tea" out of beer brewing ingredients? I like teas and I like how some people describe the different beer flavors, and I think it's very interesting, but unfortunately I'm not into alcohol or the beer brewing so far. I've heard the hobbyist brewers describe the grains as something that is basically readily edible and a great material to make tea out of by just steeping some in hot water, but I was never able to get enough information about that from the streams or texts, as it's not their main focus. So I decided to ask here.

There are exotic teas which are not teas at all, but collections of herbs or just a single herb or grain. Buckwheat tea is nice and I like the product called "barley tea". I don't know for sure whether it's actually what it says on the label, or if there are parts of grains which are usable as tea ingredients and parts which aren't, so I'd like to know everything about turning some tasty grains into non-alcoholic tea by just steeping them in hot water for some minutes.

For the sake of clarity, my questions are:

Are there any beer brewing ingredients usable in making an "herbal tea"?
Do the flavors which are normally expected to be found in beer after it's ready for pouring into glasses after a long time of sitting in kegs, translate into the tea which steeps for just minutes?
If there's a gradation, which ingredients are the most appropriate for turning into tea?
And lastly, if you have any recommendations, please throw them in at the end of your answer.

Whew! There are a lot of good questions in your question! To get the credentials out of the way, I'm a tea writer that owns a tea tavern and has done quite a bit of homebrewing (I've also made some tea beer, which may interest you).

First, the only "official" ingredients of beer (if you follow the Reinheitsgebot, or Bavarian Purity Law) are barley, water, hops, and yeast. Similarly, "real" tea is made only from the leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant, but "herbal" tea consists of pretty much any leaf, stem, root, seed, or flower you want to steep in water.

With that covered, we can move on to common terminology, where beer can contain a variety of different grains, like malted and unmalted barley, wheat, oats, rye, and corn. I've even used more exotic grains like triticale in a homebrew. A lot of adjuncts are often added, too, ranging from honey to berries, juniper buds, and every imaginable spice.

So, as to question 1: Yes, you can use beer brewing ingredients for making herbal teas. You'll want to blend them, though. Steeping straight hops doesn't make for a great drink. If you steep the hops for 3-5 minutes in boiling water, most of the aromatic oils will evaporate and most of the bittering agents won't have a chance to take effect. It's pretty meh. Blend hops with tea leaves or other herbs, though, and you can make an interesting drink.

Question 2: Very little of the flavor of a typical beer develops in the keg. It develops during the boil and the primary/secondary fermentation steps. Once it hits the bottle (or keg), beer is ready to drink. You can certainly toss barley in boiling water and let it steep a while to make a drink, but without the fermentation process, it won't taste a whole lot like beer. That doesn't mean it won't be good — especially when blended with herbs — but it won't be beer.

Question 3: Since you're using water to make both tea and beer, and yeast has no place in tea, you're really asking whether barley or hops makes a better tea. It depends on your personal taste. I'd probably say hops.

And Question 4: I'll give you the same recommendation I'd give any homebrewer or tea lover: experiment. Hops are pretty cheap. Buy some (the flowers, not the pellets), get some teas with flavor bases you like, and play around. Malted barley is cheap enough that you can probably talk a homebrewer into giving you a couple of pounds, especially if you trade for a six-pack.

Good luck, and let us know how your experiments turn out!


Are Spittoons Used in Beer Tastings? When tasting wine, it is often suggested that tasters do not swallow the wine, but simply taste as necessary and then spit into a bucket/spittoon of some sort. This, of course, aids in the tasting of large amounts of wine without the effect of the alcohol (getting drunk).

In casual tastings among friends, part of the fun is obviously getting drunk. However, I've been wondering if judges at competitions or more formal tasting venues (possibly breweries themselves) use spittoons.

To put it in the form of a question: Are spittoons ever used for beer tasting?

To my knowledge, the answer is always no.

To fully experience the flavor of beer, one must swallow it. This is because, unlike the vast majority of wine, beer is carbonated (albeit to varying degrees). When you swallow beer, some of the carbonation escapes the liquid as gas, and actually rises up from your throat into your nose (or, at least, into your nasal passages), carrying with it some of the flavor molecules of the beer. Thus your sense of smell combines with your sense of taste to produce an overall sense of flavor in a manner that is different from what occurs when you drink (uncarbonated) wine.

If you spit out your beer, you're ruining the experience.

(This explanation is based on one that I heard years ago from a brewmaster at Anheuser-Busch. I can't remember his exact words, but you get the gist.)

On a side note, regarding the important relationship between taste and smell, I'm sure you will see tasters at both beer tastings and especially wine tastings swirl their drink a bit to smell it from the glass before tasting it. The difference is that carbonated beverages pack a smell double-whammy coming at you after you swallow.


What is the traditional vocabulary to describe the characteristics of beer? I know there are certain words experts use when they talk about wine. Categories of taste, colour etc.

This is of course a matter of creativity and subjectivity, like describing a beer as “chocolaty” or “nutty” despite there being no chocolate or nuts in it.

But is there an established vocabulary in beer-tasting? Where could I find a list of words, and a description of these properties? For beer, what are the magic words so abundantly found in wine culture?

I found this pretty amazing infographic at popsci.  Most of them seem pretty clear, but for context reading some of the BJCP Style Descriptions might help you out.  But really, describe it however it tastes to you even if the word isn't commonly used in beer tasting.  There are some hop varieties that, to me, smell and taste like raw green onions rubbed on feet so I just say that.


Rum brand with the strongest rum flavor? I am looking for the brand of light rum that has the stongest rum flavor. I emphasize light because what I am looking for is distinctive rum flavor, not the flavor of the barrel in which it was aged. I normally use Bacardi light, but to me, its flavors are too weak. Any recommendations?

I would recommend "Appleton White" from Jamaica. It's a blend of column still and pot still rum, and pot still destillation tends to produce a more flavourful spirit.

You might also want to look into rhum agricole. it's not destilled from molasses but from sugarcane juice. it's a different flavour profile, but for me, it's more intense.


What type of beer did the pilgrims have? What type of beer would the pilgrims have had access to in the early 1600's, and if they did have beer, would it be a good pairing with turkey?

Also bear in mind that beers back then were made out of lots of ingredients that we'd think of as odd.  Cock ale was obviously a thing, which was beer that was fermented (or boiled) with a rooster in it.  Lots of beers would also have been strained through spruce post-boil which would've given them some wood or pine quality.  Lots of other flowers were often involved.

Check out George Washington's small beer recipe here.  Though this is a poor transcription and a lot of folks agree that it should read "Bran, Hops to taste", it's still clear that the grain is sort of a "for taste, whatever you can spare" thing while the molasses is the star of the show.  A lot of early drinks were like that, involving some sort of concentrated or burnt sugar in addition to grains, which generally weren't barley at the time.

However, in the most ideal case where you had access to the best beer you could find...it would be some form of brown ale or lighter porter.  Maybe an amber ale if you could find one that wasn't very hoppy.  The stable kilning process that enabled people to make pale malt wasn't really invented until the mid-1600's and wasn't very popular until the 1700s, so brewers in the 1600s would've used a sort of generic-y brown malt that might taste slightly burnt and premium beers may have been able to include some lighter malt that was much harder to make and find.  And it'd probably still have some molasses in it.


Is there a modern wine that is designed to resemble ancient Roman winemaking? Wine was a cornerstone of ancient Roman cuisine and most Romans (including children and slaves) drank it every single day.

In the past 2000 years, both grape cultivars and winemaking itself have evolved significantly. Is there a modern wine, commercially available today, that is intended to resemble ancient Roman wine as closely as possible?

The Romans learned their love of wines from the Greeks. In fact Greek wine was highly praised by the Romans and incorporated viticulture into their own culture, thanks to the Greeks. The white  Retsina or Resinated wine of the ancient Greeks is still produced in Greece and is locally very popular.

There are a few wineries in Europe, notable Italy that make a claim (loosely) of producing a truly Roman wine, but interpretation is still left to the reader.

First of all, there is the Cesanese Wine

  Cesanese could have been the local wine of ancient Rome.

  •It’s quite possible that Cesanese was the red wine of ancient Rome because the grape is quite old and existed in the region during pre-Roman times.

  •However, there is no physical records to prove this, just ampelography (the study of grapes).

  •Evidence of Cesanese dates back to the 1400s from agricultural contracts that were preserved in local monasteries.

  •There are only about 1500 acres of Cesanese vineyards left around Rome and the province of Frosinone in Lazio, Italy.

A second possibility is Frascati Wine:

  The Romans referred to it as the Golden Wine both for its color and its value.  It has become embedded in the cultural and economic traditions of the city.  In fact, in 1450, there were 1,022 taverns in Rome.  Producers of Frascati owned almost all of the taverns.  It has been said that Frascati is the most often mentioned wine in Italian literature.  Pope Gregori XVI, in the first part of the 18th century, said it was his favorite wine.

  The wines made in close proximity to Rome are collectively known as Castelli Romani, nine communes that produce wine in the Alban Hills, which are just south of Rome.  The vineyards range from 200 to 1,000 feet in altitude.  The Soils are well drained and volcanic.  The Mediterranean provides some influence but the climate is more affected by the hills.  Of these, Frascati is the most famous.  It has historically had a widespread reputation as an inexpensive and serviceable white wine served in the cafés of Rome.  The potential, however, is there to really improve the wines.

Mas des Tourelles offers some unique “Archeological Roman Wines”:

  These wines are only available in France (and in few quantities in Germany).
   As many people contacted us to have informations on the way to buy and taste these wines in the US, you should know that it is hard to export wines without having a registered importer. It need also that this company can after deal with a reseller that can work with all the states.

  Mulsum

  Like testifying the passages of Pline the eldest, the blend of wine, honey and a certain number of plants ans spices (cinnamon, pepper, thyme ect...) are usedin making this famous wine, which was often served to the « gustatio » (before the meal as an aperitif).

  However, it also accompanies filet of duck with figs, small quails with grapes and pine kernels, very spicy dishes, Roquefort or chocolate fondant. To serve at 14°.

  Turriculae

  Made exactly according to the writings of Lucius Columelle, it displays the tastes of the Romans as far as dry wine is concerned. The addition of seawater, fenugrec, defrutum (grape juice concentrated to boiling point) ect..., during the vinification makes an amazing and complex wine. Roman dishes, such as oysters ans smoked fish, are wonderful with our wines of recent years.

  However, in the years of 2746 - 2747, you will be able to serve it with fried foie gras or cakes with nuts. To serve at 18°. « The fenugrec confers it to the particular « vin Jaune » taste and it has a detectable smell due to the notes of nuts and almonds. The taste of the Turriculae proves to be rich and supple with a round prune flavoured finish.
   (La Revue des Vins de France - Mai 1999)

  Carenum

  This sweet wine, described by Palladius, is produced by fermenting very mature grapes with plants, quince and defrutum. A delicately viscous and silky wine notes of quince and subtle aromas of crystallised peaches, it is a wonderful accompaniment with “foie gras” and fruit tarts.

  To serve at 14°. « The wine is of an amber colour, and its smell hesitates between peach and caramel. These smoky and caramel notes are also present in its mellowt taste. It makes a very nice aperitif ».
   (La revue des Vins de France - Mai 1999)

To make things a little more interesting it could be noted that Italian Scientists have planted vineyards with the aim of making wine using techniques from classical Rome described by Virgil.

  Archeologists in Italy have set about making red wine exactly as the ancient Romans did, to see what it tastes like.

  At the group's vineyard, which should produce 70 litres at the first harvest, modern chemicals will be banned and vines will be planted using wooden Roman tools and will be fastened with canes and broom, as the Romans did.

  Instead of fermenting in barrels, the wine will be placed in large terracotta pots – traditionally big enough to hold a man – which are buried to the neck in the ground, lined inside with beeswax to make them impermeable and left open during fermentation before being sealed shut with clay or resin.


How can I tell whether a beer will improve with age? Most mass-market beers come with expiration dates, and cease to be good for drinking if too much time has passed since they were brewed, even if they've been stored in unopened containers and good conditions. Some major breweries even have long-running advertising campaigns about the freshness of their products.

Other beers improve with age. What qualities make a beer suitable for cellaring or bottle-conditioning? How can I know whether a given bottle of beer can be aged, short of looking it up online?

There are a couple of considerations, although this is far from a complete answer.

First, a stronger (higher ABV) beer will tend to cellar better, as the alcohol can act to help prevent oxidization.

Second, a beer with less emphasis on hops, and more on malt, yeast, or other characteristics, will be a better candidate, because the qualities that hops impart will fade in a fairly short time.  This is why your IPAs and such should be consumed sooner than later -- the character is primarily in the hops.

The purpose of cellaring a beer is to see its improvement over time.  Some may stay exactly the same, which others will change.  I think the answer there lies in whether there is still active yeast or bacteria in the bottle, and whether there is anything for them to chew on.  Some styles (lambics, for example) are far more prone to this, but I don't think there's a hard and fast rule that one couple follow.


Looking for a Rosé recommendation I would like to add a few bottles of Rosé to my wine collection and would like a few recommendations on good  Rosé.  If you have one, let me know what it is.

Looking for a Rosé recommendation?
The ultimate recommendation would involve that particular variety of Rosé you may be interested in.
Having lived many years in France and having drank wine on a very regular bases while overseas, I would like to recommend the Tavel Rosé.
There is just something awesome about wine made from grapes in the Rhone Valley!

Tavel Rosé
The French wine region of Tavel, on the sloping bank of Rhone, is known for its famous rosé wines. In fact, Tavel wines are only available in rosé variety. The rosé wines of this region are also known as the “The King of Rosés”. From light salmon to ruby pink, there are a variety of rosé wines with complex aromas of summer fruits and a full, rounded mouth with hints of spice. The wines in this region are made from Grenache, Syrah, and Clairette varieties.
Food Pairing
It can be served as an aperitif or with seafood pasta, cold fish starters, herb sausages, and a variety of cheese.

The following may be of some interest in making an ultimate choice of Rosé that one may be looking for as a recommendation:

A Guide to 10 Different Styles of Rosé
Rosé (Wikipedia)
A Comprehensive Guide to Rosé Wine | The 10 Perfect Styles
10 Shades Of Rosé


How can I brew a black lager? Is a black lager really a lager (in terms of yeast and brewing time)? Can I just throw in whatever would make a good stout but use lager yeast? If not, then how much play is there to the recipe?

I've got a little bit of experience brewing ales, mainly stout and brown ale. Just a few months ago I tried my first experiment, deviating a little from a recipe in my choice of malts and yeast, but still using a malt extract for my primary malt. I have zero experience with brewing lager.

A black lager, or perhaps a schwarzbier, really is a lager.  Aside from the difference in the fermentation process, there will be some difference in your base ingredients, as a schwarzbier will focus less on the chocolates or coffee flavor of a stout.

I suspect you may find significantly more information in homebrew.stackexchange.com, as hunse suggests.  We would love to go into all sorts of detail over there!


How should one store liquors in a home bar? In a home bar, the rate of consumption is (in theory at least...) a lot less than for a commercial bar. This means proper storage of ingredients becomes a much more important question, as bottles will stick around for months or years.

What's the best way to store liquor to ensure each bottle does not go bad?

What impact do light, temperature, humidity, and other factors play in this?

Are there any particular alcohols (e.g., vermouths) that should be stored differently?

Some tips:

Protect your bottles from sunlight and extreme temperatures.
If your bottles have cork tops, make sure to keep the corks moist so that they don't disintegrate (just turning the bottles upside down every month or so for a few seconds does wonders).
As the level in each bottle drops, consider transferring the contents to a smaller bottle. This prevents volatiles from leaving the liquid and also excludes oxygen from the bottle (though whether you're mixing in extra oxygen during the transfer is perhaps a worry). If you know beforehand that you will take your time on a certain bottle, I'd rebottle it at the outset.
If you already own it for wine (or are otherwise serious about keeping half-empty bottles for a long time), you could also use something like an inert gas wine preserver (e.g. PrivatE PreservE or Winesave PRO) to add a layer of what is basically Argon over the liquid. I haven't tried this.

Vermouths and other alcohols ~20% ABV don't keep well for long once opened. Treat them like wine: drink them faster or open fewer of them. They will lose their aromas, then oxidize, and finally turn to vinegar.

Liqueurs with low water activity (read: lots of sugar) will probably stay safe to consume for quite a long time (years), but they are still prone to oxidization leading to off flavors. Re-bottle at the outset if you must, or consume faster, or discard and buy new.

Consider storing your bitters in the fridge.


What drinks can be paired to a particular legend or myth? What drinks can be paired to a particular legend or myth?

We all know that that many people drink to the legendary person of St Patrick. But what I am interested in is in knowing if there are any drinks associated (paired) with a particular legend or myth (Christian or otherwise) and not simply to an historic or legendary person in some general sense. In other words, the pairing must associated to a particular event within a legend or myth.

I am not willing to include folklore at the moment!

Judaeo-Christian, Greek and Roman mythologies have links to wine.
Pastafarians have a goat that gives beer from it's udder.
Norsk myhtology references mead.

And then you can always read articles from the Lords of the Drinks.


Nutritional value of hops? Since beers are made with hops, what nutritional value do those hop give to a human body when beer is consumed?

None, the hops are added to provide a bitter flavour and because they have an antibiotic property that favours yeast over other microorganisms.

The hops are filtered out in the brewing process so there is no calorific gain.

In a typical UK beer recipe the hops are typically 1% of the dry ingredients.


How much actual alcohol is safe to drink per day? Ok, so I'm 17 and only recently started drinking.
I'm experimenting and learning, I'm looking to drink for nothing but pleasure, no exaggerations or excesses.

So, you look at a label and you see x% alcohol, which means, well what it means.

And what I intend to know is how much actual "pure" alcohol would be safe to drink on a daily basis, so I can do the math and find out how much of each drink I can drink in a day and stay as healthy as I've ever been.

(I'm ~1.6m tall, and weigh ~57Kg)

Thank you.

The CDC suggests no more than 2 drinks a day as moderate drinking.

The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism suggests no more than 4 drinks per day, and no more than 7 drinks per week, to stay at a low risk for an alcohol use.

At 17 your brain is still developing and imbibing alcohol runs the very real risk of affecting that development. Drink in moderation.

In response to the below comment, a single drink technically does vary but about 45ml / 1.5oz of spirit (e.g. vodka), a 5oz glass of wine, or a 12oz beer.

When I say it varies, different locations have different measurements. Check out this page:

Standard drink (Wikipedia)