Star san ice cube

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

grssmnperez

Well-Known Member
Joined
May 10, 2012
Messages
147
Reaction score
0
Is it possible to put 6ml = to 1/5th of a fluid ounce in a gallon water jug, freeze it and then cut it out of the plastic to drop into hot wort?
 
Poobah58 said:
Sure it's possible...but why?

I just figured it would be a quick and easy way to chill down the wort without risking contamination.
 
If you freeze it, the only thing Id worry about is chlorine. If you can use Brita or the like to clean that out, I wouldn't use any sanitizer. It would be a waste of money and risking flavor contribution or unintended consequences.
 
Pezedorado said:
If you freeze it, the only thing Id worry about is chlorine. If you can use Brita or the like to clean that out, I wouldn't use any sanitizer. It would be a waste of money and risking flavor contribution or unintended consequences.

So if i use the sanitizer in the carboy and there is some left over, it may effect the flavor o the beer?
 
So if i use the sanitizer in the carboy and there is some left over, it may effect the flavor o the beer?

Leftover flavor from undrained sanitzer is far less concentrated sanitizer than an icecube formed from mixed solution. Semi scientific taste tests have proven that carboys that havent dried should not contribute flavor, but when you have a gallon or more of sanitizer solution mixing into the beer, I would be leary.
 
So if i use the sanitizer in the carboy and there is some left over, it may effect the flavor o the beer?

There's a HUGE difference between "some left over" and "dropping a gallon of frozen sanitizer" into my wort.

I once drank a shot of diulted starsan. It has a mild citrusy flavor. I guarantee you would not detect the leftover foam, or a few ounces of starsan solution at the bottom of a carboy, in a 5 gallon batch of beer, unless you have some phenomenal sensitivity to the flavor of starsan.

I honestly think that in most beers, even a gallon would be hard to detect, but there's certainly no promises there.
 
OK, I get what you're trying to do. I used to sanitize a food storage container with starsan just like you would any other vessel or container and then fill it with boiled water. Freeze that and then dump it in to your wort. It worked great for me...
 
BrewKnurd said:
There's a HUGE difference between "some left over" and "dropping a gallon of frozen sanitizer" into my wort.

I once drank a shot of diulted starsan. It has a mild citrusy flavor. I guarantee you would not detect the leftover foam, or a few ounces of starsan solution at the bottom of a carboy, in a 5 gallon batch of beer, unless you have some phenomenal sensitivity to the flavor of starsan.

I honestly think that in most beers, even a gallon would be hard to detect, but there's certainly no promises there.

The is only 6ml in the 1 frozen gallon. I am afraid if i boil the water and then try to poor it into a plastic container it will melt the container. That is the only reason i ruled that out. I am making a citrus beer so i don't think i would b able to taste it
 
The is only 6ml in the 1 frozen gallon. I am afraid if i boil the water and then try to poor it into a plastic container it will melt the container. That is the only reason i ruled that out. I am making a citrus beer so i don't think i would b able to taste it

Just let the water cool first. Just like chilling wort, you can put it in an ice bath if you want. I would just put the lid on the kettle and let the water chill over night when I did it.
 
grssmnperez said:
The is only 6ml in the 1 frozen gallon. I am afraid if i boil the water and then try to poor it into a plastic container it will melt the container. That is the only reason i ruled that out. I am making a citrus beer so i don't think i would b able to taste it

Right, but that's the normal dilution rate, so you'll have 1 gallon of normal starsan solution... Or am I misunderstanding?

And yes, i agree, do not pour a large amount of boiling water into plastic. :p
 
Another simple option is to purchase ice from the store, such as Home City ice, that has been shipped in. It is made from sterile water to begin with and is usually kept frozen below -4F, which is a low enough temperature to kill almost all bacteria anyway. As long as you make sure the bag is puncture free when you buy it, there shouldn't be any issue.
 
Just boil water, let it cool some, maybe put the pot in the sink and run cool water around it. Then when it is under 190 or so, what ever the melting temperature of your freezing vessel, fill and freeze.

This will be sterile, if you sanitize the container, and much easier and cheaper.

Many threads on this have been posted.
 
Stauffbier said:
Just let the water cool first. Just like chilling wort, you can put it in an ice bath if you want. I would just put the lid on the kettle and let the water chill over night when I did it.

+1. If you do it a few days in advance you'll have plenty of time to cool it off before freezing it. The starsan probably won't hurt but why risk it if you can do a better way with only a little more time commitment?
 
and is usually kept frozen below -4F, which is a low enough temperature to kill almost all bacteria anyway.

Sorry, not true. You don't kill off bacteria (well, some will die but not all) by freezing. They just go dormant, for the most part. Just like you can't kill bacteria on meat (or other foods) by freezing. (I'm not talking about liquid nitrogen cold or absolute zero ;) , just normal deep freezer cold).

Bottom line is: don't fool yourself into thinking you can sterilize water by freezing it.
 
May be a stupid question on my part but wouldn't this gallon of water change your target gravity or are you calculating this extra gallon in your #s. I have single a tier and use an immersion chiller to cool my wort. Interested in knowing other methods of cooling people use, just haven't heard of this one.
 
May be a stupid question on my part but wouldn't this gallon of water change your target gravity or are you calculating this extra gallon in your #s. I have single a tier and use an immersion chiller to cool my wort. Interested in knowing other methods of cooling people use, just haven't heard of this one.

My guess is that the OP is brewing extract and using the ice for chilling and as top-off water. ;)
 
Sorry, not true. You don't kill off bacteria (well, some will die but not all) by freezing. They just go dormant, for the most part. Just like you can't kill bacteria on meat (or other foods) by freezing. (I'm not talking about liquid nitrogen cold or absolute zero ;) , just normal deep freezer cold).

Bottom line is: don't fool yourself into thinking you can sterilize water by freezing it.

I'm not sure how well this translates to brewing, but I used to work in the meat department of a supermarket that made fresh sushi in the store. We had to keep the fish in a freezer that stayed lower than -4F because that was the lowest that infectious bacteria have been known to survive at. I'm not sure about wild yeast spores or some of the bacteria that can hurt your beer, but I'm willing to bet that if you brewed a beer using things only sanitized by freezing below -4F for a day or more that it would work out for you.

Most people's home freezers don't go that low, however, so it kind of is a moot point in that regard.
 
I'm not sure how well this translates to brewing, but I used to work in the meat department of a supermarket that made fresh sushi in the store. We had to keep the fish in a freezer that stayed lower than -4F because that was the lowest that infectious bacteria have been known to survive at. I'm not sure about wild yeast spores or some of the bacteria that can hurt your beer, but I'm willing to bet that if you brewed a beer using things only sanitized by freezing below -4F for a day or more that it would work out for you.

How long did they keep that fish hanging around? My guess is it was consumed rather quickly. With beer we're talking about liquid that might be sitting around as long as a month in the fermenter and possibly longer in a bottle or keg. That gives one or two bacteria plenty of time for multiplying into a large enough quantity to cause problems vs. a small amount in food that when consumed likely isn't enough to make a person sick..
 
How long did they keep that fish hanging around? My guess is it was consumed rather quickly. With beer we're talking about liquid that might be sitting around as long as a month in the fermenter and possibly longer in a bottle or keg. That gives one or two bacteria plenty of time for multiplying into a large enough quantity to cause problems vs. a small amount in food that when consumed likely isn't enough to make a person sick..

Very excellent point. Like I said, wasn't sure how well it translated into brewing :)
 
It's all semantics. In reality it's pretty hard to infect your beer. That's not to say we shouldn't practice good sanitation all of the time, just in case. It's just saying that we could likely slack a little in our process and suffer none the worse for it. This even inspires me to buy a decent food grade bucket, and make a batch of beer without ever sanitizing the bucket. Or the bottles for that matter. Just to see what happens. Maybe a small, one gallon batch. Just for the sake of science and experimentation!

**Disclaimer** I do not recommend anyone tries this at home!
 
We had to keep the fish in a freezer that stayed lower than -4F because that was the lowest that infectious bacteria have been known to survive at.

Sorry, that's just not true. I'll bet you if you freeze some meat to that temp and then take it out and put it in a sealed sterilized container you'll see just how much bacteria will have survived.

And -4 F is not that extremely cold for a freezer. That's pretty standard for your average household freezer, and a freezer-only unit will even go quite a bit lower.

Believe what you will, no big deal. But do some more research on it and you'll see what I'm talking about.
 
I think the issue is that at those temperatures the bacteria can't propagate or produce spoilage compounds, not that they die. So at that temp the bugs are dormant and don't ruin the fish, but they don't die. But then the bacteria are killed when you cook the fish.
 
Back
Top