GNBrews
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Mar 24, 2007
- Messages
- 674
- Reaction score
- 23
At work and boredom has struck. Been thinking about vacuums and how they can boil and freeze a liquid. What if you could boil with a vacuum, chill with a vacuum, then pitch and ferment under pressure?
Neat idea...but. When you boil wort, you're not just boiling for boiling's sake, the temperature is an important part of the equation. In fact, the reason that recipes often have "high altitude" directions, is because of the lower air pressure found at high altitude. As a consequence, food does not cook as quickly because the temperature at which water boils is lower (~1°F for every 550ft above sea level).
A good example of this is trying to brew in a place like Denver, CO where water boils ~202F. As a result, hop utilization is about 20% lower.