Bullion & digital thermometer fell into kettle...

So I was helping a friend brew up a pumpkin ale yesterday (Yuri's Thunderstruck!). The kettle was bubbling away on the stove top, and she reached up above the stove to grab some spices out of the cabinet. CRASH -- all of a sudden she's screaming and I see a canister of chicken bullion cubes bobbing around in the boil wort!

I scream too and grab the top of the little plastic jar as it bobs up, narrowly avoiding burning my fingers. All I can think about is "I wonder how chicken-flavored pumpkin ale tastes?"

We check the plastic jar, and it actually doesn't look like any liquid got inside it. All the little bullion cubes were dry. WHEW. (However, a small part of me wanted to try the chicken-pumpkin experiment...)

Thinking we're all in the clear now that disaster has been avoided, I'm joking around and having a good time when I go to move the digital probe thermometer base that's magnetized and affixed to the range hood above the kettle, when PLOP, the damn thing falls into the brew pot!!!

So we begin a second round of screaming and I eventually snatch the thing out of the pot. This is one of those probe thermometers where the probe can survive anything, but the display base has an LCD display like a calculator.

The thing makes sort of a final groan sound, and the display starts rotating through all the colors of the rainbow....

So now, we got 5 gallons of pumpkin ale that MAY BE flavored with chicken bullion and MAY BE contaminated with whatever cancer-causing agents can come out of boiling an LCD display, a circuit board and a AA battery....

So we're gonna RDWHAHB and see how it turns out, but I'm hoping that this burned through all my murphey's luck for the year.

LOL I love how, in my head, you're both screaming with your arms waving when these things are happening.

I would venture to guess that you're fine with the bouillon. However, with the temp probe thing, I can only hope you're fine. Anyone else want to chime in on that one?

If you are interested in the chicken flavored beer...there is an old recipe for Cock Ale; I think it's in the Complete Joy of Homebrewing, 2nd ed.

Have you ever had a Bloody Bull? it is a Bloody Mary with beef bullion in it. very tasty. I imagine a nice stout with some good beef aftertaste could be tasty... i guess that is what i am designing next.

if you had more than 15 minutes left in the boil, you should be fine. any grungies left on the thermo from your fingers would be safe after the boil.

I don't think the thermo was in the wort long enough to 'flavor' it.

B

Casey27 said:

If you are interested in the chicken flavored beer...there is an old recipe for Cock Ale; I think it's in the Complete Joy of Homebrewing, 2nd ed.

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I had a friend who had a cock ale ... however, i must say, there was no chicken involved. :fro:

im sorry fellas, I just couldnt resist.

bad coffee said:

if you had more than 15 minutes left in the boil...

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Yeah this was at about the 15 min mark. I just now have to warn my vegetarian friends that there's a minuscule chance that the beer's not veggie friendly!

I love stories of excitment