Recent content by Craiginthecorn

No. It is a hybrid of Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Saccharomyces eubayanus developed by Fermentis. Saccharomyces pastorianus (standard lager yeast) is also a hybrid of these two, but Novalager contains a greater percentage of cerevisiae.

I've tried several methods over the years, starting in the dark ages of the 1980s. In the last decade, I've brewed on the Grainfather G30 and G40 and Picobrew Z. Last year, I bought a 10L Braumeister V2. It seems crude in many ways. The controller is comparatively primitive. There's no built-in...

Just a guess about this ancient thread. The OP, edubrueurope, was using a refractometer and failing to adjust for the presence of alcohol.

In my case, no. I use a top plate and am making batches that are too small for liquid levels to reach anywhere near the handle holes.

I just did a little half-@ssed experiment. I’m brewing a 1.057 OG beer that called for Irish Ale Yeast. I had a pack…18 months old and a full year past its Use By date. I made a 500ml 1.013 starter and added 1.25g of FermFed. I then made a second identical starter, but 2x the volume, decanted...

I've had the G40 since it was first released. My one frustration has been that when used as designed, my wort is filled with bits of grain. As a result, I started putting a BrewBag around the grain basket, which collected all those bits of grain. While that worked fine, it still frustrated me...

It's always a great idea to clean your pipe using a pipe cleaner immediately after smoking, while the pipe is still moist inside. This is just the mouthpiece and shank, however. As for cake, with a new pipe, especially with the rare pipe without a factory- or artisan-applied carbon bowl coating...

There aren't any. McClelland had one that was OKish. Generally speaking, the crossovers don't work. The Stillwell pipe tobacco cigars aren't great, overpriced, and don't taste like pipe tobacco. Pipe tobacco blends with cigar leaf tend to be best when the cigar leaf is condimental, rather than...

A bit of nit-picking on my part, but McClelland closed up shop. They were still a successful business, but could no longer source high-sugar red Virginia tobaccos that met their unique requirements. Plus, the guy who made all of their tobacco, Mike McNeil, was ready to call it a day after years...

Are you thinking of The Pipe or The Smoke? https://pipedia.org/wiki/Super-Temp

The primary goal for Lallemand in developing this yeast was the ability to reduce fermenter and tank residency time, while producing a clean lager flavor. Lagers have traditionally needed to rest in cold storage for many weeks to allow off flavors to be corrected and also to allow time for...

I have an experimental 2.5G batch of Pilsner fermenting with Novalager right now. I was quite pleased with it in my AvgBrü West Coast Pils, but the high attenuation and hop expression were positive attributes for that beer. I'm interested to see how a highly-attenuative lager yeast will affect...

Regarding the reports of fruitiness, the West Coast Pils style guidelines for this AvgBrü stipulated a fair amount of fruity American hops. Nearly everyone who did a split batch of Novalager and Diamond/34-70 reported much greater hop expression in the Novalager batch. That was my experience as...

With the passage of time, I'm wondering about real world homebrew experience with this method, particularly from brewers who have used it a number of times. My personal experience is limited to a single batch using a then new Bootleg Biology beta yeast hinted as being the Blauges strain...

I used a tiny amount to dry hop an ordinary bitter that was ... ordinary. Blech! Tastes like earth. Don't use Northdown to dry hop.