Recent content by lonelynoose

Degassing? Hmmm. I read a study a couple of months back that showed they reached optimum fermentation by keeping the must on a stirplate for the first week and cutting it right before fermentation stopped. The assumption was the stirplate kept the yeast continually suspended and provided more...

Thanks for the tips all. My friend is going to use 120 after all. He's going to steep it and add it after it cools.

IMO, I feel refined sugar is not ideal because it has been ripped of all it's vitamins and minerals. The same can be applied to a lot of these fruit juices my friend uses. Whether we like it or not, using malted grain (and other natural ingredients such as honey and hops) provides us with some...

I suggested crystal malt for for the caramel type flavor. Are you suggesting he should just use caramel candy like he wanted before? No matter what this kid is hell bent on adding caramel flavor.

My friend here at work who makes wine by buying frozen fruit juice and adding in pounds of sugar wants to do an apple 'wine' with caramel. First I told him that adding sugar to juice to make wine is less than ideal then I told him dissolving caramel might work but for flavor using some Crystal...

Thanks for all the feedback! As for my sources, most of the stuff supporting Mash Outs has been from books and 'how to' web articles. All advice to skip it has come from multiple homebrewers. If there truly is a 10% increase in efficiency I'm certainly going to try it. Thanks again for all...

Ok... so do you really need to do a Mash Out??? Everything I read tells me something different.

THIS. I get it for 11$-12$ here in MD for 5lbs. I hate when honey is super clear but I just deal with it. Saving up for a 60lb pail from dutch gold, like the idea of their wildflower honey from Brazil.