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It depends on which specs you look at. Different versions of specs exist for the same yeast, which muddies the waters considerably. What I have here specified 15-30C (18-24 recommended) for Mauri 1433, 18-30 for M20 and 18-15 for M21. But MJ especially have issued wildly varying specs for their...

I'll see if I can find them. Incidentally, my sister is a historian and archeologist, and she has quite a bit of material on the subject as well.

True. Which is why the common perception that "hops cause estrogen effects" is also far too undifferentiated. Being an expatriate Dutchman myself, I can tell you that the English and the Dutch didn't get along too well in those days, and that the Dutch diet of the time was also high in fat and...

I'd like to add a few footnotes on the perceived problems with phytoestrogens in hops. Which, in short, are generally grossly over-estimated. Research in this field continues, but a few key points have clearly emerged in recent years. Our diet includes many natural sources of phytoestrogen...

Not sure. I can't get it here, so I'm looking at Sage for that purpose. Shame... Myrrh combined with Frankincense would make for a good Xmas beer! :D South Africa (where I live) is a former Commonwealth country so to all intents and purposes we use Church Of England measurements. But to me a...

I'm in South Africa were I can't get all that. So I'm focusing on what I have (which should be more than enough to get me started towards a good gruit beer) an take it from there.

Good point! All herbs were dried All herbs were well within their "use by" date (at least 10 months before expiry date) All herbs were obtained from the same supplier in South Africa, who imports from Germany (i.e. the herbs would have been sourced from their countries of origin and then...

OK, so there's so much reading on gruit herbs that I haven't even managed to get through most of it (work has been challenging these past few weeks) and therefore I decided to just have a basic tasting. You've got to start somewhere. :) So I steeped 1 teaspoon of several herbs in a cup of...

I agree with your assessment that it's most likely Mauri brew 496. Diamond Lager is less likely, on the basis of the fact that the latter is specified as a Pastorianus strain.. But then, MJ is known for having their specs wrong, and performance reports from the field suggest that it could be...

Excellent advise. However, I missed it last night, so I beat you to it. Yes, I agree, this was a bad idea. I will have to give my taste buds some time to recover before I continue further experiments. I now believe I know the meaning of "bitter". I thought I did when I tasted some hop pellets...

An excellent suggestion! Going to chew the cud tonight. :)

Which I just found with the aid of Google (having looked around HBT before I posted the above but failed to find it - duh.) Thanks for mentioning that; I'm going to read up on it right now!

I'm about to plunge myself headlong into the dark, mysterious world of brewing some ancient gruit ales. It's been nice knowing y'all. :-) Of course jumping in and finding out is a good way to learn, and I will definitely do that, but while I'm still looking at ingredients and recipes, I'd like...

Responses. Plural. Not just yours. :)

Steeping. And my crush is fine; I use the same crush for mashing and then there's no problem. But as I said, that's another matter. Based on the responses here I'm going to give it a go with 500 grams of roasted barley in 6 litres of water and see what happens!

Been there, read that. :) But, as I said, those (eminently sensible) guidelines are based on a more average malt bill than 100% roasted barley. Hence my question. I've experimented with that. I find that even a low gravity wort tends to ruin my already so-so extraction efficiency. However, for...

The water is fairly hard, but I'm hoping that the dark malts will work well with that. The pH of the steep is not my main concern; I'm just wondering if I'm not being overly ambitious with my water to grist ratio.

There are various guidelines on how much water to use when steeping grains (seeing as too much water promotes tannin extraction), but these are usually based on an average grain bill. But what when you only steep very dark (and therefore more acidic) grains? I'm planning a stout (extract +...

Highly interesting reading. Thank you!! So that's esters being reduced during a lengthy conditioning phase, possibly (although, as I understand it, this is still somewhat tentative) as a function of yeast autolysis. Is there a similar effect that applies to volatile phenols? I have noticed a...

Good. Constructive disagreement leads to further understanding, so disagree away! :) M36 was changed from M72 Burton Union at the same time MJ changed several other yeasts; a change that just happened to coincide exactly with Lallemand's revamping of their product range. Until Suregork runs...