NA beer

[bobcostas]

Hey guys

I had a thought the other day. I have a good friend who doesn't drink anymore but still occasionally craves the occasional brew. NA beers are pretty much all crap (for probably good reason) and doesn't like them at all. i know the processes by which the brewery's make NA beer, but how about for a homebrew?

would making a very low gravity beer, adding a wee bit of yeast and essentially going straight to bottle produce total garbage?

just a thought.

...now off to brewing some high test stuff.

~CR

 

[downwardzspiral]

To be honest, I don't know how good something like that would taste. I would assume it would taste like a watered down beer with low abv.

I've thought about this subject in the past, but seeing as how I do consume alcohol, have had little reason to pursue it any further. I would assume though using the same basic principles as distillation, one would theoretically be able to achieve an NA beer.

Since alcohol boils at 172F, while water boils at 212F, it would seem logical that one would be able to slowly heat up your beer after it has fully fermented, at which point it would hold at roughly 172 till all the alcohol boiled off, before once again climbing in in temperature. At this point cool and force carb to be left with an NA beer. My only concern on the matter is I'm unsure how the heat would affect the flavor of the beer.

Likewise it would also seem to make sence to do the exact opposite, much like an eisbock. Freeze the thing and poor off the unfrozen portion (alcohol) while this would most likely not affect the flavor as much, I would be concerned with knowing to to pour off just the alcohol. With sugars and everything else in there lowering the freezing point, I would be uncertain how to do this without poring off the flavors as well.

 

[wailingguitar]

Since alcohol boils at 172F, while water boils at 212F, it would seem logical that one would be able to slowly heat up your beer after it has fully fermented, at which point it would hold at roughly 172 till all the alcohol boiled off, before once again climbing in in temperature. At this point cool and force carb to be left with an NA beer. My only concern on the matter is I'm unsure how the heat would affect the flavor of the beer.

A buddy of mine used to do it this way, I wish I could say I tasted the results but for one reason or another it never happened. The main concern was oxygen uptake. It's true that heat will affect the flavor somewhat, but since we all know that lots of breweries pasteurize beer, the heat isn't going to hurt it as much as the oxidation.

My understanding is that the beer had to be consumed pretty quickly or it would start to show oxidation effects. It might be possible to rig something up to minimize O2 uptake... maybe a carbonating stone submerged in the beer, bubbling up through it as it warmed... something like that.

 

[Dan]

Bob, My input does nothing to help you formulate a recipe. I like good beer and have had good NA beer before, not in the US though but during a tour in Iraq; there was a German (I think) NA beer available, can't remember the name. While drinking it I thought to myself if this stuff was available in the US it would be very popular. Anyway, it tasted like good beer. Not the crap NA beer we find in in the USA.

So it can be done.

 

[AKnewbrews]

Put the beer in a containment vessel that can have a vacuum pulled on it without collapsing. Boil the alcohol off at room temperature by lowering the pressure of the vessel. You have to make sure it is the right pressure or you can also boil off the water. Not sure what pressure alcohol boils at room temperature, but I am sure there is a conversion thingy on the web somewhere.

The main problem, finding a vacuum pump and container in order to pull this off and then......where does the boil-off go? Do you condense it like a distiller using temperature, or have another container with a lower pressure to vent or "pull" the alcohol gas into it?

This method would keep the fermented beer from being subjected to the heat. Whether or not that is an issue is another thing. Question to consider...Does beer have a different chemical reaction with other things dependent on whether alcohol is in solution as opposed to not in solution?

 

[ghank15]

This is interesting. I have a friend who loves beer but can't drink because he has epilepsy and his doctors think drinking can cause seizures. I wanted to make him an NA for his birthday.

I was thinking brew as usual, and before bottling, boil the beer, add yeast and sugar for carbonation, and wait a few weeks. Is this inadvisable?

 

[bobcostas]

good thoughts, guys.

I had considered the vacuum approach. I am a science teacher, so i have access to a vacuum pump. I was also worried about where the alcohol vapors went.

I might give that a shot. worse case scenario, i suppose would be wrecking a session beer kit. i can be out $20 and feel okay about this experiment.

thanks!