Non-Alcoholic brew?

[anemic]

jumbo,

I agree with your last sentence. I plan to re-hop at "5 minutes" or "2 minutes" (very tough to time that the first attempt) &/or flameout. I plan to add one pellet each time. I'm going to watch the boil closely so I can witness the temp rise. I plan to repitch with champagne yeast because that is what is recommended for a 100% NA root beer recipe I have for the kids. I have an American Wheat that smells like it could be make an interesting NA beer. My intent is to achieve some of the "interesting, fresh, microbrew/homebrew" flavors we all enjoy and make a big step up on the commercial NA offerings. Should be miles ahead based on freshness alone.

 

[anemic]

I boiled down 1.5 gallons out a full batch of American Wheat, and it started boiling before it hit 170 and topped out at 202; the temp would not rise higher than that so I called it NA at that point. I added about 2 saaz pellets preboil, and again at flameout. Primed with just under 2 oz of table sugar, and madly over re-yeasted it with half a pack of champagne yeast. I think I will go for about 1/2 tsp / gallon next time on the yeast for this. It smells good. I think this has better promise than the alcoholic version which will surprise me if I like it. I have not enjoyed it's aroma yet. Look forward to trying both.

 

[BierMuncher]

FWIW, I pulled out an 18 month old bomber of this experiment and it tasted fan-freaking-tastic.

Even after 22 ounces, I was so unphased I took a 90 ride on the motorcycle.

No question that returning fermented beer to above 172 degrees for 40+ minutes will boil off the alcohol. I remember the distinct smell of the ethanol in my brewshop during the process.

I'm tempted to repeat the experiment on a light cream-style-ale and perhaps reintroduced some hop tea for complexity.

So...I applaud anemic for actually breaking out the equipment and putting the theory to test. For the rest of you who are pulling extracts out of college text books....brew some beer....fire up the kettle...and take notes along the way. Then we'll listen.

 

[anemic]

Last night we had pizza & I quick chilled the American Wheat, and I'd had it's NA twin in the fridge for a couple days. Good news! SWMBO felt the NA beer MAY have had a touch of detectable alcohol, however, not much at all. She gave the flavor a smile and a thumbs up, saying, "Now THAT's the kind of beer that I like." (somewhat of a challenging customer). She enjoyed the full glass and reported being 100% sober.

I only did a small sip test. It had very little aroma. The thing that I dislike about commercial NA's is some nutty background flavor. This doesn't have that. It did not seem to be green, it carbed up nicely. It is what I was hoping for, so I am going to brew up a 3 gallon size (3.75 gallons of water, which should be 3 gallons in primary) of the same recipe and NA all of this next one.

The full octane twin was quite similar in many regards! More aroma, a little more flavor, but again, like a more flavorful lager. A very clean ale. I enjoy more complexities personally, but for the intended purpose, this turned out exactly as planned.

 

[BierMuncher]

...She enjoyed the full glass and reported being 100% sober.
...

Excellent.

I need to brew up another NA here pretty soon.

 

[justflow1983]

I made an interesting discovery about two weeks ago. Had a poker night but was meeting a big client in the morning and couldn't drink... but I can't play poker without beer . So I got 3 bottles of Erdinger Alkohol-Frei and it was actually fairly good. Definitely more of a soft drink than a beer, but a genuinely enjoyable beverage that I liked better than the regular Erdinger.

I know its off topic but I just thought I'd post on a decent NA commercial beer. I may try a NA homebrew one of these days... sometimes I want a beer but don't want the booze.

 

[anemic]

I have now brewed the NA several times. I liked it best when I "dry hopped" it by slipping a few hop nuggets into the re-boil right after flameout. Adds a layer of complexity.

Also, if you can tolerate some alcohol, I brewed a Scottish 60 shilling ale. Results:
+ flaw free, pure good beer flavors without any off flavors
+ neat color, red & brown
+ pleasing nose
+ the 031 OG resulted in a level of alcohol that is nearly imperceptible. This level is nearly the same as 3.2 % beer which I used to dislike as an impostor. For me, this version is nice.
- the flavor is bland! I sure hope that it complexes up a good deal as it ages or I will have to share it a lot. Actually it looks like a yummy microbrew while it tastes rather similar to a millerbudcoors! Or, it has a lack of perceptible flavors as per the flagship pils's.

* I plan to to add a # more LME + more hops and shoot for a 70 shilling in hopes of some stronger flavors. But it's certainly not far from what I was after.

 

[mordantly]

Even after 22 ounces, I was so unphased I took a 90 ride on the motorcycle.

No question that returning fermented beer to above 172 degrees for 40+ minutes will boil off the alcohol. I remember the distinct smell of the ethanol in my brewshop during the process.

I'm tempted to repeat the experiment on a light cream-style-ale and perhaps reintroduced some hop tea for complexity.

so how did it taste? ive pondered if one could take a 8.5% belgian abbey and make it na or very close to it (say under 2% abv). so one could take a bottle to work for lunch and not crash a $500k milling machine. byo had a article that stated it would taste weird after driving the alhohol out.

 

[Doog_Si_Reeb]

This is intriguing. I have been thinking about an NA beer for mid-day or other times when I would like to have a beer without the buzz. It sounds like most people go with lighter low-hopped beers. Any reason for this? I understand that a lot of the hoppy goodness disappears with the boil, but it sounds like that could be replaced during the boil off stage.

Is a palatable NA stout achievable? How about an American Pale Ale? I'm curious because I may try this in the future.

 

[anemic]

Doog Reeb,

I would recommend the APA over the Stout. My reason is that you could & should rehop NA at the reboil, and this is more in keeping with an APA than a stout, which tend to be balanced or even sweeter. Err slightly on the side of more hops than you think you may need at the flameout or a moment after, and don't hesitate to experiment on half of your next batch. This makes it fun because you get to compare side by side!

So on the day you are ready to bottle your APA, take half of it and boil it for NA, bottle the other half as your standard APA / control batch. I probably should re-yeast my NA's with the same yeast (eg WB-06) however I always re-yeast with Champagne dry yeast. For a half batch, use a half a dry pack. It does not affect the flavor of the beer. In fact I have had such success that I cannot tell the NA from the standard beer the times I have split the batch. (my NA's have all been a basic American wheat beer

Caveat: this method is somewhat labor/time intensive it can feel like turning the labor for one batch of beer into three times the effort.

 

[mordantly]

so it seems best to take some of a batch and attempt. got it. but if one were going to do a 5 gal of it, hold off on all but bittering hops till the alchy is boiled out?


i just found some reading that said .05%abv is attainable by taking the unfermented wort ot 32F and use a high pitching rate. "high" to me would seem like a 10 gal lagers worth in 5 gals. im going to make 1 qt of beer with light dme (1.050), and use a 1 qt starter of 1187 ringwood to see how much abv is produced.

 

[Doog_Si_Reeb]

anemic,

Thanks for the info, I am going to have to try this on a batch pretty soon. I like the idea of splitting it to do a side-by-side comparison.