Primitive/Improvised Methods Beer

[November]

Apparently, this project is the equivalent of a rain dance. Poured last night and early this morning so firewood is soaked. Delayed another week or two.

 

[November]

The sun came out and dried up the landy landy. Getting the fire started now. I will post pictures and updates as I go.

 

[November]

Got a fire going and I am boiling the water for the mash. I set the bricks on the pre heat but I will move them into the fire once I get the mash started. I decided to use an old wrecked grill I found rather than the fire pit. Should keep the wind out a bit easier.

 

[Psylocide]

Wow, good luck! Interested in how this turns out.

 

[November]

Mash in! Temperature felt low, guessing here, so I left it on the fire for another couple minutes. Now it's resting.

The fire is roaring so I just set the bricks on top. They Have like two hours to heat up.

Now I built a lauter tun.

And lined it with my filter medium, buffalo grass.

 

[November]

Lautering. It came out suprisingly clear. The grass worked like a charm.

Then came the boil. I heated 8 bricks on the grill. I added 2 and it brought it to almost boiling.

I added a third and it boiled.

From there on I just took out the oldest one and added a fresh one. The old one went on the grill to reheat. I was able to keep a ferocious boil this way. I even had a boilover! Yes, I even managed to take a picture of the boilover.

I'm not cooling it, so I put it in a water can and I will let it sit till tomorrow then I will pitch. Going to go with a packet of muntons since the wild yeast part of this project failed.

I will ferment in the same container. No airlock, I will just open the vent.

 

[1977Brewer]

You're basically putting together an Apocalypse brewing primer for us, which should have it's own subforum anyway since I'm convinced every home brewer has a little doomseday prepper inside.

I might have missed this, but are you using hops at all?

 

[November]

Yes. Forgot to mention hops. I used a palm full of whatever unlabeled hop I found at the bottom of my chest freezer.

Probably tettnanger, goldings, Willamette, or maybe cluster. No idea on amount or IBUs, but that is fitting g with everything else on this project. Going to consult the notes my wife took with measurements to see how close I was.

 

[ArkotRamathorn]

Any taste tests along the way? I love taking big slurps of hot wort on cold brew days.

 

[djt17]

You need to send everyone following this thread a bottle when finished!

 

[Rockn_M]

You need to send everyone following this thread a bottle when finished!

Yes, I like that idea!

This is really interesting.

 

[Fedora]

This is very cool stuff , November. Brewed the hard way, huh? Hats off to you, sir. I'll be watching for updates.

 

[November]

Ok. So as promised, I had my wife take measurements and just not tell me until I finished. I did this because I didn't want to make adjustments during the process to compensate for mess ups.

Take away? I'm good at temps, terrible at weights and volumes.

I nailed all of the drying temps within a degree or two. My method was to keep a shot glass of water in with the grain and periodically stick my thumb in it. 120 seemed pretty natural to me, like bathwater that is just barely too warm.

My use of quarts to weight was right for premalted grain but way off for sprouted grain so what I thought was 8 or 9 pounds ended up being like under 6.

Mash temp wasn't bad, I thought I was low and I was right. It was 142 when I mashed in and put it back in the fire and 150 when I took it off.

Final volume is about 2.5 gallons. Gravity is 1.038. I mashed in with all the water and did no sparge. 1/3 of the malt was homemade crystal and the rest was kilned about as dark as light Munich.

 

[November]

Any taste tests along the way? I love taking big slurps of hot wort on cold brew days.

Just tried a sample I pulled and cooled.

Tastes like warm wort. That's not real descriptive but I guess I mean it tastes like normal prefermentation beer. Not very bitter right now. I might have gotten low hops utilization or my hops may be old or maybe it will come out more as at ferments.

It smelled amazing while boiling though. Like lots of crystal and Munich.

I have heaps of white hot coals. Anyone have a javelina or goat I can borrow?

 

[November]

You need to send everyone following this thread a bottle when finished!

You guys want to try beer filtered through grass and cooked with bricks?

We might be able to put something together when it finishes.

Still I wish I could have gotten the yeast project to work, but there is always next time.

 

[1977Brewer]

You guys want to try beer filtered through grass and cooked with bricks?

You've been around way longer than me, but even I know this question answers itself.

 

[thekraken]

So you got it boiling and kept it boiling with bricks alone? You didn't have a fire under your kettle?

And to your question: yes, I would definitely try this beer if you can confirm there were never any crocs in the vicinity. Good job.

 

[November]

So you got it boiling and kept it boiling with bricks alone? You didn't have a fire under your kettle?

And to your question: yes, I would definitely try this beer if you can confirm there were never any crocs in the vicinity. Good job.

Ha! I read that story. Nope, no crocs in the area.

Yes, it was probably like 120 or so after I let the mash drain then I got it to a boil and kept it boiling by just cycling out the bricks. I was losing heat faster than the bricks could recover by the end but not by much. With ten bricks I probably could have boiled indefinitely, or at least until the fire died.

I probably could have heated the bricks quicker if I stuck them right in the fire but this way I didn't get ash in the beer.

Putting the pot right in the fire would have worked but I didn't want a lot of mesquite smoke flavor.

 

[thekraken]

Yeah, I'm guessing ash flavor wouldn't be very tasty.

I spy chimney starters in one of your photos. Next time you could put one of those rockets under the pot! I'm thinking two chimneys, one after the other, plus the hot bricks would get you through the boil and leave you enough room on that grill for some brats. Less brick cycling work at least.

By putting the kettle over the fire I wonder how much smoke flavor that would impart. The bricks that were directly in the smoke were getting cycled in and out of the wort it self, I wonder if that in of it self would actually transfer even more smoke flavor.

 

[November]

Yeah, I'm guessing ash flavor wouldn't be very tasty.

I spy chimney starters in one of your photos. Next time you could put one of those rockets under the pot! I'm thinking two chimneys, one after the other, plus the hot bricks would get you through the boil and leave you enough room on that grill for some brats. Less brick cycling work at least.

By putting the kettle over the fire I wonder how much smoke flavor that would impart. The bricks that were directly in the smoke were getting cycled in and out of the wort it self, I wonder if that in of it self would actually transfer even more smoke flavor.

Good point it might have gotten smoke from the bricks.

I used the chimneys as hobo stoves to cook the crystal malt and it worked like a charm. I'm sure you could boil a few gallons on two, they put out a lot of heat.

I am already thinking about version 2 and I think I might build a large brick rocket stove, large enough to fit the bricks in the stove itself and still put a pot on top. That and I want to get the wild yeast to work.

This whole thing was a lot of fun so I might go a bit crazier on the next one. If any one has some off the wall ideas let me know.

 

[November]

It's alive.

 

[ArkotRamathorn]

It's alive.

It looks more evil than regular beer.

It's PRIMITIVE BEER

 

[helibrewer]

I wish I had your experimental motivation, excellent work, this is really what it's all about I think.....imagine all the failures back in that "Pre-Homebrewtalk Era".

 

[Bambooshoot]

A thought on your yeast conundrum.

For millennia, the way people got yeast for their next batch was to reuse from an old batch. I think it would NOT be cheating to either (a) save some yeast from your next batch made with commercial yeast, or (b) pitch your primitive beer on top of the yeast cake from your next batch made with commercial yeast, or (c) use the dregs from a bottle of commercial unfiltered/unpasteurized beer to build up a starter. All three of these methods were probably used by beermakers for centuries or more, before the days when you could buy clean commercial yeast.

The Mad Fermentationist has a great resource on harvesting commercial dregs.

 

[thekraken]

A thought on your yeast conundrum.

For millennia, the way people got yeast for their next batch was to reuse from an old batch. I think it would NOT be cheating to either (a) save some yeast from your next batch made with commercial yeast, or (b) pitch your primitive beer on top of the yeast cake from your next batch made with commercial yeast, or (c) use the dregs from a bottle of commercial unfiltered/unpasteurized beer to build up a starter. All three of these methods were probably used by beermakers for centuries or more, before the days when you could buy clean commercial yeast.

The Mad Fermentationist has a great resource on harvesting commercial dregs.

I vote for option starting out with option C, then reusing that yeast from then on making it a house yeast. "Foraging" for yeast in bottle dregs seems to me like it's pretty much in the spirit of what your doing.

Heck, to make it more of a surprise you could build up dregs from several different beers at once and just see what you wind up with.

 

[November]

I regularly use the first two methods so they are pretty normal sounding to me. I like the third option though especially if I used multiple dregs from different beers. Kind of a Russian roulette with yeast. Might give it a try in version 2.

 

[speeddemon190]

totally awesome....yes send me a bottle

 

[Culinarytracker]

...With ten bricks I probably could have boiled indefinitely, or at least until the fire died.

I probably could have heated the bricks quicker if I stuck them right in the fire but this way I didn't get ash in the beer.

I've done quite a bit of cooking like this with the "rock boiling" method.
The way I've always dealt with the ash is to have two containers handy. One with whatever I am cooking (usually some kind of stew or tea), and another one with rinse water.

When the (10-15) rocks are nearly glowing hot in the fire, I take them out with long tongs, quickly drag them through the rinse water to clean off the ash etc... then drop them in the cooking pot.

I'll keep 2-5 baseballish size rocks going, and when one stops looking like it's boiling the crap out of the liquid, then it goes back into the fire, and another one gets rinsed and added.

After a boil is going, I have found that a couple baseball sized rocks can boil a gallon or two of water for quite a while. Maybe 10 minutes.

Glowing hot rocks might cause quite a bit of caramelization (scorching?) of the wort, just something to consider.

 

[tsl346]

One way to get more exact with your strike water is to use boiling water and ice water. Having an exact temperature of your water will help. 1 part ice water (32 degrees) to 2.5 parts boiling water (212 degrees) will give you strike water of 161.

 

[November]

Interesting note on the ice water. I purposefully avoided all use of ice in this project, but might be of use to someone that suddenly finds themselves without a thermometer.