homebrewandbeer.com

Now this may seem stupid, but its a serious question, anyway here goes....

I am talking AG brews here...
Whenever I drink my Kolsch, which tastes just divine, I end up with a very dry mouth the next morning, even if I only have say 6 stubbies.

If I drink my light Ale, its nowhere near as bad, and neither is DrS's Golden Ale.

What would be the major things in brewing which would give you a dry mouth next morning ? (other than you drank bucketloads of the stuff).

I want to know so i can avoid it, nothing worse than the old cocky's cage mouth

Cheers,
Chris (a huge fan of brewing and GT Falcons, hence the new avatar)

How do the Alc% of the brews stack up?

Grog

I have noticed the same dry mouth in the morning, normally it's just a beer volume issue, but I've noticed it is increased with my hoppier beers (so far only K&B).

Grog wrote:nothing worse than the old cocky's cage mouth

Still rather the cocky cage mouth, as opposed to the thumper headache.

Grog wrote:Chris (a huge fan of brewing and GT Falcons, hence the new avatar)

(resisted urge to insert Holden comment here)

Planner

Earle,
Kolsch is about 4.7 %
Light Ale is about 3.4 %
DrS's Ale about 4.7% as well I think.
Nothing too big there I dont think...

Planner,
Yes agree, rather dryness than headache...
No problems with Holden comments mate, like em all (Muscle cars), but love GT's, thats my second hobby.
http://www.smartfill.com.au/xa

I do remove all trub etc before fermenter, and its the same filtered or not.

BUT - it wont stop me drinking the stuff

I am experimenting with mash temps to see if changing that makes a difference.
Last Light Ale brew at 69 deg c, 60 mins, will see what happens.

Wild Plum = AWESOME!
Drool icon here. [ ]
Cheers

Ethanol is the cause of mouth dryness which is quite simply, dehydration.

Ethanol is a diuretic.

Beers that a very bitter may linger the next day but that is more mouth puckering from bitterness than dehydration.

Hi Doc,

any methods to reduce Ethanol or not that simple ?

(BTW Laser is back up and running, will get something sorted shortly)

Ethanol is the alcohol in alcoholic beverages, i.e. not the bad stuff you might be thinking about such as methanol and fusals.

Easy way to reduce it is to reduce your alc%. Or just drink water

Brew something lower in alc. Getting rid of it once its in the beer is not easy, possible but the effort involved far outweighs any benefit. Simplest method is to not put it in there in the first place.

I have a 2.9% hoppy amber ale on tap at the moment. Great for mate who want to drive or if i want to have a few beers and then drive myself.

drsmurto wrote:
I have a 2.9% hoppy amber ale on tap at the moment. .

Have thought about this just recently but not done any research on it (low Alc Mash brews).
Is it just a simple reduction in the amount of grist or do you need to add some unmalted grain to retain a bit of body?

Mick.

Much less malt so you need to mash at a higher temp (69-70C) to produce more unfermentable dextrins.

I use a lot more munich malt in low alc beers as its a 'beefier' malt.

I believe its a well balanced light beer that doesn't feel like the watery light commercial beers. Other brewers who have tasted it agree and I had enough requests for the recipe that i listed it on AHB - Link

I also used a low attenuating english yeast (Windsor). I normally use Wyeast 1187 (Ringwood) in low abv beers but Windsor produced a similar result.

Think Little Creatures Rogers but lower in alc, a bit more body and a touch more hop aroma.

To get lower alcohol, you either reduce your grain bill for a given quantity of beer, or plan to mess up your mashing and destroy your efficiency.

The first option is definitely the better one!

The other thing with lower alcohol beers is that generally you mash at a higher temperature than you would for a standard beer. That means mashing in the region of 68 to 70ºC. I don't use unmalted grains in my low/mid alcohol brews.

One of my favourite house beers is a Mild. Here's the recipe from my last one. It's delicious drinking, with plenty of flavour, nice deep colour, and normal body. If you didn't know it, you'd never guess it's only about 3.4% ABV. I amazed our last house guest with it. One comment was how I got that much flavour in a mid range beer, when most if not all the commercial offerings tasted like nothing. I didn't go into specifics, just told him it's all down to the skill of the brewer!

MILD
Batch Size: 22.50 L
OG: 1.037 SG
FG: 1.011
Estimated IBU: 26.1 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 80.00 %
Mash 60 min at 70ºC
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

3000.00 gm Pale Malt (2 Row) UK (5.9 EBC) Grain 83.33 %
250.00 gm Crystal Medium (145.0 EBC) Grain 6.94 %
200.00 gm Crystal Malt - 60L (Thomas Fawcett) (118.2Grain 5.56 %
100.00 gm Wheat Malt, Dark (Weyermann) (13.8 EBC) Grain 2.78 %
50.00 gm Carafa Special T2 (1150.0 EBC) Grain 1.39 %
23.00 gm First Gold '06 [7.90 %] (60 min) Hops 20.6 IBU
6.00 gm EKGoldings [4.80 %] (60 min) Hops 3.3 IBU
14.00 gm EK Goldings Plug [4.30 %] (10 min) Hops 2.3 IBU
1 Pkgs London ESB Ale (Wyeast Labs #1968) Starter

Thanks for the info Lads,

Yes, I started my last light brew mash temp on monday at 69 deg, so it should work out ok.

thanks for the recipes lads, i'm going to make both of them next 2 brews, i prefer a light beer, then you can sort of 'get on it' on a friday night without stuffing the sarurday...

cheers,
Chris

warra48 wrote:Here's the recipe from my last one. It's delicious drinking, with plenty of flavour, nice deep colour, and normal body. If you didn't know it, you'd never guess it's only about 3.4% ABV.

Thanks Warra. I've been looking at brewing another KnB light, but now might give your recipe a go, scaled down. I've got most things in stock except for first gold (I'll bitter with something else) and Carafa (which I can get next week).
The advantage of lower OG, means I can do a concentrated boil with my small biab setup and then dilute to get a reasonable batch volume in the fermenter. At present I'm limited to about a 2.5 - 2.7kg grain bill (should result in about 15-17l).