Food Lab: Brewing

Confession time: this wasn't really a Food Lab. Mad Kitchen Scientist has been home brewing for more than 30 years and is, truly, expert at it. But I've never brewed beer, and wanted to at least learn what the process is, so this was more like a tutorial or demonstration than an actual lab.

Beer-brewing is conceptually simple:

• Crack the grain 
• Combine with warm water to form the "mash" 
• Cook the mash at a low temperature
• Strain the grain out of the mash water
• Add the "sparge" water to form the "wort"
• Add your other flavoring ingredients (hops, malt)
• Boil the wort
• Chill the wort QUICKLY 
• Strain the wort into your VERY VERY CLEAN fermentation container
• Add the yeast and a little more clean, cool water 
• Let the yeast do its job (aka ferment the beer)
• Bottle the beer

As Mad Kitchen Scientist is fond of reminding us, no known human pathogens can survive the brewing process (as long as you're careful not to introduce them in the fermentation and bottling), so beer is not only, per Ben Franklin, proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy, it's also proof that She doesn't want us to die from drinking bad water, a major concern throughout much of human history. 

In fact, historically, beer tended to feature at every meal, even for children, due to the aforementioned water quality problem. Of course, those beers were not juiced to the high alcohol levels of today's imperial stouts (the beer we brewed this weekend), Belgian IPAs, and Scotch ales (or the even higher levels of speciality beers than can start to approach the proof of distilled spirits). Still, our forefathers - and foremothers - were likely rarely sober as judges. Of course, while alcohol abuse is very serious, it turns out the communities of tipsy apes do better than the communities of sober apes, and beer can be an excellent way to induce that cooperation and sense of bonding. So on to the brewing! For the good of our community of tool-using apes! 

If brewing is conceptually so simple, what's the deal with good versus bad homebrew, and the dizzying variety of beer options available? 

Recipes (and temperature control). And Mad Kitchen Scientist has been refining his for decades. 

The grain is primarily barley, but there are all different types of barleys for brewing at all different levels of roast.

Mad Kitchen Scientist's super-secret

Imperial Stout blend

Cracking the grain is cracking the grain - and it's a delightfully analog process.

The next stage at which the brewer really influences the product is in what you choose to add to the wort by way of hops (type, quantity) and malt or other sugars (same). This is also when you can get into experimenting with things like fruit beers or other flavors. 

Look at those pretty hops!

Once the wort is ready for fermentation, two things are VERY important:

• You need to chill your wort FAST
• Your carboy needs to be CLEAN (so does your filter and your airlock)

Mad Kitchen Scientist created a clever gizmo from copper tubing to cool the wort by plunging the coil of copper tubing into the wort, attaching one end to tubing that runs from the cold water tap and letting the water run out the other end back into the sink.

Clean carboy? Bleach solution, scrub scrub, rinse rinse rinse.

Then you filter the wort into the carboy, add the yeast and cool, clean water to fill, insert the airlock, and let those little guys get to work eating, digesting, and, per Alton Brown, farting, which is what creates the fermentation and, ultimately, the fizz.

Saturday was glorious, so we also smoked (and ate) a brisket and played with the dog. To drink? Homebrew that was already aged and ready to go, duh. 

Get to work, Yeast! 

How did Mad Kitchen Scientist's brewing expertise come to be? Well, it turns out, a little more than 30 years ago, he was housemates with his "Brew Daddy." Both of them were also competitive Ultimate Frisbee players, and their house was definitely the hip hangout for that crowd. Brew Daddy was already an accomplished brewer, he showed Mad Kitchen Scientist how to brew, and then it became a situation of iron sharpening iron as they inspired each other to up their game. It's been many years since they shared a living space, but, unsurprisingly, Mad Kitchen Scientist has continued down the path set all those years ago.

I will likely not start down that path - Chef Spouse doesn't drink beer, so I'd just be brewing for myself, and I already have a good source of homebrew at the ready - but I am glad to understand, conceptually, how to do it.

I'm also looking forward to cracking one of these babies at Mad Kitchen Scientist and The Executive Committee's resumed New Year's Eve house party later this year....