The South Plains Project- 'Circulating the Mash Tun Wort'

In designing this brewery I'm looking to use the latest in technology to create a maximum efficiency system to convert malt starch into malt sugar. Normally in a brewery, the grains are put in a large bin and by adding hot water to a certain temperature, they create a conversion from malt starch to malt sugar, the sweet liquid, called wort, can then be fermented into beer. Depending on how you obtain that conversion greatly effects the efficiency of the conversion. Many artisan brewers have efficiency ratings of 70-80%. This is often done by loading a large kettle with grains and heated water, and stabilizing the temperature at say 68 degrees Celsius, for one hour while continuously stirring the grains so they don't burn. Here's a drawing of how I perceive the HERMS system will work.

I'm trying to design a system that uses a concept called Heat Exchanged Recirculating Mash System or HERMS for short and the theory goes like this...

         The 630 liter Hot Liquor Tank with circulating coil

The March Pump


  the Mash Tun and Hot Liquor (hot water) tank  are combined to  circulate the liquid wort  through a  heat exchanger coil located in the Hot Liquor Tank using the using the March pump to keep the liquid wort temperature constant at 68 degrees Celsius. I have a thermostat attached to flip the March pump off and on to keep the temperature constant. The Hot Liquor Tank is powered by the Ghidini Steam Compressor.  So as the pump recirculates the wort at a constant temperature, I get a excellent conversion efficiency ratio, usually around 98 %

                                                    The 670 liter Mash Tun

Then by turning a valve, I pump the wort into the Boiling Kettle and sparge (rinse) the mash with hot water to collect the remaining sugars and later also pump those into the kettle.

Desserts

I'v been doing desserts every year now for the American Womens Club annual meeting, this year I did my Seven Fruit Tart and served it with a Moelleux au Cholcolat, made with Valrhona chocolate, it has a warm chocolate ganache center that melts when the dark chocolate souffle rises and runs out like a rich sauce. I served it with a Grand Marnier Chantilly Cream. It was quite a hit!

The South Plains Project

A simple floor plan design for the South Plains Brewery

The South Plains Project

                 I am currently in the midst of building a microbrewery. What a enormous project! I have been shopping for months online, searching for used tanks and kettle to build this within my meager budget. When I finally found a large kettle, I just thought I would get a gas burner. Then I emailed Kal at 'The Electric Brewery' in Canada to ask about heating element inserts. He said for my volume, 500+ liters, the only way to go is to power a steam jacketed kettle with  a steam generator. Here's a photo of the steam jacketed kettle I found, used in Germany.

  This would work perfectly for me. It has a 550 liter capacity, can tip with a hand crank, a valve in the bottom, and a operating pressure of 1 bar steam. I could bring 550 liters liquid to a boil in 30 minutes. Cost: 1460 euro, 13360 Swedish Crowns or $2000. Less than one fifth of what it sold for new.
             Then I needed to find a steam generator (last week I had never heard of it, now I needed one) so after endless Google searches I found a small company in Denmark that could sell me a small steam generator. Cost: 6600 euro, 60,000 sek or $9000. I must say, I was shocked at the price. I'm sure it's absolutely worth it and that's what they go for but it wasn't in my budget. Here's a photo of the Maxi 60 steam generator.

                     Then I noticed the name...'Ghidini' and thought, doesn't that sound Italian so I went on Google Italy and after some searching and translation, I found a site for Ghidini and after numerous emails was able to negotiate a price for 2500 euro, 22,800 sek or $3500. Now suddenly it was within my range, with a huge saving from my first estimate!

AWC Regional Conference

I recently did appetizers and desserts for the American Womens Club regional meeting. The menu was simple but elegant

Smoked salmon crepes of herbs & fresh cheese

Pork filet, roasted potatoes, feta, cukes, ruccola

Wild mushrooms on puff pastry hearts

Goat cheese, sundried tomato pesto

Gateau Basque ( Cherries & rum in vanilla bean cookie dough)

Auteuil  ( White chocolate-anise mousse, genoise biscuit, raspberries)

Strawberry Napoleon

I got a wonderful comment from Kara Fairchild after the party I'd like to share

Hi Jeff,

I just had to send a note to you about your food at the regional. I have been member o f the AWC of Malmö for about a year, but  didn't get to a club event that you catered. Then, I moved back to Göteborg. So, the regional was actually the first time I tasted your cooking. It's...CRAVABLE. I am a foodie. I am also a vegetarian. The canapes and the desserts (I didn't try the white chocolate cake because I suspected gelatin (could be wrong, of course. Hope not though because it looked to die for and I would hate to think I missed out on it!) were some of the best foods I have ever had in Sweden. Suburb. Someone across the table from me said that the pork canape was the best thing she had even tasted. The smell of meat doesn't do much for me anymore, but even *I*, a seasoned veggie, have to admit that the smell and sight of the pork was making me salivate. Then I took a bite of my own food and the pork was a mere memory! =)  More than anything, and I can not stress this enough, I walked away feeling totally satisfied with the food that I had been served. Anyway, that is all I really wanted to say. You did such a fabulous job on the food!

Kara

A Brief Summary and The South Plains Project

A lot has happened since I wrote my last blog. My partner who I had planned to open my microbrewery backed out because he was worried it was too risky. I however felt I had a superior product and felt quite confident that my beer could sell. So I decided to do it by myself. I added a bifirma, a second company under my existing business and called the company 'South Plains Brewing Company', the region I'm in , söderslätt, means south plains in English, anyway, I liked the sound of it. I have arranged to rent a small workshop on a farm, it's set up like a kitchen, previously used to smoke fish so it's a perfect place for me to set up equipment, fermenters & tanks.However, I needed a way to finance my equipment so I took a full time job running a company's restaurant, Icopal, located in the port of Malmö, doing a international/Swedish menu daily. I do breakfast & lunch for 30-60 people everyday. It's been working out great for me. Since then I've been purchasing equipment every month. This month I'm purchasing two 600 liter fermenters from Germany, they are very cool with a floating lid that hermetically seals.
Here's a photo... It looks small but is actually pretty large, 72x150 cm.

 So I expect to be producing 1200 liters  a month by Christmas, and I am

very excited about it. Last month I entered a competition for microbreweries
and Artisan craft brewers here in southern Sweden, and I had been sick and didn't think I would be able to go but ended up going anyway. I had a booth with two kegs, my Pale Ale & my Imperial IPA. I gave out about 200 10ml
samples and at the end of the night, much to my surprise, I won.My IPA took the bronze medal. I know everyone always liked it but I never expected

to win the competition. Here's the label I made for the competition. The IBU figure is the level of bitterness, this amber ale is very bitter, a fairly high alcohol percent, 8%, with a wonderful floral hoppy aftertaste, very well balanced, completely organic, a absolutely fabulous beer!

Designing labels

I met with Tomas Dahlgren, our graphics designer last night at the Green Lion Pub to discuss text and design for labels. He designed the labels you saw on the previous blog. Of course, all of these things are always changing, but right now we are planning to start with five ales and do a occasional lager that changes.



Tomas Dahlgren's Windmill

 Each bottle will be similar in design with the logo of the windmill and farm at the bottom of the bottle, next to it is alcohol volume and size, ex. 33cl, then on the top is a logo to represent each beer, the name of the beer and then I have to write a brief description/story about the beer. This is still a work in progress, but here's what I've come up with so far:

Bohemian Pilsner

This classic style of beer comes from Bohemia, once the crossroads of medieval Europe. A pale golden color, the distinctive flavor comes from the noble Saaz hops which gives it a pronounced floral boquet and a lingering rounded bitterness, with a dense, long lasting creamy white head. We salute Josef Groll for creating this golden lager in 1842.





Bohemian Coat of Arms from the 1912 Olympics

 



logo-something to represent Bohemia...perhaps the coat of arms like historic lion with crown banner

Black Sheep Porter

A dark & malty ale with characteristics of molasses & coffee, this ale was made famous in the 1700's by the workers who carried baggage to the ships in London and would bring a fresh pint to the sailors, hence the name 'Porter'.

logo- the black sheep

Post Colonial IPA

For beer warriors who accept the challenge,this highly hopped amber ale will assault your tastebuds on the very first sip, and persist in hoppiness to the bitter end. This style was made famous when the English ships transporting kegs of ale to the colony of India, the beer would always go sour. So they tripled the hops, raising the acidity, hence the name 'India Pale Ale'

logo- a english cutter ship or clipper

South Plains Pale Ale

Brewed in the style of California artisan Pale Ale, the color is darkish yellow to copper tinge, this is a moderately bitter ale and has a strong hoppy floral boquet, with hints of citrus and melon.

logo- a sachet of grains, or a raised hand holding the grains

TLB Golden Bitter

Rich in color of straw to light gold, this very bitter ale gets it's unusual flavor from a blend of the highly acidic 'Pacific Gem Hop' (15.1% alpha acids) and the mild Noble German hop, Spalter, giving this bitter a complex wood or oak flavor with hints of blackberries.

logo- something to imply clean like snow or waterfall, maybe the pond

Altbier

A copper colored, cool fermented, cold conditioned, clean tasting, with a mild hop presence, a firm creamy head, a medium body and a slightly sweet-dry finish. Alt means old, an allusion to the old style of brewing, in contrast to the new beer, the lager style which was invented in Bavaria in the 16th century, which is now the most popular brew in the world. Before that, Altbier was just 'bier'.

logo-something old, perhaps a monestary

Red Sky Marzen

This lager is the historic forerunner to the Oktoberfest beer festival in Munich. A rich German malty aroma and flavor, but the finish is relativly dry. The color is a dark gold to orange and red hues. Our Marzen is cold conditioned for a minimum of 60 days, creating a smooth, clean and rather rich malty lager.

logo-red sunset?

Fridhem Gaard's Doppelbock

A extremley strong malty dark lager with a very low hop aroma and bitterness, the color ranges from medium to dark brown with ruby highlights. A bavarian speciality, there is evidence that it was first brewed illegally by the Paulaner monks on April 2nd, 1751, the names day of their patron saint, St. Francis of Paula.

logo- Monks?, big fat or ugly monks

Dutch Lager??(name)

I need a name for this one, it's kind of like a Grolsh or Heineken

 

Then on the back label we have 'My Story'...thats a tough one to write third person, but I'm working on it.Also I put a little on the quality control with this..

 

'A hand crafted ale, brewed in the tradition of the Reinheitsgebot, or German Beer Purity Law of  1487 in which we only use water, barley, hops & yeast and are completly organic and natural, free of any additives'

Then at the bottom of the bottle there is a batch number I fill in and a place I sign it...........approved by me.

 

Overall it was a good night with Tomas, he liked the things I had written and we talked about many possibilities. We talked about a great many thing, tasting different ales, surprised by how expensive they were...95 kr. (about$14) for a 33cl beer and wondering what I should price mine at. So now I'm struggling with labels & names & descriptions, Funny how life changes!

South Plains Organic Brewing Company

For those of you that don't know, I am in the midst of opening a micro-brewery. You may remember one year ago I posted a recipe for a English ale. Well my friend Anders Paulsson, who owns the Fridhem Gaard farm that the restaurant 'Three Lily Buds' is located, that I write so much about, thought my beer was absolutly fantastic, thought I should enter it in competitions and ultimately convinced me to open this brewery to sell to restaurants, bars, pubs, and the state run alcohol store, Systembolaget. We felt we had a niche by brewing organic since that is so popular here and there is almost no organic beer for sale here. Also there are so many Ecological/Organic restaurants here that can't find organic beers, at least not locally, so that means they have a carbon footprint which kind of defeats the whole purpose. So we started talking to the authorites last summer to determine what it would take to open and start selling & serving. A woman flew down from the Swedish Public Heath and we met, she had a great many questions and inside I expected to run up against a wall of bureaucracy, but to my complete surprise, she gave us her blessing. She had a list of things we needed to do, and we were able to complete that list and to make a long story short, we got final approval and can now (after we get all the tax regulations in order) brew beer in the restaurant, sell it on tap in the restaurant, and I can sell it to other places. Of course, I still have to order grains & hops..brew it...bottle it...so it may be some time until it actually happens, but at least I feel like were there! Where I can make the beer, Anders is connected and networked. He can make things happen while I would struggle with them. A example is the labels. He had a graphic designer named Tomas Dalgren create them, I think they are absolutly wonderful! To date I have made about 20 experimental batches, 15 of them excellent so we plan to open with six. That will be...

                           Bohemian Pilsner

                           Pale Ale

                           Golden Bitter

                           IPA

                           Altbier

                           Porter

   We plan on starting small and buying some larger equipment in the spring. At first we thought we would name it 'Paulson & Brown Organic Brewing Company' but now have thought to have it be 'South Plains Organic Brewing Company' and P&B will be one of several labels under it. The area we are in is called south plains (söderslätt in swedish). Thats my update on the microbrewery for now....chao!