American light lager

[Megastout]

Brewed a bit ago, split batch after fermentation and lagering, one is normal and the other made non-alcoholic by bringing up to 180 degrees for 25 minutes, cooling, adding yeast and priming sugar for bottle conditioning. Has only been one week, just sampled, taste is very much alike, need a little more time for full carbonation. When ready, I will bring so you all can taste the 2 versions

[CurtisG]

Cool experiment. I wonder if theres anyway to check if all the alcohol was driven off.

Maybe a hydrometer / refractometer comparison. They should read the same if there is no alcohol right?

[Justin H]

Cool experiment. I wonder if theres anyway to check if all the alcohol was driven off.

Maybe a hydrometer / refractometer comparison. They should read the same if there is no alcohol right?

You could compare hydrometer reading both before and after heating. If any alcohol was driven off the specific gravity would be higher. You could even calculate the alcohol remaining. Ethanol has a SG = 0.79.

I don’t believe you would see a difference though. As I understand it (which is admittedly little) ethanol has a boiling point of about 78.5°C (173°F). But the boiling point of an ethanol - water mixture (beer) will vary depending on the composition of the solution. I don’t know what the boiling point for the equivalent “typical beer” range would be, but I suspect it would be considerably higher.

I found the following image which seems to fit the discussion.


Edited to add image

[Megastout]

interesting

[Megastout]

Will bring to the January meeting for comparison, Alcohol vs nonalcohol

[Justin H]

Tim,
Did you take any gravity readings before or after the heat treatment?

[Megastout]

Did not take after unfortunately

[ctninh]

Not conventional to measure zero alcohol with homebrew equipment. Need lab stuff.

-Calvin