July 2013 Release Notes

The July 2013 release is live. Hop stand support, gyle/krausen priming calculator, starting mash thickness field, and many other refinements are in this release. Along with changes to the cloud application this month our iPhone app was just updated to version 1.5 and is available in the app store. Many thanks to those who contributed to discussions in the feature request forum.

Support for Hop Stands – select Whirlpool or Hopback in the Hop Use drop down.

Hop Stands are getting a lot of attention lately and Brewer’s Friend now supports them!

A hop stand is a technique where hops are exposed to the wort after the boil but before fermentation.

• In a Whirlpool hop stand, the whirlpool is started after the boil and extra hops are added.
• With a hopback the wort is pumped or drained through a container holding the extra hops on the way to the fermentor.

Hop stands avoid vaporizing the essential oils and are said to result in smoother bitterness and flavor. The temperature and time of the exposure greatly impacts the utilization (for the purposes of IBU calculations). Given the wide variation in process and equipment out there, the utilization factor is left up to the brewer. A value of 10% is generally accepted, but could vary based on process. The hotter the temperature and the more time, the higher the utilization.

When selecting Whirlpool or Hopback as the hop use, two new fields will appear.

• The utilization of the hops (normally 10%, but could be zero if done at lower temperatures or for a short time).
• The temperature at which the hop stand is performed at.

For more information on hop stands see this excellent and detailed write up by BYO (Mar/Apr 2013).

Equations for modeling hop stand utilization and their IBU impact are being worked on by Kaiser!

State of the Art Gyle / Krausen Priming Calculator:

Our Gyle / Krausen Priming calculator is powered by Kaiser’s equations and his gyle/krausen spreadsheet. For convenience, if you don’t have enough Gyle or Krausen on hand, the calculator reports how much additional sugar is needed to hit the target CO2 level. It also breaks down the relative CO2 contributions from the beer, gyle/krausen, priming sugar, and any unfermented sugars still in the beer. Our plan is to eventually link up the recipe editor and brew session to our three priming calculators (gyle/krausen, priming sugar, and keg calculators).

Updates to the Recipe Editor:

• Total grain bill weight is displayed in the fermentables box.
• When changing the unit drop down for hops and grains, the value automatically toggles to the equivalent value in the new unit.
• Starting mash thickness field added for All Grain recipes as requested in the feature request forum. This sets us up to build out mash profiles down the road.
• Mash lines can be specified in quarts or gallons for recipes in US mode.
• Other Ingredients can be specified in milliliters.
• Volumes of CO2 added in priming section in the Other Ingredients section.
• New profile options for the recipe editor: Default Batch Size and Default Boil Size.

Other improvements:

Pre-boil gravity is now displayed on the recipe view, recipe print, and brew session pages.

The My Recipes and My Brewing list has been improved to include the recipe type. On the My Recipes page, each recipe now has direct links to related brew sessions.

iPhone 1.5 Updates:

• Improved listing of recipes with index (ability to jump down quickly) and snapshot indicator.
• Mash thickness field for all grain recipes.
• Recipe level volumes of CO2 and CO2 unit.
• Hopstand support (whirlpool and hopback hop uses).
• Mash line volume can now be specified in quarts or gallons (for recipes in US units mode).
• Other ingredient unit list now includes milliliters.
• Click here for more information about our iphone app.

Our mission is to help you brew better beer. Stay tuned for more updates at Brewer’s Friend!