SECTION XIX.
Of Precipitation, and other remedies, applicable to the diseases incident to Beers.
Noaccident can be so detrimental as leaky or stinking casks, which lose or spoil the whole or part of the contained drink. The necessity of having, on these occasions, a remedy at hand, was undoubtedly the reason, why coopers were first introduced in store cellars. Constant practice might have qualified their palates so as to make them competent judges of the tastes of wines and beers, and to enable them to know which were the fittest for immediate use. The preparing or forcing them for this service, was a matter, which the profit gained thereby made them ready enough to undertake. Chymists, whom they consulted on this occasion, gave them some informations, from whence the coopers became the possessors of a few nostrums, the effects of which they were supposed to have experienced. But, ignorant of the causes of most, if not all the defects they undertake to remedy, and unacquainted with the constituent parts of beers, it is not to be expected that their success should be constant and uniform. The brewer, earnest to do his duty, and to excel, ought to keep a particular account of every brewing; by this means he best can tell how he formedthe drink, and ought consequently, in any disorder, to be prepared to direct the properest remedy.
The intent of this treatise has been to discover the means by which errors may be avoided. Chymical applications are intended to remedy those errors, which may be occasioned either by carelessness or accident. The wholesomeness or propriety of the applications, which will be indicated, must be left to the judgment of my readers; it is most likely that there is sufficient room for improvement, and we might expect it from those, whose profession it is to study every thing, that may be conducive to the safety of mankind.
Whatever vegetables wines are produced from, whenever they deviate from the respective perfection, a well-conducted fermentation might have made them arrive at, they may be said to be distempered. Foulness, or want of transparency, is not the least evil, but, according to its degree, it obtains various appellations, and requires different helps. From what has been said, nothing can be more plain, than that it is always in our power to form beers and ales, which will be bright. Yet porter or brown beer is constantly so brewed as to need precipitation: the reasons for this management have before been offered. Were we to wait till the liquor became transparent by age, a more real disorder would ensue, that of acidity. Precipitation is then serviceable, especially when beers are to be removed from one cellar to another, ashort space of time before they are to be used. By being shook, and the lees mixed with the liquor, a strong acid taste is conveyed therein, and the power of subsiding, which is wanted, renders the forcing them, in that case, of absolute necessity. In beers brewed with liquors sufficiently heated, no flatness is occasioned thereby; as the case is, under like circumstances, with liquors produced by low extracts, from grain not sufficiently dried. The degree of foulness in porter should however be limited; its bounds ought not to exceed the power of one gallon of dissolved isinglass, to a butt. Isinglass is dissolved in stale beer, and strained through a sieve, so as to be of the consistence of a jelly. The beer is set in motion with a stick, which reaches one third part down the cask, before and after this jelly is put in; and a few hours should be sufficient to obtain the desired effect. We have before observed, that this quantity of jelly of isinglass is equal to a medium of 10 degrees dryness in the malt, and heat of the extracts. When the opacity exceeds this, the liquor is termedstubborn; the same quantity of dissolved isinglass repeated, is often sufficient, if not, six ounces of the oil of vitriol are mixed with it. An effervescence is, by this addition, produced; the oils of the drink become more attenuated, and the weight added to the precipitating matter, is a means to render it more efficacious. Instead of the oil of vitriol, six or eightounces of the concrete of vitriol, pounded and mixed with the isinglass, are sometimes used with success.
A foulness in beer beyond that which is calledstubborn, gives to the drink the denomination ofgrey beer. This arises from the oils which float upon the surface, and which the liquor has not been able to absorb. In this case, the same methods as before mentioned are repeated; the quantity of dissolved isinglass is often increased to three gallons, that of vitriol to more than 12 ounces, and sometimes a small quantity ofaqua fortisis added to these ingredients.
The next stage of opacity iscloudiness; when the cooper confesses that the distemper exceeds the power of his menstruums, and that his attempts extend no farther than to hide the evil, tournsol and cochineal, were they not so expensive, might in this case be used with success; but what is less known, and would greatly answer the intent of hiding the dusky colour of the drink, is madder;—about three or four ounces of this is the proper quantity for a butt of beer. Calcined treacle, by the coopers called blacking, from its acidity, is of some small service, for, by coloring the drink, it somewhat lessens the grey hue thereon; a quart is generally used in a butt; and, to prevent the defect in the beer being noticed by the consumer, the practice is to put thereon what is calleda good cauliflowered head. This might be done by using as much pounded salt of steel as will lay upon ashilling; but the difference in price between this salt and copperas makes the last generally to be preferred. The strong froth on the top of the pot, and that which foams about it, together with somewhat of a yellow cast, are often mistaken for the signs of a superior merit and strength, though, in fact, they are those of deceit. A little reflection that the natural froth of beer cannot be yellow, nor continue a long time, especially if the liquor has some age, would soon cure mankind of this prejudice. Cloudy beers, under these circumstances, though not cured, are generally consumed.
Beers becomesick, from their having so large a portion of oils, as to prevent the free admission of the external air into them. The want of this enlivening element makes them appear flat, though not vapid. Such beers should not, if possible, be brought immediately into use, as age alone would effect their cure. But when this cannot be complied with, every means that will put the beer upon the fret, or under a new fermentation, must be of service. By pitching a butt head over head, the lees of the beer, which contain a large proportion of air, being mixed again with the drink, help to bring on this action, and to remove thesickness.
Burnt hartshorn shavings, to the quantity of two-penny-worth, put into a butt, are often of use.
Balls made with eight ounces of the finest flower, and kneaded with treacle, convey likewise air to the drink, and promote its briskness.
Beers, by long standing, often acquire so powerful an acid, as to become disagreeable. The means of correcting this defect is by alkaline, or testaceous substances, and in general by all those which have the property of absorbing acids. To a butt of beer in this condition, from four to eight ounces of calcined powder of oyster-shells may be put, or from six to eight ounces of salt of wormwood. Sometimes a penny-worth or two of whiting is used, and often twenty or thirty stones of unslacked lime; these are better put in separately, than mixed with the isinglass.
From two to six pounds of treacle used to one butt of beer, has a very powerful effect, not only to give a sweet fulness in the mouth, but to remove the acidity of the drink. Treacle is the refused sweet of the sugar baker, part of the large quantities of lime used in refining sugars, undoubtedly enter in its composition, and is the occasion of its softening beers.
In proportion as beers are more or less forward, from two to four ounces of salt of wormwood and salt of tartar, together with one ounce of pounded ginger, are successfully employed. All these substances absorb acids, but they leave a flatness in the liquor, which in some measure is removed by the use of ginger.
Sometimes, in summer, when beer is wanted for use, we find it on the fret; as it is then in a repelling state, it does not give way to the finings, so as to precipitate.For this, about two ounces of cream of tartar are mixed with the isinglass, and if not sufficient, four ounces of oil of vitriol are added to the finings next used, in order to quiet the drink.
Some coopers attempt to extend their art so far as to add strength to malt liquors; but let it be remembered, that the principal constituent parts of beer should be malt and hops. When strength is given to the liquor by any other means, its nature is altered, and then it is not beer we drink. Treacle in large quantities, the berries of theCocculus Indicus, the grains of paradise, or the Indian ginger pounded fine, and mixed with a precipitating substance, are said to produce this extraordinary strength. It would be well if the attempts made to render beers strong by other means than by hops and malt, were to be imputed to none but coopers; Cocculus Indicus, and such like ingredients, have been known to be boiled in worts, by brewers who were more ambitious to excel the rest of the trade, than to do justice to the consumers. Were it not that pointing out vice is often the means to forward the practice of it, I could add to this infamous catalogue, more ingredients, it were to be wished practitioners never knew either the name or nature of, for fining, softening, and strengthening.
Formerly brown beers were required to be of a very dark brown, inclinable to black. As this color could not be procured by malt properly dried, the juice ofelder berries was frequently mixed with the isinglass. This juice afterwards gave way to calcined sugar; both are needless, as time and knowledge remove our prejudices, when the malt and hops have been properly chosen; and applied to their intended purpose.
Such are the remedies chiefly made use of for brown beers. Drinks formed from pale malts are always supposed to become spontaneously fine, and when they are so, by being bottled, they are saved from any farther hazard. As it is impossible for any fermented liquor to be absolutely at rest, the reason of beers being preserved by this method, is, thereby they are deprived of a communication with the air, and, without risk, gain all the advantages which age, by slow degrees, procures, and which art can never imitate. Were we as curious in our ales and beers as we are in the liquors we import, did we give to the produce of our own country the same care and attendance which we bestow on foreign wines, we might enjoy them in a perfection at present scarcely known, and perhaps cause foreigners to give to our beers a preference to their own growth.