In my last post, I wrote about my first attempts at brewing within the limited space and capabilities available in our 36’ motorhome (if you are interested in the brewing process, I suggest you go back and read that post). I kept to cider and mead because they are simple brews that I do quite often. However, I also know that those are not the most common or popular drinks around, so here is my take on brewing beer in the RV.
Just like before, I knew that simplified recipes, simplified techniques, and smaller batches are key to successful mobile brewing. For beer, simplifying means that I need to skip the most labor, space, and time intensive part of the brew day – mashing. Mashing is the process that converts the starches stored in malted barley, wheat, or other grains into fermentable sugars. This usually involves some careful water chemistry, stirring in crushed grains, holding that mixture at a carefully controlled temperature for an hour or more, then draining and rinsing to get the resulting malty, sugary water out of the grain mixture. I’ve done plenty of mashes at my sticks-and-bricks home, but that’s just not something I’m anxious to tackle in a motorhome (though I imagine there are more dedicated homebrewers out there who do it). Luckily, commercial suppliers create “malt extract” which is produced via the above mashing steps followed by concentration to a syrup or dehydration to a powder.
An aside: Malt Extract is commonly used in homebrewing, although as a primary recipe component, it’s often considered only appropriate for beer kits or beginning brewers, and something that a “real” brewer will grow out of. This is, frankly, an old prejudice rooted in the notion that extracts do not produce as good a flavor. Many years ago, extracts were not always well made and perhaps not stored carefully, but in the modern homebrewing market, there are many high-quality options and high product turnover means that freshness is no longer a great concern. Brewing with extract doesn’t give quite as much recipe flexibility, but can still produce some excellent results, especially when steeped with a bit of crushed “specialty” grain to add a little extra punch to the flavor.
Whether it comes from mashing grains or mixing malt extract and water, the resulting liquid is called “wort” and it needs to be boiled for a while to pasteurize it, extract the flavor and bittering components from the hops, and to meld the flavors. Here lies another advantage of extract brewing; the total volume of liquid needed for the boil and the boil time can both be dramatically reduced. With an extract brew, it is common to boil at one-half or even less of the final volume, topping up with water afterwards. Further, the extract has already been boiled to some degree, so the wort really only needs 30 minutes or so of boil time (instead of the 60-90 minutes common with all-grain brewing). The net result is that I can use a smaller pot and less fuel/power to boil, and I save time.
A note about hops: Hops provide bittering to balance the malty sweetness in the beer as well as add significant flavor components of their own (especially in styles like Pale Ale and IPA). The amount of time the hops are in the boil determines how much flavor and bittering are extracted. With shorter boil times, I have to increase the quantities of hops to compensate. Some brewers will decry the “wasted” hops, but I find it worthwhile to save the time.
Now for the simple recipe part. Here is the entire ingredient list for a 2.5 gallon batch of simple pale ale, one of my “go-to” brews:
- 3.15# Golden Liquid Malt Extract (1 jug)
- 1# Amber Dry Malt Extract
- 1.5 oz hops (Citra)
- 1 package of ale yeast (Safale US-05)
- Water
The process is fairly simple as well:
- Heat a gallon of water.
- Add the malt extracts and dissolve thoroughly.
- Bring to a boil. Total boil time is 30 minutes.
- As boil starts, add ½ oz of hops, then again at 20 minutes and 25 minutes into the boil.
- After 30 minutes of boiling, quickly cool the wort in an ice bath.
- Pour the cooled wort into a carboy and top up with water to 2.5 gallons.
- Add the yeast, cap with an airlock, and let sit for about 2 weeks to ferment.
I’m skipping some details (ask in the comments if you are trying to replicate this), but the whole pre-fermentation process takes about 90 minutes, with half of that just waiting for the wort to cool. That is in comparison with about 6 hours of constant attention required for a regular, all-grain, brew day, as well as a LOT more equipment. Whether in an RV or a fixed home, this is truly the lazy brewer’s path to good beer! Brewers note: this recipe has a starting gravity of 1.057 and a completed ABV of ~5.8%.
Once the fermentation is complete, we now have some flat, warm beer and need to do something with it. To carbonate and “package” the beer, there are two main options; bottles or kegs. Bottling will be most accessible for a homebrewer – it only requires some basic equipment and storage is fairly easy. On the other hand, almost every “former” homebrewer I’ve met says he/she dropped the hobby because bottling is a major pain-in-the-a$$. Personally, I hate to bottle and have been kegging my brews from early in my homebrewing experience. Let’s discuss some ideas for adapting and simplifying each method.
Bottling is generally achieved by coaxing the yeast to carbonate the beer after the bottle is sealed. When the fermentation stopped, the yeast have only gone dormant because they ran out of easily accessible sugars. By mixing in just a little more sugar, we can wake up the yeast so they will generate CO2 and give the beer some fizz. I have not bottled in the RV, but if I were to do so, I’d use swing-top bottles (sometimes called “Grolsch” bottles – eliminates the need for a bottle capper), add “carbonation tablets” to each bottle (instead of mixing a sugar solution into the whole thing), and then siphon the beer into the bottles. These bottles are pint-sized, instead of the more common 12 oz, so the 2.5 gallon batch of beer would yield about 18-20 bottles of beer. These would need to sit at room temperature for 1-2 weeks to carbonate, then probably should be kept refrigerated after that.
Kegging, on the other hand, simply requires siphoning the beer into the keg, applying pressurized CO2, and waiting awhile. The CO2 will naturally dissolve into the liquid over time, or this can be accelerated with some agitation. This is very “simple” but it requires a lot more equipment and serving space: a CO2 tank, a regulator to control the pressure, a tap to dispense the beer, and most significantly, a large chilled space to keep the keg. Previously, I have carried kegs along on most of our trips simply by taking over some of the fridge space (and using a smaller CO2 tank and simple, plastic “picnic” taps to dispense). We have a large refrigerator (not a residential unit, but still pretty big), so two of the 2.5 gallon kegs take up about the bottom third of the fridge. While this has been an acceptable solution for trips of 2-3 weeks, for full-timing, I’d really have to work out something else. My thoughts on that are evolving, but the ideas include: get smaller kegs (1.0 to 1.5 gal) and continue using the main fridge; keep a separate, small electric fridge in the closet or similar space; or buy a bare, 12V chilling unit (common in marine applications) and convert a basement compartment into a refrigerator. Time will tell, but for now, I’ll continue using the main fridge.
In truth, everything I’ve described above is not far different from what a beer kit brewer might have done. The main differences are that I’ve cut down the batch size and targeted more small-space-friendly techniques and equipment. So far, I’ve done 7 batches of beer using these simplified steps and had reasonable results. I have a pale ale and a stout in kegs right now and will be taking those along for our trip to NomadFest next week (as well as some cider and mead). If you are there and happen to see the Rambling Roos flag, stop by and say “Hi” and you might get a chance to sample some 🙂 .
Cheers!
–Roger