On the spur of the moment, I thought of brewing a pumpkin beer today.
Don't have any fresh pumpkin, but I do have canned; however, there is
nothing on the label to indicate whether it has any preservatives, so
I'm thinking that it probably _doesn't_ ... but I don't want to take a
chance; besides, my brewing book says not to use 'canned' pumpkin with
preservatives. So I thought of making a cherry beer instead using
cherry pie filling. Besides the ingredients which I know are alright,
it lists citric and ascorbic acids (I think they are okay) and 'sodium
citrate' and 'red 40 color' (I presume dye won't be a problem either).
I did a google for sodium citrate and read enough to see that it is
sometimes used as a preservative. I don't know what the concentration
is in the can, but we're talking about a 21 oz. can in a 5 gallon batch,
so it will become very diluted. I'm tempted to just give it a try, but
thought I'd at least see what sort of replies I might get while my water
is heating up.

Thanks for any advice anyone can provide.
--
Bill Velek -- my web-sites: [url]www.velek.com[/url] & [url]www.2plus2is4.com[/url] !!
You're invited to join "HomeBrewers" grid-computing team to help
cure diseases; visit [url]http://home.alltel.net/billvelek/team.html[/url]

try this site for flavors ingredients
[url]http://www.northernbrewer.com/beer-flavorings.html[/url]

"Bill Velek" <billvelek@alltel.net> wrote in message
news:1b5bf$457aee87$471e80c6$18168@ALLTEL.NET...[color=blue]
> On the spur of the moment, I thought of brewing a pumpkin beer today.
> Don't have any fresh pumpkin, but I do have canned; however, there is
> nothing on the label to indicate whether it has any preservatives, so
> I'm thinking that it probably _doesn't_ ... but I don't want to take a
> chance; besides, my brewing book says not to use 'canned' pumpkin with
> preservatives. So I thought of making a cherry beer instead using
> cherry pie filling. Besides the ingredients which I know are alright,
> it lists citric and ascorbic acids (I think they are okay) and 'sodium
> citrate' and 'red 40 color' (I presume dye won't be a problem either).
> I did a google for sodium citrate and read enough to see that it is
> sometimes used as a preservative. I don't know what the concentration
> is in the can, but we're talking about a 21 oz. can in a 5 gallon batch,
> so it will become very diluted. I'm tempted to just give it a try, but
> thought I'd at least see what sort of replies I might get while my water
> is heating up.
>
> Thanks for any advice anyone can provide.
> --
> Bill Velek -- my web-sites: [url]www.velek.com[/url] & [url]www.2plus2is4.com[/url] !!
> You're invited to join "HomeBrewers" grid-computing team to help
> cure diseases; visit [url]http://home.alltel.net/billvelek/team.html[/url][/color]

Bill Velek <billvelek@alltel.net> writes:[color=blue]
> Besides the ingredients which I know are alright,
> it lists citric and ascorbic acids (I think they are okay) and 'sodium
> citrate' and 'red 40 color' (I presume dye won't be a problem either).[/color]

How could citric acid be OK and sodium citrate not be?

Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc | New on Home Office Records: Ethan Lipton
| [url]www.homeofficerecords.com[/url] [url]www.ethanlipton.com[/url]
The Gigometer | Pepper Of The Earth: the HO blog
[url]www.gigometer.com[/url] | [url]www.homeofficerecords.com/blog[/url]

Pierre Jelenc wrote:[color=blue]
> Bill Velek <billvelek@alltel.net> writes:
>[color=green]
>> Besides the ingredients which I know are alright,
>>it lists citric and ascorbic acids (I think they are okay) and 'sodium
>>citrate' and 'red 40 color' (I presume dye won't be a problem either).[/color]
>
>
> How could citric acid be OK and sodium citrate not be?
>
> Pierre[/color]

Hi, Pierre. I'm not a chemist so I don't know how the two compare. I
had said that I "think" citric acid is okay ... and I said that because
it is an acid, and I know that yeast can tolerate a certain amount of
acidity -- such as when an acid wash is done -- and I was also assuming
that the amount/strength of acid in something we can eat right out of
the can, if we wish, would be sufficiently diluted by mixing it in wort
to therefore make it less than 1/15th of its concentration in the can.

Cheers.
--
Bill Velek -- my web-sites: [url]www.velek.com[/url] & [url]www.2plus2is4.com[/url] !!
You're invited to join "HomeBrewers" grid-computing team to help
cure diseases; visit [url]http://home.alltel.net/billvelek/team.html[/url]

S wrote:
[color=blue]
> try this site for flavors ingredients
> [url]http://www.northernbrewer.com/beer-flavorings.html[/url][/color]

Thanks, S. I'm glad you pointed that site out to me for future
reference, but I'm looking at two cans of cherries on my desk which are
tempting, versus putting off this experiment for perhaps a couple of
weeks. And I consider that fruit beer was being made long before there
were any commercial extracts available, and is still being made
successfully today with fresh or frozen fruit; two examples are award
winning recipes for cherry ale and strawberry ale in my brewing book.
So my primary concern is the sodium citrate ... and now that I think of
it, another issue: since canned fruit has presumably been cooked already
as part of the canning process -- (I don't know if canning in "cans" is
the same as in "mason jars") -- the pectins are likely to have already
been set and will cause haze in my beer. But since I'm usually far less
concerned with the looks of my beer than how it smells and tastes, I
might still give this a go just to see how it works out. Just in case,
since everything inside the can should be sterile, I'll sanitize my
blender so I can puree and pour into the fermenter rather than add to
the boil and expose to any further heat.

Cheers.
--
Bill Velek -- my web-sites: [url]www.velek.com[/url] & [url]www.2plus2is4.com[/url] !!
You're invited to join "HomeBrewers" grid-computing team to help
cure diseases; visit [url]http://home.alltel.net/billvelek/team.html[/url]

Bill Velek <billvelek@alltel.net> writes:[color=blue]
>
> Hi, Pierre. I'm not a chemist so I don't know how the two compare.[/color]

They are pretty much the same thing once put in a biological liquid.
Citric acid will react with weak bases to form citrates.

The acidity of citric acid is probably irrelevant (the quantities in
question will not affect the pH); instead, it is the ability of citrate to
grab trace contamination by metals such as iron and copper that is useful:
by removing such metals, it inhibits the ability of some bacteria (and
loose enzymes) to spoil foodstuffs.

Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc | New on Home Office Records: Ethan Lipton
| [url]www.homeofficerecords.com[/url] [url]www.ethanlipton.com[/url]
The Gigometer | Pepper Of The Earth: the HO blog
[url]www.gigometer.com[/url] | [url]www.homeofficerecords.com/blog[/url]

Pierre Jelenc wrote:[color=blue]
> Bill Velek <billvelek@alltel.net> writes:
>[color=green]
>>Hi, Pierre. I'm not a chemist so I don't know how the two compare.[/color]
>
>
> They are pretty much the same thing once put in a biological liquid.
> Citric acid will react with weak bases to form citrates.
>
> The acidity of citric acid is probably irrelevant (the quantities in
> question will not affect the pH); instead, it is the ability of citrate to
> grab trace contamination by metals such as iron and copper that is useful:
> by removing such metals, it inhibits the ability of some bacteria (and
> loose enzymes) to spoil foodstuffs.
>
> Pierre[/color]

Thanks, Pierre. So can I interpret that to mean that trace amounts of
sodium citrate will not harm the yeast or hurt my beer?

--
Bill Velek -- my web-sites: [url]www.velek.com[/url] & [url]www.2plus2is4.com[/url] !!
You're invited to join "HomeBrewers" grid-computing team to help
cure diseases; visit [url]http://home.alltel.net/billvelek/team.html[/url]

Bill Velek <billvelek@alltel.net> writes:[color=blue]
>
> Thanks, Pierre. So can I interpret that to mean that trace amounts of
> sodium citrate will not harm the yeast or hurt my beer?[/color]

Right. As a matter of fact (it's not true of all additives or
preservatives) citrate will very likely be metabolized by the
yeast, since it is an intermediary in cell respiration (the
citric acid, or Krebs, cycle.)

[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citric_acid_cycle[/url]

Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc | New on Home Office Records: Ethan Lipton
| [url]www.homeofficerecords.com[/url] [url]www.ethanlipton.com[/url]
The Gigometer | Pepper Of The Earth: the HO blog
[url]www.gigometer.com[/url] | [url]www.homeofficerecords.com/blog[/url]