I recently have been told that I shoukld be using brown bottle to brew in as
claer bottles allow the brew to be affecyted by light.

I am hoping to obtain views from the group if anyone has any experience in
this as I have planned to brew into clear 375ml bottle plus 1.25ml & 2 litre
plastic PET bottles.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts

Mick

You won't have any problems as long as you store the bottles in the dark.
Keep 'em in a case or cardboard box till you use them and you'll be fine. I
have used both clear bottles and plastic bottles with few troubles. The only
trouble I had with plastic was upon repeated use and cleaning, the
occasssional plastic bottle wouldn't seal completely.

"Mick" <rouintoy@zeta.org.au> wrote in message
news:s_30b.1193$d6.82617@nasal.pacific.net.au...[color=blue]
> I recently have been told that I shoukld be using brown bottle to brew in[/color]
as[color=blue]
> claer bottles allow the brew to be affecyted by light.
>
> I am hoping to obtain views from the group if anyone has any experience in
> this as I have planned to brew into clear 375ml bottle plus 1.25ml & 2[/color]
litre[color=blue]
> plastic PET bottles.
>
> Thanks in advance for your thoughts
>
> Mick
>
>[/color]

Ross McKay <rosko@zeta.NOT.THIS.BIT.org.au> wrote in message news:<l3l5kvg8e8mg73mmu9e669muegfs78ekgs@4ax.com>...
[...][color=blue]
> Traditional beer bottles are brown for a reason - they keep out more of
> the light that will skunk a beer.
>
> As for PET, from what I've read they are good for short term storage
> only - eventually, they'll let in some oxygen which will oxidise your
> beer (that's a Bad Thing).
>
> Of course, YMMV. If you keep your clear PET bottles in the dark
> (especially away from fluorescent lights) then you might never notice a
> problem.[/color]

I wouldn't -- and I don't -- worry. Keep the bottles, as Ross says, in
the dark: that means in a box or a cupboard, or even just a quiet
corner of the shed (well away from kerosene, mower-fuel, creosote or
anything else with a pong!). Very little beer is kept long enough to
make the slightest real-world difference. Even commercially-sealed
plastic bottles do very slowly leak gas (we opened a two-year-old one
of lemonade, and found it flat as a pancake); but the pressure inside
is enough to keep oxygen out for a long time. Check the best-before-by
dates on the lemonade and beer in a shop to get an idea of the
*minimum* time this will be (I'd do it for you, but haven't got any
commercial bottles around just now).

Mike.

The only person I know who uses PET bottles made pretty bad beer in glass
bottles so I'm not sure if the PET has anything to do with bad beer or not.
They don't seem like a good idea to me. They are easy to cap but really hot
water makes them turn into abstract art and the moulded foot makes them hard
to clean. Re Ross McKay's comment about the Aussie beers in clean bottles, I
heard that the processes the beer goes through removes the light sensitive
components so the colour of the bottle becomes irrelevant. I'm guessing Ross
is talking about Carlton Cold. I agree with him about the crappy taste of
commercial Aussie beers available in Australia (inlcluding Carlton Cold) and
I think the least of that beer's worries is the colour of it's bottle. I've
heard Fosters tastes different in every country but I would be scared to try
it. I'm guessing Ross is a fellow Aussie, and when he says
"what-hop-I-don't-know-what-a-hop-is beers" I think he's talking about the
flavourless and bitter as hell Pride of Ringwood. The only reason Aussies
drink beer so cold is to dull the flavour of this horrid hop. Stay clear of
CUB and you'll do your taste buds a favour. Boag's, Cascade and Redback are
the commonly available Aussie beers worthy of drinking, though the the rarer
Mountain Goat beers are my favourite at the moment.


"Ross McKay" <rosko@zeta.NOT.THIS.BIT.org.au> wrote in message
news:l3l5kvg8e8mg73mmu9e669muegfs78ekgs@4ax.com...[color=blue]
> On Mon, 18 Aug 2003 22:52:44 +1000, "Mick" <rouintoy@zeta.org.au> wrote:
>[color=green]
> >I recently have been told that I shoukld be using brown bottle to brew in[/color][/color]
as[color=blue][color=green]
> >claer bottles allow the brew to be affecyted by light.
> >
> >I am hoping to obtain views from the group if anyone has any experience[/color][/color]
in[color=blue][color=green]
> >this as I have planned to brew into clear 375ml bottle plus 1.25ml & 2[/color][/color]
litre[color=blue][color=green]
> >plastic PET bottles.[/color]
>
> G'day Mick,
>
> Clear bottles will let in too much of the light that will affect your
> hops. Hop oils react with certain wavelengths of light and will produce
> nasty flavours in your beer if there is any real hops there. Notice how
> (at least Aussie) beers sold in clear bottles are the flavourless,
> what-hop-I-don't-know-what-a-hop-is beers?
>
> To an extent, green bottles are just as bad for beer. One of the guys on
> the Aussie Craft Brewer list says that it's light in the green
> wavelengths that does the dirty, so obviously green bottles are not
> going to help much either. See here:
>
> [url]http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CraftBrewing/message/17311[/url]
>
> Traditional beer bottles are brown for a reason - they keep out more of
> the light that will skunk a beer.
>
> As for PET, from what I've read they are good for short term storage
> only - eventually, they'll let in some oxygen which will oxidise your
> beer (that's a Bad Thing).
>
> Of course, YMMV. If you keep your clear PET bottles in the dark
> (especially away from fluorescent lights) then you might never notice a
> problem.
>
> cheers,
> Ross.
> --
> Ross McKay, WebAware Pty Ltd
> "Since when were you so generously inarticulate?" - Elvis Costello
>[/color]

G'day Jaf,
[color=blue]
>... Re Ross McKay's comment about the Aussie beers in clean bottles, I
>heard that the processes the beer goes through removes the light sensitive
>components so the colour of the bottle becomes irrelevant. I'm guessing Ross
>is talking about Carlton Cold. I agree with him about the crappy taste of
>commercial Aussie beers available in Australia (inlcluding Carlton Cold) and
>I think the least of that beer's worries is the colour of it's bottle. I've
>heard Fosters tastes different in every country but I would be scared to try
>it. I'm guessing Ross is a fellow Aussie, and when he says
>"what-hop-I-don't-know-what-a-hop-is beers" I think he's talking about the
>flavourless and bitter as hell Pride of Ringwood. The only reason Aussies
>drink beer so cold is to dull the flavour of this horrid hop.[/color]

Actually, the process that these beers go through is akin to not letting
a real hop flower anywhere near the beer. They use isomerised hop oils
in the mega-swill beers, but the ones in clear bottles like Carlton Cold
barely get any of that either. As you suggest, these beers are designed
to be consumed bloody cold, straight from the esky, and as quickly as
possible before they get a chance to warm up. A post in rec.humor.funny
some years back talks about the end result, where beers like this get
warm, as being "suck point" - when they start to *really* suck! IMO,
Carlton Cold reaches suck point at opening.

There's been some debate about PoR hops over in the Oz Craft Brewers
list. I haven't ever used any, so can't comment, but IIRC the final
analysis is that they have their place when used appropriately. It's
just that Aussie mega-swill beers (like most mega-swills) are a pretty
piss-poor attempt at beer.

[url]http://oz.craftbrewer.org/[/url]
[color=blue]
>Stay clear of CUB and you'll do your taste buds a favour.[/color]

Too right. Generally. But realise that CUB owns a huge range of what
appears to be little breweries, including Matilda Bay (Redback), and
Lion Nathan / Tooheys own most of the rest including Malt Shovel (James
Squires).
[color=blue]
>Boag's, Cascade and Redback are
>the commonly available Aussie beers worthy of drinking, though the the rarer
>Mountain Goat beers are my favourite at the moment.[/color]

There are quite a few pretty good Aussie beers around now, but not from
your average bottle'o. Also starting to be a good range of imports, too.
Of course, in Australia, a "premium beer" means a green bottle, so many
beers will die under fluoro lights before you get to even open them. I
have an arrangement with the bottle'o down the road where they give me
bottles straight from the box out the back, away from the lights. Having
once arrived at a "beer party" with a range of expensive, imported and
*skunked* beer, I am grateful for this service.

cheers,
Ross.
--
Ross McKay, WebAware Pty Ltd
"Since when were you so generously inarticulate?" - Elvis Costello