What I do hate is the wine industry. Bunch of namby-pamby grape gropers whose bottles collect dust and who spit instead of swallow. Which is why my interest [...]]]> Well, maybe “hate”‘s a strong word. I’ve just never had a wine that I’d prefer over a good beer. I’ll keep trying though. You know, for science.

What I do hate is the wine industry. Bunch of namby-pamby grape gropers whose bottles collect dust and who spit instead of swallow. Which is why my interest was piqued by a blog post (What the Wine Industry Can Learn from Craft Beer) suggesting that craft beer-style innovation would be a boon to the wine industry. It’s a good read; check it out.

What the article fails to address is the fundamental difference between beer and wine consumers. Beer drinkers fall into two fairly distinct categories: craft beer drinkers and non-craft beer drinkers. Wine drinkers also fall into two categories: expensive wine drinkers and inexpensive wine drinkers. The difference is that cheap wine drinkers want the same products as the expensive wine drinkers, just lower-cost versions. Economies of scale dictate that the craft wineries charge higher prices, whether their product is substantially different or not. This would be especially true for any winery bold enough to test-market a small batch of something truly innovative.

Besides, what does innovation look like in the wine industry? Fermenting Pinot with a Chardonnay yeast? Scandalous. The problem isn’t that genuine innovation is impossible, but that it’s undesirable. Of course a vintner could make a Passionfruit Pinot Grigio. It just isn’t clear that anyone would want it.

Craft brewers are innovators for the simple reason that craft beer drinkers don’t feel beholden to tradition, whereas wine – at least wine as we know it – is nothing but tradition. Demand drives supply, and the consumers who are amassing five-figure cellars full of craft wines value tradition. Seriously unconventional wines aren’t impossible, but the market is certainly unproven. The shoe is on the other foot. If craft wineries do succeed in creating this new market, it will be by emulating the brewers they’ve spent the past few centuries turning up their noses at. And that’s a thought that any beer drinker should love.

Then again, what do I know? I hate wine.

We’ve all heard it. I’m ashamed to say that I’ve even parroted it myself in the past. But it’s only half true.

The OG contribution of simple sugars is certainly [...]]]>

A pound of sugar per five gallons of beer will add nine points to the original gravity and reduce the final gravity by two points.

We’ve all heard it. I’m ashamed to say that I’ve even parroted it myself in the past. But it’s only half true.

The OG contribution of simple sugars is certainly easy enough to calculate. Most brewers are probably aware that potential extract is typically given as a percentage of the potential extract of pure sucrose (46.21 point-gal/lb, 96.39 °P-L/kg). Let’s assume a volume of 20 L (5.28 gal) just to make the math easy. For a 5.0-5.5 gal batch volume, that will get us within 5%, which I think most brewers would concede is “close enough”.

(96.39 °P-L/kg)(0.454 kg)/(20 L) = 2.19 °P = 1.00856

So if your batch volume is 5.5 gal, eight points might be a better rule of thumb, but the oft-quoted value is essentially correct.

Determining how sugars will affect the FG gets a little more complicated, because, let’s face it, for most of us it’s been a while since high school chemistry. There also has to be an assumption made about how much of the sugar is consumed, and how much is fermented. I think it’s reasonable to assume that a healthy, active population of yeast will consume nearly all of the simple sugars available. I’m going to further assume that the sugar is being added during the anaerobic fermentation phase, so that nearly all of it will be fermented, as opposed to being used for aerobic respiration. The amount of ethanol generated then becomes a simple question of stoichiometry. The relevant reaction is:

C₁₂H₂₂O₁₁ + H₂O → 4C₂H₅OH + 4CO₂

So four moles of EtOH will be produced per mole of sucrose fermented. On a volumetric basis:

4((454 g)/(342.3 g/mol))(46.07 g/mol)/(0.789 g/mL) = 309.8 mL

Which is 1.525% ABV, incidentally. The reduction in density is a two-term weighted average:

(20000*1.0000 + 309.8*0.789)/(20000 + 309.8) = 0.9968

So when added to 20 L of water (or beer), a pound of fully-fermented sugar will actually reduce the SG by about 3.2 points, or 0.8°P. Maybe I’m splitting hairs here, but saying “two points” is off by about 60%.

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