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I had an enquiry today about alcohol free kits. How would you go about brewing a kit and then releave it of its alcohol and still bottle carbonate. I know you could in theory probably brew as normal and then boil the whole lot. How long would be necessary? You could then bulk prime and add some dry yeast to each bottle. What do people think? Is there an easier way. Is this feasible?

I wouldn't recommend it. I imagine the pros only bring the beer to around 78 C to boil off the ethanol. (and then keep the alcohol produced) I can't see how it would taste all that good after stewing. You would have to re-seed with yeast because the critters will die during the heating stage.

Most brewers use much more subtle and complicated techniques invlolving yeast manipulation which are too tricky for homebrewers.

Also, though very unlikely, you might fall foul of the distilling police if they hear you are evaporating ethanol from beer.

"Bugno":3vwenpuk wrote: I had an enquiry today about alcohol free kits. How would you go about brewing a kit and then releave it of its alcohol and still bottle carbonate. I know you could in theory probably brew as normal and then boil the whole lot. How long would be necessary? You could then bulk prime and add some dry yeast to each bottle. What do people think? Is there an easier way. Is this feasible?[/quote:3vwenpuk]
Worked on distillation projects for years and its hard enough just to get clean ethanol from a fermentation, even with of 10 HETP column. Problem is all the other alcohols, many of which have higher boiling points than water. I figure it would just taste awful! But then again, I've never tried it.

Hmmm, make one wonder about what they have to do to alcohol free beers!

Brian
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Bugno have you though about ginger ale and root beer kit, they are the nearest to alcohol free brewing around

[quote:3env7qlk]We should first state that alcohol-free beer is real beer, although many occasional consumers and beer enthusiasts will argue that. While some alcohol-free beers are made without fermentation and get their taste from natural flavorings, non-alcoholic beer is usually produced in the same way as traditional beer: mixing water, barley malt, hops and yeast. The alcohol is taken out only after the beer is fully brewed. The process, called vacuum evaporation, influences partially the taste of the beer, making it slightly bland. If it's something you miss when you drink non-alcoholic beer, that's the alcohol itself. Alcohol-free beer contains the same ingredients as traditional beer, minus 99.95% of the alcohol. And that's the good part about this drink: it keeps the nutritional values of a normal beer (fiber, iron, magnesium, potassium, phosphorus and plenty of B vitamins) and consuming it, even excessively, doesn't influence our health negatively.[/quote:3env7qlk]

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I've never had root beer but Ginger Beer is quite nice. I know Coopers do a Ginger Beer kit, which can be made up as either non alcoholic, or alcoholic where extra fermentables (sugar, malt extract) can be used.