ice well

— As I had succeeded a year before in the preservation of hopped wort by means of ice, I thought I would now endeavor to cure this unsound beer by means of the same agency. A few casks, each containing seventy liters, were filled with this beer and placed in an ice well. After four or five months they were taken out and examined, when it was found that the original good quality of the beer was predominant. The beer was not only clear, but of good taste, while the cloudy beer which had remained in the cellar turned sour and completely bad in a few days. Here we see that the destructive action which had commenced in the beer was suddenly arrested by the influence of the low temperature of the ice well; there was no increase of acidity, and eventually the secondary fermentation took place unhindered, whereby again, as in the case of sound beer, alcohol and carbonic acid were produced. The external characteristics of the "cured" beer were as follows: The smell on opening the bung was good and the taste clean and sharp; the surface of the beer showed minute bubbles such as are usually found in a normal after fermentation. The beer was sent from the ice well to a distant cellar which was not cooled; here it cleared itself again in a very short time, showing that the wild ferments were unable to exercise any action even under the conditions of raised temperature. This experiment was at the time very much called in question, which was scarcely to be wondered at, considering how deeply rooted antiquated or preconceived ideas take hold of one's mind. But the doubt only leads on to the truth if suspicions are tested by means of experiments. The internal processes at work in this case may be explained in the following manner: That the "dusty" beer owed its turbidity to acetic acid was clear, from the circumstance that the beer remaining in the store cellar turned sour in a few days and completely turbid. We shall not err, therefore, if we conclude that the acetic ferment was thrown out of action by the cold temperature of the ice well. The low temperature stopped the decomposition of the yeast by the acetic acid, and the acetification of the alcohol was also arrested.