Of The Fining Of Malt Liquors


It is most desirable to have beer fine of itself, which it seldom fails

to do in due time, if rightly brewed and worked; but as disappointments

some times happen, it will be necessary to know what to do in such

cases.



Ivory shavings boiled in your wort, or hartshorn shavings put into your

cask just before you bung it down, will do much towards fining and

keeping your liquor from growing stale.



Isinglass is the most common thing made use of in fining all sorts of

liquors; they first beat it well with a hammer or mallet, and lay it in

a pail, and then draw off about two gallons of the liquor to be fined

upon it, and let it soak two or three days; and when it is soft enough

to mix with the liquor, they take a whisk, and stir it about till it is

all of a ferment, and white froth; and they frequently add the whites

and shells of about a dozen of eggs, which they beat in with it, and put

altogether into the cask; then with a clean mop-stick, or some such

thing, stir the whole together; and then lay a cloth, or piece of paper

over the bung-hole, till the ferment is over; and then bung it up close,

in a few days it will fall fine.



But if you want to fine only a small quantity, take half an ounce of

unflacked lime, and put it into a pint of water, and stir it well

together, and let it stand for two or three hours, or till the lime

settle to the bottom; then pour the water off clear, and throw away the

sediment; then take half an ounce of isinglass cut small, and boil it in

the lime water till it dissolves; then let it cool, and pour it into the

vessel, &c.



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