Can dry ice be used to carbonate home brew?
I am working on a home beer and in the past we used the sugar water method of carbonateing but i am wondering if it is safe/ possible to use dry ice to carbonate it faster?
yes, but there’s a reason that commercial breweries don’t do this
it is very hard to control the level of carbonation using this method, and you could end up with bottle bombs
just stick with the bottle conditioning, your beer needs a few weeks to peak anyway
I'm going to home brew for the first time with my Mr Beer kit for dummies?
yes, but there’s a reason that commercial breweries don’t do this
it is very hard to control the level of carbonation using this method, and you could end up with bottle bombs
just stick with the bottle conditioning, your beer needs a few weeks to peak anyway
References :
http://www.west.net/~science/feedback_CO2.htm
homebrewer of 4 years
Comment by James M — December 14, 2009 @ 2:48 pm
The possibility of bottle bombs would be increased greatly plus you’d have to specify that the dry ice you’re purchasing is rated for food contact. If you’re really interested in carbonating more quickly it would be better to invest in a kegging system.
References :
Comment by I8AShroom — December 14, 2009 @ 3:36 pm
You can, I did it one time when I had a keg go flat, and had lent out my CO2 tank. However, like mentioned, very difficult to control the carbonation level.
Also, dry ice you get at the grocery store, isn’t very clean, or sterile. So it’s not always the best thing to put into beer either. I’ve heard of putting it in a bowl and pouring home-made rootbeer or soda over it to have a carbonated "punch" dish.
If you plan on doing this, make sure to leave the container uncovered when you add dry ice. Like if you’re bottling and want to speed up the carbonation, put a big chunk of dry ice in your bottling bucket, and rack on top if it. That might work, but then you’d have to cut back on your priming sugar. If you did it in a keg, put the dry ice in the keg, rack on top of it, and leave the keg open (don’t seal it) or you’ll have a bomb.
References :
Comment by Axelpeddle — December 14, 2009 @ 4:15 pm
Yes, but controlling the carbonation level is next to impossible. You could try using the dry ice to cool your wort to pitching temps.
References :
Comment by Dann G — December 14, 2009 @ 4:42 pm