http://blogs.wsj.com/personal-techn...ith-recipes-from-top-micro-brewers/tab/print/ So apparently this is already in production. It's not for me, but I wonder if it'll be profitable. A $19 price point for 5 Liters of fresh beer seems relatively reasonable and the idea that established breweries are contributing recipes is intriguing: "From Rogue on the West Coast to Dogfish Head on the East Coast, more than 50 cult-favorite brewers are contributing PicoPak recipes (in exchange for licensing fees, naturally). Thoughts?
Looks cool! I'm just getting into homebrewing, but I certainly wouldn't turn my nose up at this. It's kind of a handy dandy sidekick to quickly and easily make a small batch of this or that on the side. At $1,000 I won't be able to afford one, but the $500 kickstarter deal doesn't seem bad. Still out of my ballpark. Maybe in a decade or two we'll be able to buy this kind of thing for $200 and the technology will be even better. I'll pick one up then.
That intrigues me too. They should send me one to test in my "small apartment" that does not have room for a 5 gallon batch of all grain, nor the constant temperature in any one location in which to ferment.
I looked at the original 2.5 gallon version of this, this only handles the mash and boil/hop addition part of the process. This product does not handle the fermentation part of the brewing
CNet Review In this review, they replicated a breweries beer, most complained of excess dicetyl. The original version is almost $2K
Of course, it’s not ready to drink quite yet: You still have to pitch the yeast and wait five to seven days to ferment at room temperature before you can cool it and tap it. Because the Pico is connected to the Internet, you’ll get an alert on your smartphone when your beer is done. Oh, yes, that's a grand idea.
A non-brewing friend just sent me a link to their kickstarter campaign yesterday (where, if anyone here wants one, you can get the new, smaller (5L) one for~ $600 - not sure where the prices quoted above are coming from). My thoughts? It's infinitely cooler than a Mr. Beer - but still has lots of room for improvement. From what I could tell in the video I saw, the hops and crushed grain are bundled together in the brewing equivalent of a giant compostable keurig k-cup. They advertise being able to 'dial in' (literally, with a dial) the bitterness AND alcoholic strength to a desired level without ever discussing how this works. The only way I can envision it is that the former adjusts the boil time (longer for more complete isomerization to drive up the bitterness) while the latter decreases the volume of water used - or varying combinations of both, depending on the settings. All of which begs a slightly different question. If the hops and malt are packaged *together* in the pods as they appeared to be in the video, then there cannot be multiple hop additions during the boil. The original 'Zymatic' (the $2k, 2.5 gallon one) has 4 hop 'cages' to allow bittering, flavor, and aroma additions. But, if the new one doesn't? Seems kind of limiting. There's also lots of room for an uneducated user to screw up the beer. It gets transferred hot into the mini-cornelius keg 'fermentor' and the user has to wait for it to cool before pitching the yeast (a tiny pack of White Labs liquid made just for Pico - props to them for that!). We all know that people (ESPECIALLY excited new brewers with a brand new toy!) can be impatient. And, 80F is 'close enough' to RT, right? Errm... I applaud the thought and the engineering that went into this, honestly. It's cool. But - I'm still not sold. It takes a big chunk of the fun and creativity out of the brewing process and leaves one with the 'worst' parts: The weeks of waiting and the cleaning. All for a single 5L minikeg? No thanks. Super-cool concept - but is there really a market for it?
I think I've said this before on the 'brewie' thread, but if it's that easy, then why not just go to the store and buy commercial beer that I'm sure is a hell of a lot better than what this thing produces. I just wouldn't feel right giving this to someone and saying that I 'made' it. There's not craft to this whatsoever.
^^That said, I don't see the purpose of this particular incarnation, granted there will probably be a market for it, but I think a lot of people will be drinking bad beer. This seems to just glaze over the task of chilling that wort quickly (just set it on the counter and let it come to temp before pitching). And I think it also dumbs down the role in fermentation. Also wondering if the yeast is tuned for each recipe, and seriously fermenting for about a week... As mentioned before this is a wort maker, not a beer maker. I could see how the larger one could be helpful if you have the cash to throw down on it, and in my opinion it is no different that buying a somewhat automated mash/boil setup as you are manipulating the grain bill hop additions etc
$19 for a little bit more than a 12 pack. I'd rather just buy a 12 pack of properly made beer. I feel pretty comfortable from a money point of view and I don't see how anyone could justify spending this kind of money. People confuse me
Using DRM tech with the "pods" is a real deal breaker with this one, takes all the creativity out of brewing. I wonder long it'll take for someone to come up with a hack for those picopaks, prob someone right now working on it. Wait a min I'll google it.
At $19 / 5-L batch ... the per liter grain/hop bill costs $3.80 (assumes there's no shipping cost ... as if). Sunk cost for the equipment: $1000 Each liter from the 1st batch costs $43.80 + the yeast ... dry hops ... etc. One only needs to brew 196 batches to get the per liter cost down to $4. If brewing once a week ... you reach the $4 per liter price-point after 3 years 9 months. Just like the other Picobrew product ... this is Mr. Beer for hipsters.
Yes like others for the life of me I cannot figure out how this will work. Not sure if the $19 includes shipping, but the part that isn't automated is the part of this process that can go horrendously wrong. I am somewhat surprised that brewers are onboard with this, I can see how someone like DFH would be ok with it, they are in large distribution, but the smaller guys trying to crawl up, I don't think I would want people running around talking about my beer that they made with this machine. Can't wait for the beer reviews: "poured from picobrew keg into tulip..."
