Hi Minibrew friends!
While we were busy testing and brewing with the OTBs that arrived around a month ago in our office a lot of interesting things happened.
In short, we were busy with the design of the mashing filters, started development of ingredient packages and we also have a little surprise from the brewery point of view.
In this update, we will be focusing on
- Design of mashing filters
- Recipe and stability development
- Usability Tests
- Brewing collaborations
But first of all - a short time-lapse we recorded.
Thats what a typical day at the office looks like.
Design of MashingFilters
The past weeks the mashingfilters in the machine have been researched and optimised, due to high pressure in the machine the filter bed endures a lot of stress and builds up much pressure.
With new improvements, the design has been strengthened and changes are sent to China for new molds, new tests are set up to validate the new prototype and continue the optimization.
In the next few weeks, these adjustments will be tested further with very tough mash beds and very low ph levels to ensure the filter endures protein denaturation and viscosity increasement.
Recipe and stability development
With the new adjustments, the overall extract efficiency has increased by over 5%, meaning that the team has now officially started the recipe development for the Minibrew brew packs!
During this phase the team will develop several packages that will be available for the Minibrew community, ranging from perfumes IPA’s to Belgian tripels.
Setting up at Home Usability Tests
Next, to the daily brewing tests, we also invested some time in usability tests and setting up a test for the MiniBrew to ensure the best user experience when unboxing and setting up the machine at your home.
What we found that tubing and routing of our connections to water source and outlet as well the power connection worked in most of our performed tests.
Brewing Collabs
We are very happy to have welcomed twelve Dutch breweries that created collaborations for a beer brewing competition during the Steek Bier Festival (6-8.04.2019) in Utrecht.
In this competition, two breweries form a collaboration and are challenged to brew a one of a kind beer on the Minibrew.
So far we’ve seen some amazing tricks with rare hops, fruit powders, extreme ph levels and of course the art of the craftsmen themselves.
The breweries that participated were the following:
- A Sour was brewed by Van de Streek Bier (Utrecht) & Brouwerij de Prael (Amsterdam):
- A Hopfen Weizen was brewed by De Leckere (Utrecht) & Uilitje (Haarlem)
- A Pale Ale by Bird Brewery (Amsterdam) & - Stapzwan (Utrecht)
- And another Pale Ale by Jopen Bier (Haarlem) & Brouwerij Maximus (Utrecht)
The next few weeks our development department will take care of the fermentation and dry hopping while waiting for the tasting jury, which will be done by…YOU!
Curious about judging the beers?
The beers will be presented at the Streek Bier Festival in Utrecht where the visitors will be the judge and pick their favorite.
Feel free to hop by and cheers with the participated breweries and us on this great collaborations.
What the brewers think about the MiniBrew and what they created we will share within the next couple of days on our social media channels.
Curious about joining the #beervolution? We currently have some job openings available :)
Cheers!
MiniBrew
P.S. OFFICE SPACE = FREE BEER?
We are looking for office space from 1st of August on….Do you know anyone that is looking for a great new company to join their facilities?
Some requirements:
- 250 - 400 m2 (office + work/testing environment)
- Around Amsterdam & Utrecht
- Close access to public transportation.
If you happen to know someone or have space available yourself we have a REWARD for you - FREE BEER ;) Just drop us an email to hello@minibrew.io
