Vores Øl

Vores Øl (Danish for Our Beer) is presented as the first open source beer. Today also known as [Free Beer]. The recipe is published under a Creative Commons license. The beer was created by students at the IT-University in Copenhagen together with Superflex, a Copenhagen-based artist collective, to illustrate how open source concepts might be applied outside the digital world. The students brewed the first 100 litre batch, titled 'version 1.0', of the dark heavy beer in the school cafeteria, and created label designs and a website to promote the beer and publish the recipe.

Contents

1 Usefulness of original recipe
2 Recipe for Vores Øl

2.1 Malt extract
2.2 Taste and sugar
2.3 Fermentation

3 Other Opendrink projects
4 External links

Usefulness of original recipe

Almost immediately, much of the homebrewing community spoke out against the quality of the recipe, several posting to a Slashdot thread[link]. Most notable among the complaints were that it was never stated how much water to use in the mash, what type of yeast was to be used, the style of beer being produced (other than being dark and heavy), whether or not any hops were being added for aroma, fermentation temperature, or how the beer was supposed to taste. Along the lines of the open source software that the group is implicitly promoting, several people have said that if this recipe was source code, it would not compile.

By his own admission, Rasmus Nielsen, one of the developers of the beer, has stated that the beer was a medium for the message of "dogmatic notions of copyright and intellectual property that are dominating our culture."[link] He also admitted that the group was not made up of beer gurus and implied that their experience in beer production was limited. Because of the underlying theme of the group's message, the correction and development of this recipe is actively encouraged.

Recipe for Vores Øl

The following recipe is as shown on the official website (as of September 2005), although other variants may exist due to the freedom given to modify the recipe.

Recipe for approximately 85 l (approximately 6% alcohol by volume).

Malt extract

Four types of malted barley are used:

6 kg pilsner malt
4 kg münsner malt
1 kg caramel malt
1 kg lager malt

The malt is crushed and put in 55–60 °C hot water for 1–2 hours.

The mash is filtered and the liquid now contains about 10 kg malt extract.

Taste and sugar

50 g Hallertauer (Northern Brewer) hops
60 g Tettnang hops
300 g Guarana beans (Guarana beans can typically be bought at health food stores).
4 kg sugar

The malt extract is brought to a boil in a large pot with Hallertauer NB hops and approximately 70 l (18.5 gal) of water.

After half an hour, the Guarana beans and sugar are added.

The mixture simmers for about an hour, the heat is turned off, and the Tettnang hops are added and left to sit for 10 minutes. The mixture is then filtered and cooled in a sealed container.

Fermentation

Yeast is added and the beer is fermented at room temperature for approximately 2 weeks.

When the beer is fully fermented, it is transferred to bottles. First 4 g sugar is added per liter and some yeast from the bottom of the fermentation tanks for priming.

The beer is then left in the bottles at room temperature for 8-10 days for carbonation.

Other Opendrink projects

There also exists a brand of open cola called OpenCola.

External links

[Vores Øl]
[Vores Øl recipe]
[Free Beer]
[Superflex]
[Danish students launch open source and shareware beer]
['Free' Danish beer makes a splash] (BBC News)
[Pass Over a Frosty Mug of Home Brew Version 1.0] (The New York Times)
[Wired]
[Spiegel Online]

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