Beer Forum

I was reading "Designing Great Beers" the other day and it mentioned that malt extracts lack "free amino nitrogen" that is essential to a fast fermentation. does anyone add nitrogen to help along their beer? if so, in what form?

I made a mead last year which required supplementing the must (mead wort) with a teaspoon of "FAN" powder, which my LHBS guy provided. Supposedly malt is better at providing the nutrients than honey however. Sometimes I use "servomyces" capsules in my beers, which might serve the same function by increasing the quality of the fermentation.

usually nitrogen is only taken into consideration with wine and meads where nutrients for the yeast are very scarce. Just for beer, all you might want to add is a nutrients blend such as Wyeasts or Servo, or a couple pinches of bread yeast into the boil.