testing for mouse

[from Heather]

When I took Peter's class last summer, he gave us all some solution to swish around in our mouths, spit out, and then we drank some Samuel Smith cider, and it tasted like popcorn. The solution helped non-mouse detectors be able to detect it then. He said it was a great party joke to do. Thing is, I don't know what the solution was, as I didn't apparently write it down.

Does anyone know what I'm talking about?

Heather

[Andrew Lea]

Sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) is what Peter likely used. The mousy
components are salts in cider at low pH and hence non-volatile. The
bicarb raises the pH, makes them into volatile free bases and then you
can taste / smell them. Native ability to detect mouse probably depends
on the pH of your oral cavity. The bicarb over-rides this.

Andrew

--
Wittenham Hill Cider Page
http://www.cider.org.uk

[Wes Cherry]

Decent article on mousiness in wines here:

http://www.winebusiness.com/wbm/?go=getArticle&dataId=48582

"ATHP is an unstable compound of similar structure than ETHP but with
100 times lower threshold: 1.6 ?g/l (in water). What this means is
that, for equivalent concentrations in wine, this compound would
confer a mousy defect more readily. One interesting thing about ATHP
is that it exists as two tautomeric forms. (Tautomers are similar
molecules that are interconvertible by a slight chemical reaction.)
These two tautomeric forms are an amino (favored by acidic wine
conditions) and an imino form (favored by alkaline conditions). The
catch here is that only the imino form has a mousy off-flavor. As we
know, mouth saliva contains sodium bicarbonate, which is alkaline.
Researchers believe that, when wine comes into contact with saliva,
the tautomeric balance shifts towards the more volatile imino form,
explaining why mousy off-flavor cannot be smelled in a wine but
becomes apparent when tasted. This also explains why the "palm and
sniff" method works (skin being less acidic than wine). ATHP is an
important odorant in many foodstuffs, such as freshly baked bread,
crackers, taco shells and corn tortilla chips, popcorn and rice cakes."

-W

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[from Heather]

Thanks. We were at a brewery for some 2 day weekend event, and diacetyl kept being a topic that came up, which got me thinking about mouse. I was thinking maybe it was epson salt that Peter used, but I wasn't sure. I think I would much rather use baking soda.

Heather

[Andrew Lea]

On 10/11/2010 18:13, from Heather wrote:
> Thanks. We were at a brewery for some 2 day weekend event, and diacetyl
> kept being a topic that came up, which got me thinking about mouse.

Kind of interesting.

Diacetyl is present +/- in cider and wine but nobody seems to mind.
Whereas brewers go ballistic if they think they've got even a trace!
Big 'mega-kegs' do continuous monitoring for diacetyl they are so paranoid!

By contrast mouse / bread / popcorn is widespread in beer and nobody
minds. In fact in many cask beers it's even a positive quality factor to
my way of thinking. Whereas in wine or cider even the tiniest amount is
a strict no-no.

Horses ... courses!

[greg l.]

Another example is brettanomyces, a bad fault in wine or cider but
brewers actually use cultured brett in some beers.

I think that chemists oversimplify taints, attributing things like
mousiness or cork taint to one chemical when there are actually a
range of chemicals responsible. (not that it really matters). When I
did sensory evaluation class we did tests to find our thresholds for
things like sweetness and bitterness, it was amazing the variability
between people's sensitivity for different chemicals, I'm sure part of
the variation in sensitivity to mousiness is due to genetic variation.

Greg

[Rick]

Heather, I'll confirm what Andrew said. Peter gave us baking soda in
water solution. Don't believe he indicated the specific ratio, but
only a little would likely suffice.

Rick

[Peter Ellis]

From this morning's DT.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/recipes/8123556/Apple-brandy-The-culture-of-Calvados.html

I haven't forgotten about getting the price of stills, Barry. I've just
not been going in the right direction for the agricultural merchants
this week.

Cheers

Peter

[olbol]

How is copper still able to process acidic cider, especially at high
temperatures? I would think its corrosive qualities would increase.