How Do You Pour Your Soda

Yes I know the specifics are important here but I observe foam no matter what or which way I pour from and to. Generally speaking I tend to pour from a can that is at fridge temperature into a pint glass with ice cubes from the freezer. I do not chill the glass mostly because I don't have room in the freezer to keep a glass nor time to wait for one to chill. It is one of those minor questions in life that I find it interesting to ponder. Would for example pouring over the back of a spoon or down a glass rod make a difference. I would love to quantify the amount of gas lost during different methods of pouring.

Perhaps - take the ice cubes from the freezer & put them in bowl in the fridge an hour or so before 'drinkies' - should be melting / slightly wet when used?

The 'melty' surface might cut down on the nucleation sites, and cur down on the amount of bubbles released. However, one must also look at the nucleation sites on the class itself. A cleaner glass will have fewer 'tiny bits' to form nucleation sites, and a newer glass will have fewer microfractures.

Since a poured beer is supposed to have a 'head' on it, there are some beer companies who have branched out and started selling glasses with a ring laser etched into the bottom of the glass, to provide a controlled set of nucleation sites, to produce a thicker 'richer' head, and to provide the visual appeal of the wide collumn of tiny bubbles rising through the center of the brew.

We're going off topic with all sorts of beverages. Guess we should be glad we haven't veered into Japanese animation and it's localization for American kids, where you have pirates drinking 'Frothy Mugs of Water,' because they don't want to show adults drinking alcohol on a 'kids show.⁽¹⁾'

Notes:

1. One particularly stomach-turning example was one character who was 'sophisticated,' and always shown drinking an amber-colored wine, which was changed to 'orange juice' for the kid's redub. That alone wasn't bad, but the scene showing HOW sophisticated he was, had him eating pizza with a knife and fork, while still enjoying that wine flute of 'orange juice.' Pizza and orange juice? That's a flavor combination straight out of the depths of Hell.
   

"Since a poured beer is supposed to have a 'head' on it...."

Some head but it seems like many places expect the head to be as tall as the rest of the drink.

Well, the seedier places may have come to the equation of

More Head = Less Beer per Glass

Less Beer per Glass = More Profit per Glass

Does not apply to Guinness. Head is an indication of a proper pour.

Ah, but there is an allowable range for a head on Guinness, isn't there?

An 'improper pour' could have to little head, or too much.

Then again, the seedier bars/alehouses that would be pouring 'extra-large heads' to save on beer are not likely the type to stock a premium brew such as Guinness.

THe secret to a good pour is having the bubbles go down the inside of the glass from the top. That takes enough head so that the beer needs to set for awhile.

Actually, it needs to be double poured:

With glass tilted at 40-45° to the horizontal, pull the Guinness until the level reaches the brim whilst the glass is tilted. Leave to stand in a vertical glass (i.e. base on bar) while you pull or pour the rest of the round. There should be approximately 2" of free space in the glass (usually at the top). Go back to the Guinness and starting at ~40° gradually increase the angle with the horizontal to 90° whilst filling with the black nectar with the nozzle under the surface of the liquid, expelling excess head. If you're not Irish, feel free to finish off with a shamrock drawn in the head. Head should be about 1/2" thick and, as Nigh pointed out, last half an hour, this being the time it takes to drink the pint

Sounds complicated. That's why I don't pour 'em, I just drink 'em.

"If you're not Irish, feel free to finish off with a shamrock drawn in the head."

So the Irish DON'T draw the shamrock? Guess drawing extra attention to the Irishness of the beer is offensive to the denizens of the Emerald Isle. Would serving a Guinness with the shamrock art in an Irish pub be something that would start a brawl over it?

(Yeah, like a bunch of drunken ANY-NATIONALITIES need an excuse to start a brawl. You get enough drunks together in one area and SOMEONE'S getting a wooden chair smashed across their back, even if there were no wooden chairs in the room to begin with.)

A friend of mine would write his name on the froth with a thick felt tip. You could still read it when he was finished!!

Don't mention the ink and what might have been in it!!

Did you get the diffusion effect where you could see the individual colours in the ink...chromatography at its most basic

Sadly not,it was just black!!

A proper Guinness pen!

That was how he saw it too.....

Guinness has to have a thick durable head to last through the half hour it takes to pour it.

Not in to UK. The brown bit of the beer should be a full pint...so either pubs use oversize glasses and fill tot he Weights and Measures line, or a pint-to-top glass and you are entitled to ask for the pint to be topped off either after settling or after your first sip (I said SIP!!)

Ah, good ol' UK, they may have the plainest food in the world, and some of the weirdest names ('Toad in the hole,' 'Bubble and squeak,' are those entrees or nicknames for something done in the bedroom and/or bathroom? And will the site auto-censor even allow me to talk about 'Spotted d--k?' "D--k of what?"), but they take their beer VERY seriously.

We have our priorities right.

Now if only you'd quit serving it WARM.

(Although that's more of a 'culture misunderstanding,' to Americans, 'warm beer' is 'ambient room temperature,' about 70-75 degrees F, whereas the 'room temperature' beer in a pub is the temperature of the CELLAR the beer is stored in, which can be 20 or more degrees cooler than the surrounding countryside. An American getting a freshly poured pint would call it 'cool beer,' not 'warm beer.' Then again, most Americans who drink beer prefer 'cold beer,' but when you're drinking something like most American beers, the cold helps to hide a lot of the taste, which is a good thing.)

(Not really a beer drinker myself, could never stand the stuff. Give me a nice hard cider, however, and I'll happily down it. Although I prefer my cider on the rocks instead of straight from the bottle.)

Don't forget the temp. in the UK is typically a bit lower. I also enjoy a good cider, we have a farm shop not too far away that stocks more that 100 ciders.

Ah, but neither of you have 'Buddha jumped over a wall'

Thanks for the update.

Nice to see you posting as well!!

Thank you - been lurking in PMs again....good to see the gang are all still here <waves manically>

Can you even remember "proper" beer...? I don't mind the occasional blond bier, but much prefer a good real ale. Cornish "Tribute" is my current tipple of choice.

For the record, I like my lemonade / fizzy pop fairly flat, to the point that I pour slowly from a height to release the maximum amount of gas from the liquid for the first glass. For subsequent glasses, I squash the plastic bottle until the liquid level is near the top of the neck, securely replace top/lid and either shake to release gas, or leave overnight.

Mostly flat room temperature lemonade is essential for making Mackeson shandies - at least it is if, like me, you aim to float the Mackie on top the lemonade....

Never been a fan of Guinness....

You need to buy a "Swizzle-Stick"......

In a Guinness?!!?!?!

Ah. I see. Not always available. A grain or two of sugar (or salt) work wonders too...again, nucleation sites. I learned about this effect as a child when I tried adding sugar to a fizzy drink. I got quite good at judging how much sugar I could add without causing the lemonade to "explode"...

I ment the black felt tip, on the light brown guinness head......

And altitude... What's the barometer reading?

Put the booze in first; that tends to moderate the foaming. Also, post sentries to make sure no one shakes the container before pouring.

cabernet doesn't fizz, I don't share your issues

I often had that same debate with my now Ex wife when it came to cooking.

According to her everything had to go from the can to a prepping bowl to the cooking pot to a serving bowl and then to the easting bowl that had to sit on a plate for whatever reason.

By my count that was 5 steps and usually 20 - 30 minutes of time from the can to my mouth and 8 different things (prepping spoon serving spoon and eating spoon) that will need washing just to eat a can of soup.

My method was most often from can to mouth using one spoon and heating was optional at that.

If it was for family it was can to eating bowl in microwave then bowl to table. Same exact end result as hers but with only one bowl and one spoon. less than 5 minutes start to finish.

"now Ex wife"

First I'm hearing of this, didn't even know the marriage was on rocky ground. I knew she seemed a bit loony at times, but so did Gracie Allen.

On the one hand, I'm sorry to hear things did not work out between you two.

On the other hand, you shouldn't have to deal with as much of her craziness as you did before.

On the other other hand (who's counting?), there goes some of the good material for your 'observational humor,' ("Listen to what my crazy wife/silly neighbors/idiot co-workers are doing now.")

She threatened to leave one time too many and called her bluff and made her stick to it.

Mutually agreed divorce so a single $80 court fee and that was it.

Funny part was she said she didn't need me for anything ever yet I did the majority of the moving her to town plus she made it a whole two days on her own before she needed to borrow money to live on and now she calls me 1 - 5 times a week asking for help with stuff.

Since then we get together at least once a week and go out to eat which usually involves me having to come over to her place and fix things for her or carry stuff up the 1 1/2 flights of stairs to her apartment before or after.

Best part is when she throws a fit over something stupid I just say,' Bye. Call me is you want to get together next week.' and walk out the door. Our relationship has greatly improved! (mostly since apparently no one wants to come over and visit /help her.)

Not to sound insensitive, but even your divorce sounds like something out of a stand up comedy routine.

Claimed she didn't need you for anything, yet now you're doing almost as much for her as when you were married. At least you have the 'That's enough, see you next week.' routine you can use to keep your sanity.

Laugh all you want. Most days after a visit with her I shake my head and have one.

She wanted to move to town because it would save her so much time, money and work opposed to living out here with me. Yea it didn't work out that way.

For me on the other hand I had a $100 cut in my vehicle insurances without her Explorer on the list. I have seen a good $30 a month drop in my electric bill. I eat for a month on what she spent on food for a week and a roll of toilet paper lasts for a good 10 days opposed to 1 or less!

She however saw a $1200 - $1400 cost of living increase and and gained zero on time per day. If anything she lost time as well.

Oh well. Good for her I guess.

LOL!!

Thanks for sharing!!

Been there, but left the country to avoid such contact, never regretted it!!

I don't know how divorce works in your state.... but she may revisit her attorney.

She doesn't have one. That would cost money of which she has none due to terrible self financial management.

She makes just short of $50K a year on a 5 day 40 hour a week desk job and when living with me had less than $400 a month in bills to pay yet her credit cards were maxed out and she lived paycheck to paycheck.

On top of that she sees me as being basically worthless so there is nothing in my life of value she could or would possibly go after.

Yer got to get out & circulate more.

Otherwise you are just going to go round & round in circles.

But what about payments? Or does he get his wicked way with her occasionally?

I left the country to avoid such situations with my ex.....

I could make you laugh about her too!!

Very cold ice cubes (I know this sounds stupid but beer with me ) tend to cause a lot more fizzing based on my very unscientific anecdotal evidence. If I take ice cubes right from the freezer, put them in a glass and then pour pop over them, it fizzes like crazy. If I use ice cubes that have sat out in an ice bucket for a while, i.e. those have warmed up to the freezing point, they do not fizz nearly as much.

I suspect the reason for that is the greater temperature differential between the "right from the freezer cubes" is so much higher, that a lot more heat transfer occurs from the relatively warm pop to the ice. I don't know if there is a boundary layer of pop freezing at the surface of the cube that causes nucleation points, or if it is some reaction of very cold ice in warmer liquid that increases the nucleation points.

Surely one of our members who are looking for a thesis topic could study this.

Anybody else notice this effect?

I noticed it last march 32nd.

Beering with you!

Good bit of observation, Robin - will watch out for it.

First week of this year I spent in Burma - it has a nice beer, (Myanmar Beer) and they know how to pour it! - i.e. leave the flavour IN the beer, not on top!

Does CR4 accept videos?

Though I don't know why it worked, back in the days of multiple jobs, when I was once a server... if the ice was fresh out of the freezer.. (didn't have a wet glean to it) I'd add plain water first, let it sit for a bit to get the inside surface of the glass to about the same temp as the surface of the 'wet' ice... dump the water, then pour the soda.

That sounds like a 'quick chill' of the glass surface. The cooler class will help to reduce 'fiz'/foaming/etc because it's not warming up the soda. Temperature is a factor in how mutch gas can sit dissolved in a liquid, the warmer the liquid, the less gas can stay in it.

Java is right, Frank.

Tried it last night - glass mug from freezer, two v cold ice cubes.

Rinsed with a bit of water, then poured it out.

Poured the Heineken from small bottle into the glass, no head! (the way I like it) - of course you could pour the head on if you wanted to.

Beer tasted much richer with the gas in, even to the end. (gas doesn't bother me - enjoy it)

Australians run the risk of losing their passport, putting ice in beer - but in this case it was worth it.

'Fresh from the freezer' ice cubes might have a layer of frost on their surface, and until that melts off, that's a plethora of potential points for nucleation sites. That might explain the extra fizziness.

(pardon the weak alliteration, I'm still trying to get up to speed this morning, and I have to keep an eye on the clock so I'm not late to a morning meeting.)

The solubility of gas depends on the temperature of water. Keep the soda temperature as cool as you can tolerate and lesser gas will be lost.

Which is why the perfect class of Coka-Cola should be at 33 degrees Fahrenheit. Just one degree above becoming a Coke Slushie.

How many "classes" are there?

I can think of five classes off the top of my head:

Upper-upper class: Drinks Rum and Coke on the rocks

Upper class: Drinks Coke 'ice cold'

Middle class: Drinks warm Coke

Lower class: Drinks out of the horse trough

Lower-lower class: Drinks Pepsi

---

Yeah, I had to go there, #colawars and all that

LOL!!

Sooo, Pepsi max would be lower-lower class trying to pretend to be lower class?

To put Pepsi Max in, I'd need to add more levels under lower-lower class.

I'd also need to add 'Drinks dirty dishwater' to a description somewhere.

And if I'm going THAT low, I light as well add 'Sewer water' and 'Coke2' down there as well.

I drink my rum neat. No way would I spoil it with fizzy ****

Changing it for Merlot seems to solve the problem.

I'm the opposite, I prefer the drink slightly flat.

Most important is a clean glass with the minimum number of nucleation points which are the origine of bubbles. The nucleation points are either scratches on the surface or bits of dust. If you fill a champagne flute with soda, you can see the nucleation points which are more often than not close to the bottom where the hydraulic pressure is ever so slightly higher. This applies in all glasses but is easier to see in a flute as the sides are inclined and make it easier to see the variation of bubble propagation with depth.

The same works for champagne of course. If you do a reception of any kind with champagne, you can either use brand new plastic glasses (flutes obviously) which allow you to pour the entire glass without pausing for the bubbles to go down (no nucleation points at all) or use well cleaned glasses with no scratches and no dust (including towel marks).

There are some good videos on youtube etc demonstrating this nucleation effect with clean and with "normal" glasses.

I can think of three things that might help you, but you are doing it mostly right to my mind already.

1) Cool the glasses down in a deep freeze first. This is done in some German Beer festivals to ensure that frothing is kept to a minimum, they can empty two half liter bottles, develop some foam, but not have to take ages to empty the bottles.

This is especially where those non glass pottery "Steins" are used, as you cannot see the beer level.

Beer is around 94% water, so I am hoping this will help, but I have never tried it myself on soda water.

At least an hour in the deep freeze for the glass, very cold soda and NO ICE!!.

2) New glasses. They will have less microscopic surface damage. Cut glass will also have a finer micro finish, this will give fewer places for the bubbles to form.

Handle those glasses with care, I cannot say if a dish washer is a good idea or not, maybe someone else can....

Here we wet beer glasses with water (shake the excess off) before pouring, to reduce foaming or the beer, some here foam excessively making ouring difficult, as the water partially seals the surface, you might try that as well.

3) Buy a Sodastream and add a small amount of Sodium Bicarbonate to each bottle, VERY important!, mix it in BEFORE you gas the water.

Adjust the Bicarb to suit your taste, I like quite a lot myself.

Start with the end of a table knife, a pile say 5mm long, knife blade wide....

Its far better Soda than the bought stuff once you get the Bicarb amount sorted. Also, far fizier!!

Is it better to pour the soda over the ice or put the ice in the soda?

I think a person should definitely have a beer while testing the soda theories.

I don't always drink from a glass, but when I do the bartender pours for me!

More OT news: 'Most Interesting Man' replaced; changes in store for Dos Equis ad campaign Cox Media Group National Content Desk 12 minutes ago

You may not know his name, Jonathan Goldsmith, but you know him as "The Most Interesting Man in the World."

Goldsmith has been the face of Dos Equis beer since 2006, but the 77-year-old actor will be making his final appearance in an ad that starts airing Thursday, Ad Age reported.

Don't know the man or the ad or the beer.

Wet the ice slightly with water. People make the mistake of thinking it's the temperature difference causing the fizzing, but really it's usually just the roughness of the ice. This will make the ice much smoother and greatly reduce the fizzing. Also continue to pour at an angle like you've already described.

so you're saying the same can be said about a frosted mug of beers beer.

Glass is a very "rough" material at the microscopic level, which is why the Germans wet the glass before pouring the beer, it keeps the froth under control better, BUT, a very cold beer and a really cold glass, maybe because of the frost filling the roughness, froths less.....(say that fast!!)

This is an old one about a tap that reduces the foam.... I'm not surprised it was designed by students at The University of Wisconsin- Madison.

Its called the TurboTap. Gives 1/2" of head on your beer.