W-34/70 and Diacetyl rest.

So, I have two lagers that wil be ready for either a diacetyl rest or cold lagering in a couple weeks.

I am using W-34/70 in both, which per the mfg. produces low sulfur and diacetyl. I also pitched cold and pitched plenty of yeast, so anyone used this yeast without a diacetyl rest? Should I taste it to see? What do YOU do?

I have never noticed diacetyl when using that yeast. I always warm all my fermentations up towards the end anyway though, helps with those final points of attenuation and serves as a final cleanup.

Yeah, I mean it wont take much to pull the fermentors from the freezer and sit them in the house for a week while I am away, then keg and lager at 40ish.

Just curious what others have been doing, as these are my first two. One German Pils, one Munich Helles... hopefully one of them is a winner.

I've used it a few times and tried to do a diacetyl rest, but you never know if you got it at the right time - just before fermentation is complete. I find that just lagering cold for a few weeks makes the most impact on cleaning up the flavor. My advice would be try to do a diacetyl rest, but put the most emphasis on good lagering for as long as you can keep your grubby paws off of the beer. This is my method and I scored a 38 on a lager with 34/70 in the recent HBT comp. The reason it lost points was due to being out of style, the judges said it was perfectly clean and crisp with no fermentation issues.