I know it's "normal" to sometimes get fermentation without any krausen, but has anyone figured out possible causes to the phenomenom ? I brewed two beers this weekend: a saison and a milk stout. Both used pils as their base.
The saison developped 4 inches of sticky, gooey krausen on top of the beer.
The milk stout, not so much. I pitched @ 64F with rehydrated S-04 at 5:00 pm Sunday and fermentation started within 5 hours. It developped a good amount of the first foam before the krausen, but there's no krausen and the fermentation is VERY active. The CO2 escaping sounds absolutely nuts, like champagne degassing, and I see a lot of activity, but there's no gunk around the edges and no yeast on top.
I googled for the problem and found this thread: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/why-no-krausen-during-fermentation-445513/, which is also about krausen less fermentation and the author notes that:
a) The beer had lactose, like mine.
b) The wort produced a lot of foam, like mine did. It was crazy. The hydrometer sample still had foam blocking the reading after 6 hours standing at room temperature in the test jug.
Just to get it out of the way, I don't use any soap of any kind in my process and I didn't use any detergent on any tools or equipment between the two brew sessions. I rinsed my kettle and mash tun with scalding water and scrubbed on Saturday after brewing the Saison, knowing I would probably brew the next day.
Anyody has similar experiences with lactose ?
The saison developped 4 inches of sticky, gooey krausen on top of the beer.
The milk stout, not so much. I pitched @ 64F with rehydrated S-04 at 5:00 pm Sunday and fermentation started within 5 hours. It developped a good amount of the first foam before the krausen, but there's no krausen and the fermentation is VERY active. The CO2 escaping sounds absolutely nuts, like champagne degassing, and I see a lot of activity, but there's no gunk around the edges and no yeast on top.
I googled for the problem and found this thread: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/why-no-krausen-during-fermentation-445513/, which is also about krausen less fermentation and the author notes that:
a) The beer had lactose, like mine.
b) The wort produced a lot of foam, like mine did. It was crazy. The hydrometer sample still had foam blocking the reading after 6 hours standing at room temperature in the test jug.
Just to get it out of the way, I don't use any soap of any kind in my process and I didn't use any detergent on any tools or equipment between the two brew sessions. I rinsed my kettle and mash tun with scalding water and scrubbed on Saturday after brewing the Saison, knowing I would probably brew the next day.
Anyody has similar experiences with lactose ?