Filtering that Liquid Gold
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shaundesjardins
Well-Known Member
You need that yeast in your bottle in order for your beer to carbonate. The yeast will eat up the priming sugar you put in the bottle/batch and the by-product of that is CO2.
I'm just a newbie so please correct me if I'm wrong on this.
Well I might as well post my obligatary rant on this subject...CTRL-V
This comes up a lot from new brewers, especially since we in the states have grown up with fizzy yellow DEAD BEER as opposed beer cultures where living beers (such as homebrew) are consumed...
Here's a rant I wrote on this subject, don't take it personal I'm not ranting at you....It just contains some info you might be able to use in your edumacation of you, your friends and family about "living beers."
Some homebrewers on here who make labels for the beers they give away usually have a note on it about living yeasts and pouring properly. IIRC, someone on here has a logo with a graphic on one of the side panels showing how to pour. If you are giving your beers away you might want to consider doing the same.
I wish I could recall who did it for the label.
Anyway here's the "rant." (like I said it was to someone else.)
See there are actually more commercial bottle conditioned WITH YEAST SEDIMENT in stores, in bottleshops, and in most of our fridges than there are dead and filtered beers...
I enter contests...and placed decently last summer....in fact the biggest comments I got this summer was on the CLARITY of my beer..one of my beers was describes as being jewell like...and ruby like...I believe it comes from the fact that I leave it in primary for a month..use finings to clear it, and give it a nice period of bottle conditioning, make sure I cool the wort quicky and chill long enough to eliminate haze..... In other words brew properly....
If you work on you beer process, AND pour properly yeast sediment is not really an issue...it's a tiny bit of beer left behind in the bottle where there is a glass of uber clear beer. There's no yeast in this beerglass of mine, what little there is is still in the bottle.
Even if you do decide to go the expensive route of some sort of filter setup, you are going to do what the BMC manufacturers end up doing, sacrificing flavor for the sake of comsetic clarity...you can't really filter the yeast out in such a way that lets all the complex flavors of your beers come through...so of those
proteins and other things that give you beer a freshness get filtered out too.
Hope this helps you be a better beer advocate!!!
We even had the telling your friends disccusion before...
Who said you have to be an "uptight wanker" to educate?
I present to you;
So, what's wankery about that?
Remember Yeast is your friend!
This comes up a lot from new brewers, especially since we in the states have grown up with fizzy yellow DEAD BEER as opposed beer cultures where living beers (such as homebrew) are consumed...
Here's a rant I wrote on this subject, don't take it personal I'm not ranting at you....It just contains some info you might be able to use in your edumacation of you, your friends and family about "living beers."
Some homebrewers on here who make labels for the beers they give away usually have a note on it about living yeasts and pouring properly. IIRC, someone on here has a logo with a graphic on one of the side panels showing how to pour. If you are giving your beers away you might want to consider doing the same.
I wish I could recall who did it for the label.
Anyway here's the "rant." (like I said it was to someone else.)
Drink bud....otherwise get used to it.
It's a fact of life when you make living beers. Unless you keg or force carb there needs to be living yeast in your beer to carb and conditiion.
Rather than try to avoid it you should relish in the fact that you have made REAL LIVING BEER as opposed to tasteless and processed commercial crap...It's not to be dreaded it's to be celebrated.
Learn to pour homebrew properly and get over it...
[youtube]xyXn4UBjQkE[/youtube]
The Belgians practically worship it, for all it's healthful benefits...
Think of carbing/conditioning as another (but tiny) fermentation, in a small (12, 16, or 22 ounce) carboy. The yeast converts the sugar (priming solution) to a miniscule amount of alcohol (not really enough to change the abv of the beer) and CO2...The CO2 builds up in the headspace, is trapped and is reabsorbed in the solution...
Most of the time we don't notice this, (except for new brewers who stare at their bottles then start a "wtf" thread) but depending on the yeast, a mini krauzen forms on top of the bottle, then it falls, like in your fermenter and that becomes the "sludge" at the bottom of the bottles. As it falls it also scrubs the beer clean of many off flavors on the way down.
This is very similar to the trub at the bottom of your fermenter, only obvioulsy much much smaller.
Now some yeast are more flocculant then others, also depending on some brewing things one may do, some beers have very little noticeable yeast at the bottom, either because it just din't form that much OR it wasn't very flocculant and it is still in solution.
A long primary helps tighten the cake in primary, as does crash cooling...Racking to a secondary, adding finings and crash cooling all affect how much yeast is in suspension in the beer to help carb it...Also the type of yeast will change the amount of apparant yeast in the bottom, or in solution...
Also chilling the bottles down for at least a week after the 3 weeks @ 70 will help make the beer clearer and pull the yeast down to the bottom.
When I bottle I always run the autosiphon once across the bottom of the fermenter to make sure I DO kick up enough yeast for carbonation.
A lot of my beers have very little yeast at the bottom of the bottle, some appear to not have any at all, even though they seem to carb up fine.
also remember SOME beers, like Hefes are supposed to be cloudy with suspended yeasts.
For me personally, sometimes I intentionally dump the yeast in my glass, other times I do the "pour to the shoulder" method, where you watch the yeast mover up to the shoulder of the beer, and stop pouring just as the yeast is about to come out...
Now as opposed to the OP that thinks filtered dead beers are better than real beers, here's a pretty comrehensive list of all the commercial beers that are bottle conditioned...it's not too up to date though...but it is impressive...this is what a lot of us who ACTUALLY BOTTLE HARVEST THE GLORIOUS YEASTS from beers to capture the strains, use as a rough reference...
Yeasts from Bottle Conditioned Beers
Now if you look at this list, and then compare it to the "clear beers" (meaning BMC) you will quickly see that the kind of beer the OP is referring to is actually in the minority..
See there are actually more commercial bottle conditioned WITH YEAST SEDIMENT in stores, in bottleshops, and in most of our fridges than there are dead and filtered beers...
I enter contests...and placed decently last summer....in fact the biggest comments I got this summer was on the CLARITY of my beer..one of my beers was describes as being jewell like...and ruby like...I believe it comes from the fact that I leave it in primary for a month..use finings to clear it, and give it a nice period of bottle conditioning, make sure I cool the wort quicky and chill long enough to eliminate haze..... In other words brew properly....
If you work on you beer process, AND pour properly yeast sediment is not really an issue...it's a tiny bit of beer left behind in the bottle where there is a glass of uber clear beer. There's no yeast in this beerglass of mine, what little there is is still in the bottle.
Even if you do decide to go the expensive route of some sort of filter setup, you are going to do what the BMC manufacturers end up doing, sacrificing flavor for the sake of comsetic clarity...you can't really filter the yeast out in such a way that lets all the complex flavors of your beers come through...so of those
proteins and other things that give you beer a freshness get filtered out too.
Hope this helps you be a better beer advocate!!!
We even had the telling your friends disccusion before...
Who said you have to be an "uptight wanker" to educate?
I present to you;
Yeastie Boyz
A one act play by Revvy
Cast
HB) = Homebrewer
G) = Guest.
Scene, a living room, G and HB are hanging out watching the game.
HB) Hey you wanna try one of my beers?
G) Sure
HB grabs bottle, glass and bottle opener. Proceeds to open and pour beer properly.
HB) I dunno if you know this, but as opposed to BMC's this beer and most micro brews are alive?
G)Huh? Wha?
HB) They're still alive. See the macroswill makers pretty much kill their beers so they last on the shelf. They pasturize them and filter out the yeast, and to me, most of the flavor...that's why I like to brew, and like to go to brewpubs and stuff.
But these beers, and ones like Rogue, and Bell's don't filter, in fact the yeast is still in the bottle and that's how the beer gets carbonated.
B) Really?
HB holds up bottle to the light, showing the dregs.
HB) Yeah, see this stuff at the bottom? That's the yeast....notice how clear your beer is? If I had poured it in you beer it would have been cloudy, but I poured the beer til this stuff got to the shoulder of the bottle, leaving it behind.
HB knocks back the yeast dregs.
Actually the stuffs really good for you it's full of vitamin b and stuff. Sometimes I don't bother leaving it behind and just dump it in the bottle. And some beers like Wheats are meant to be cloudy with suspended yeast. There's different types of beer yeasts, and they give beers different tastes. Some yeast give the beer the flavor of Banana, or cloves.
Or like this beer here the yeast gives it this quality (Hb describes the yeast in the beer guest is drinking.) Can you taste it?
Some of us homebrewers actually capture the yeast from some of the beers, and grow our own cultures with them. Some are really awesome and hard to get.
G)Wow, I didn't know you knew so much about this stuff...cool.
HB) Thanks, didja know that the yeasts are so important to the Belgian brewers that guard their yeast like it was fort knox? Some of them take it so seriously that they actually filter out the strain they fermented with, and then replace it with a different one to bottle carb and condition them? They actually take out one strain (like the BMC'ers do) BUT they still add yeast at bottling time...it's that important to them.
G) What?
HB) Yeah and brewers and even some homebrewers who go to Belgian, actually try to steal samples of the yeast.
G) No ****?
HB) Yeah it's pretty wild, huh? Hey you wanna try another of my beers, maybe a wheat or a belgian that has a really yeasty character?
G) Yeah sure.
HB hands G a bottle, class and bottle openner
HB)Ok dude, I showed you how to pour to the shoulder of the bottle, so why don't you give it a try?
G) Cool! So will you teach me how to brew sometime?
HB) Yeah, I'm brewing this weekend, come on by Sat. Morning.
Smiles knowing he's converted another one to the 'darkside.'
G) SO can I make a beer like bud lite?
HB smacks G over the head with beer bottle
The End
(Just kidding about the last part)
So, what's wankery about that?
Remember Yeast is your friend!
Evan!
Well-Known Member
I don't filter. That involves a pump and a plate filter and all sorts of nonsense that isn't necessary if you're not a commercial operation.
Personally, the best clarifier is coldness. Crash-cool that thing to as close to freezing as you can get it for as long as you can wait. If you want to speed the process along, you can use fining agents like gelatin, isinglass, or my favorite, KC Superkleer (shellfish finings). These products are added to the beer, and form an invisible "net" of ions that are positively charged. As the net settles, it attracts particulate in the beer and drags it down to the bottom. Using these finings in conjunction with crash-cooling is the best method short of filtering.
Personally, the best clarifier is coldness. Crash-cool that thing to as close to freezing as you can get it for as long as you can wait. If you want to speed the process along, you can use fining agents like gelatin, isinglass, or my favorite, KC Superkleer (shellfish finings). These products are added to the beer, and form an invisible "net" of ions that are positively charged. As the net settles, it attracts particulate in the beer and drags it down to the bottom. Using these finings in conjunction with crash-cooling is the best method short of filtering.
Evan!
Well-Known Member
Rev, you need to stay off the crack.
(Someone is bound to come along and make their obligatory Méthode Champenoise statement...trouble is, noone on here has ACTUALLY DONE IT FOR THEIR BEER. And the club that did it is like the ultimate homebrew club on north america, and their stuff is a little beyond a single homebrewer trying to do it to 2 cases of beer.)
homebrewer_99
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...or start sharing...
Actually, the longer you let it sit in the secondary the clearer it'll be.
The clearer the brew going into the bottle the cleaner it will be coming out.
Of course, if you cold crashed and kegged you shouldn't have any sediment.
alpo
Well-Known Member
I am going to cold crash for the first time this weekend. Any tips, other than putting the secondary in the fridge for as cold as possible for a day or two? Or is that pretty much all there is to it?
...or start sharing...
Actually, the longer you let it sit in the secondary the clearer it'll be.
The clearer the brew going into the bottle the cleaner it will be coming out.
Of course, if you cold crashed and kegged you shouldn't have any sediment.
Well I don't secondary I month primary and my beer is crystal clear...
Oh look, what's this, and article in a recent issue of the NY Times about a beer with Yeast in the bottle???
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/07/dining/07wine.html?_r=1&ref=dining
(from a thread that just got posted.)
Evan!
Well-Known Member
Other than dipping your junk in it for good luck, that's all there is to it.
JoeMama
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flyangler18
Well-Known Member
I'm not nearly as eloquent as our dear Evan!
, so I'll just say that while a day or two is good, a week is even better.
I'm not nearly as eloquent as our dear Evan!
Jason, do you or Evan! know what the "warmest" minimum temp you can cold crash at? Is it just any temp below the bottom temp range of the yeast?
Since I don't have the space to coldcrash anything, but I do have a storage locker that gets down to the 50's in my APT Building's garage (Where I have my first lager going right now) I was wondering if I could cold crash an ale in there. It may not take a lot of the proteins out of solution, but it would pull the yeasties down, and maybe take other things down with it....Right?
shaundesjardins
Well-Known Member
flyangler18
Well-Known Member
Not sure about the practical limits; I'd think you'd have more success combining the cold-crashing with one of the fining agents Evan recommended earlier rather than trying to crash-cool in the lower 50s. I usually crash my ales around 38-39; for the sake of experimentation, I may try tucking a fermenter in a cool area of my basement that's often in the mid to lower 50s (far away from the furnace). When I racked my ESB to the keg to the keg last week, it was brilliantly clear and that was just after an extended primary at the lower end of the fermentation range for the Wyeast 1968 ESB strain (64°) and this strain is ridiculously flocculant.
syd138
Well-Known Member
I have never had a problem with having yeast at the bottom of my beer. Too much sucks.. but a little bit aint bad.
Long before I even started brewing I was a huge fan of Hacker Pschor, Fransizkaner and other weiss biers.. they purposely leave yeast in there. I like it.
Long before I even started brewing I was a huge fan of Hacker Pschor, Fransizkaner and other weiss biers.. they purposely leave yeast in there. I like it.
shaundesjardins
Well-Known Member
I agree a lot of the belgian and even german wheat beers have yeast sediment and in some of them. I actually swirl the bottle and mix in the sediment of yeast on occasion depending on the beer.
Some find that gross. I on occasion enjoy it.
alpo
Well-Known Member
So, given that secondairies (secondarys?) are primarily for clarification, is there any reason to even leave the secondary at room temp at all, versus just racking to secondary and immediately putting it in the fridge? Would an extra week of bottle conditioning make up for the lessened conditioning in the secondary?
What about cold crashing the primary fermenter directly after a month or so?
Last, what about the contraction of the liquid/gases in the fermenter, with respect to the airlock?
What about cold crashing the primary fermenter directly after a month or so?
Last, what about the contraction of the liquid/gases in the fermenter, with respect to the airlock?
flyangler18
Well-Known Member
So, given that secondairies (secondarys?) are primarily for clarification, is there any reason to even leave the secondary at room temp at all, versus just racking to secondary and immediately putting it in the fridge? Would an extra week of bottle conditioning make up for the lessened conditioning in the secondary?
What is this secondary thing that you speak of?
What about cold crashing the primary fermenter directly after a month or so?
Last, what about the contraction of the liquid/gases in the fermenter, with respect to the airlock?
What's this secondary thingamawuzzit that you speak of?
There are only two instances in my brewery when I use a secondary: when I'm souring a beer (like the Berliner Weisse that is sitting in secondary now) that takes 6+ months and autolysis is a legimate concern and when bulk-aging a BIG beer. 90% of the beer that I make has an extended primary (30 days +, depending on the OG), crash-cooled in the primary to further clarify and compact the yeast cake for a week or so, then off to packaging, either in the bottle or in the keg. Depending on the depth of my pipeline, those beers may age for several months further before going into the keezer for serving.I take it that your question about about gas/liquid contraction is concerned with suck-back? I've never had a problem, but you might want to use either vodka or StarSan solution.
Evan!
Well-Known Member
In my experience, there's no big line in the sand where it stops working, it's more of a sliding scale. The colder it is, the faster it seems to work, in my experience. Hell, I have a cider in my brewhouse right now that I never crash cooled, but it has cleared brilliantly and I could read a newspaper through it. And my ambient brewhouse temps are usually in the upper 50's to lower 60's from fall through spring. But the closer to freezing you get, the faster it works.
Uh...just make sure you don't share it with your significant other
Most don't appreciate dutch ovens.
orangeandblue302
Well-Known Member
who doesn't like a good dutch oven
alpo
Well-Known Member
As a follow up, I cold crashed my last couple brews. I haven't drank any of it yet, but I think it did look a little clearer than when I put it in. It was hard to tell, plus I had never made either of those recipes before so I have nothing to compare it to, but I guess we'll see. FWIW, I did use Irish moss also.
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