Gelatin

I have read a few things online about using Gelatin to clear your beer...but as usual there are differing theories..so i come to you...when do you use Gelatin and does it inhibit alcohol/head etc...

I use it in my secondary about a week before I keg it. No effect on head retention or other side effects that I noticed. Crystal clear beer!

I just started experimenting with it.

So far i've added it to warm beer that was in keg then cooled.

Crash cooled beer in a keg then added it.

Out of those two, both were clearer than not fined beer, but the crashed first then added seemed to work better.

My next batch will be crashed cooled in a Carboy then transferred to a keg with gelatin already in the bottom of the keg.

what about bottle conditioned?

There is enough yeast left to carbonate in the bottle, there should be no problems.

I typically only use it when using a less flocculant yeast like 001. If I'm using 002 or something similar I don't bother. I use it in the keg - though if I'm not washing yeast I wouldn't hesitate to use it in the primary (at cold temps), there's a thread on here with a good writeup - using the microwave and knox gelatin. Simple process, leave it for about a week.

I've added to the keg and ended up with clogged dip tubes if the keg gets disturbed at all.

It's worked fantastically since I started doing a secondary addition. Depending on the brew, I use 1 or 2 packets of unflavored gelatin from the grocery store dissolved into water that I bring to about 140 to 160 F (don't boil!). Put that in secondary, rack the beer and wait at least 3 days, then rack to the keg.

My first rye beer was extremely cloudy and had a yellowish color. My second, which I added gelatin to the keg, had a copper color but was still hazy. My third, is brilliantly copper and commercial quality clear (secondary gelatin addition). My recipe for these was 1/3 rye malt. I've experienced similar results with other brews since I started using gelatin. I highly recommend it in the secondary.

Add the dissolved gelatin to room temperature beer, then chill it for a few days. Adding it to pre-chilled beer will make jello blobs.

Does this kind work?

badbrew said:

Does this kind work?

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That will work very well. Look around for a "store" brand should you decide to add this to your regular process, I buy 20 envelopes for less than $4.00.

bigbeergeek said:

Add the dissolved gelatin to room temperature beer, then chill it for a few days. Adding it to pre-chilled beer will make jello blobs.

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Never had that problem and I always chill my kegged beer for a few days and then add gelatin. I have read that it doesn't work unless the "chill haze" is present, which it wouldn't be if the beer is warm. YMMV

brew2enjoy said:

Never had that problem and I always chill my kegged beer for a few days and then add gelatin. I have read that it doesn't work unless the "chill haze" is present, which it wouldn't be if the beer is warm. YMMV

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This is not true. The charges on the gelatin will attract and bind to haze causing proteins (and yeast) no matter what the temperature, and whether you can see them or not. This actually works better the warmer it is.

What cold temps do is to help the agglomerations of gelatin molecules and what has bound to them to then settle out.

I make mead (mostly JAOM), and I have found gelatin to be a magic bullet. The nasty lees are much less likely to return to solution after a minor jostling of the carboy...

I'd like to point out that if you add gelatin to your beer, you should disclose it to any vegan/vegetarian friends that you share it with! I know that pretty much none of it will make it into the glass, but some people don't like it on principle (for the same reason that most vegans won't touch Guinness due to the isinglass).

zachattack said:

I'd like to point out that if you add gelatin to your beer, you should disclose it to any vegan/vegetarian friends that you share it with! I know that pretty much none of it will make it into the glass, but some people don't like it on principle (for the same reason that most vegans won't touch Guinness due to the isinglass).

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With all do respect if I'm giving something I made away (homebrew, bread, pastries or what not) if someone has an allergy, adverse reaction to, a difference in principle or religious belief with a particular "thing" it is their responsibility to imo to ask the question(s) before they consume any (homemade)product they did not make. I have many friends that I share my homemade thing with and they have friends that they may share with, I cant keep track of all of their needs. Just my $.02

bad67z said:

With all do respect if I'm giving something I made away (homebrew, bread, pastries or what not) if someone has an allergy, adverse reaction to, a difference in principle or religious belief with a particular "thing" it is their responsibility to imo to ask the question(s) before they consume any (homemade)product they did not make. I have many friends that I share my homemade thing with and they have friends that they may share with, I cant keep track of all of their needs. Just my $.02

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I guess I don't disagree with this, but I'd argue that in general, most people wouldn't expect an animal-based product to appear in beer. Though it does seem like anybody that would care enough (i.e. a strict vegan) would know that it's a possibility, since most of them seem to know about the use of isinglass in Guinness.

I understand your point, but I guess one of the main reasons I homebrew is to share it with people, and it doesn't seem like any extra work to say "hey, here's a 6 pack, there's a negligible amount of gelatin in there if you're worried about that type of thing." It's not about responsibility, just about being friendly. I'm being nice enough to share my beer with them, I might as well continue to be nice and disclose any ingredients that they might have a problem with.

I guess if you give out homebrew, bread, cookies, or whatever to your friends it's never a responsibility to begin with, you're being nice and doing them a favor. So why not go all the way? I'm giving beer to someone to make them happy and share something awesome with them, giving someone that avoids animal products a beer that I clarified with gelatin goes against that.

If I bring a batch of cookies into work, and they contain nuts, I leave a little sign saying there's nuts in them. I don't feel any responsibility to do so, just being nice. If I wasn't nice I wouldn't bring them cookies in the first place

To echo what you said, I mean no disrespect! Just sharing my viewpoint

OK I guess my "cookies containing nuts" analogy doesn't exactly hold up, since that's an allergy issue and not simply a dietary preference issue. So disregard that!

I currently have to "extract w/specialty grains" kits fermenting at 68 degrees:
1. Northern Brewer Smashing Pumpkin Ale
2. B3 Stout

After 2 weeks in a 6 gal Better Bottle, I transferred the B3 Stout into a 5 gal carboy for secondary. Since my son was using my other 5 gal carboy, I decided to leave the Pumpkin Ale in the primary. Others on the forum as well as my LHBS expert advise against secondarying beers unless they're really big.

As I've sampled the Pumpkin Ale thru the valve near the bottom of the Better Bottle, I've noticed that it's incredibly cloudy. It's now been 4 weeks in the primary. The gravity was 1.012 @ 68* yesterday. The O.G. was 1.054.

Is there a way to use gelatin to make the beer look better at this point?
I plan to bottle this beer using bottling sugar.

Thanks,
Keith

brew2enjoy said:

Never had that problem and I always chill my kegged beer for a few days and then add gelatin. I have read that it doesn't work unless the "chill haze" is present, which it wouldn't be if the beer is warm. YMMV

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How do you add it to the chilled beer? Mix with some water first?

Also if you add to keg, do you get a clogged dip tube or anything?

ghart999 said:

How do you add it to the chilled beer? Mix with some water first?

Also if you add to keg, do you get a clogged dip tube or anything?

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If you use poor technique you can get beer jello which could clog the dip tube.

The idea is to dissolve the gelatin and then thoroughly mix it with the beer. If you don't mix well, you could get clumps, which negates much of the action of the gelatin. The colder your beer, the more careful you have to be about the mixing.

i have seen about 10 different ways on how to use gelatin. the directions on my ld carlson gelatin says to disolve for an hour, then bring to a boil. others say not to boil. whats the best way?

From what I read it seems that boiling the water first. Let it cool to about 140F and then add. Let it bloom for awhile and then add to beer/wort.

hey, i'm kinda new to all this, but i have a quick question: do you need to cold crash when using gelatin? i don't have the equipment to do that properly, so my plan would be to rack the beer at room temp and then add gelatin to help clear the beer. would that work? i'm making a strawberry beer and i want to rack to a third fermenter after the beer was in the 2nd with the berries. thanks!

Yes, it will still work. Being colder just makes it work faster.

thanks!