Does freezing a beer affect head retention?

A thermocouple went out on my lagering chamber and I ended up creating a giant beer ice block. I am carbonating it now, and there seems to be no head retention at all, even though everything else is going well. Could this have come from the freezing? or is it something else in my process?

Joshua

I don't think so man. I have a porter on tap right now that was dang near frozen solid (not the first time it's happened either) and it's fine. I get a nice 2 finger head at 12 psi with 10 ft lines.

How long has it been on the gas b/c it's carb level will effect that.

I've been worried about the same thing because I've been keeping mine out in the garage. What is the freezing point of beer?

Freezing can precipitate the proteins needed for head retention, but not always.

The water in beer freezes out at 32F. If you could keep the beer mixed, you'd get a few degrees lower.

Yeah, we were talking about this in a thread the other day. It's very rare that you actually get a keg that's completely frozen b/c typically 5% of a beer is alcohol. Therefore, around 5% +_ a bit will not be frozen. I'm sure you could figure it out, but I'm too lazy.

I'd better put a thermometer in the garage then. I thought beer would stay liquid well below 32F because it has alcohol in solution but I don't know where the onset of phase change is.

It was 21F here this morning. I had left a bottle of Corona in the garage on the floor as an indicator - sort of the canary in the mine - and it wasn't frozen this morning. I get some heating in there from the house, but don't really know what the delta to the outside is.

btw - I apologize for hijacking the thread here.