Keep Cold Break in?

How many of you keep the cold break material in the wort?

Lately I have been working on my technique to keep all of the trub out of my wort, I think I finally did it. I ended up with crystal clear wort except the cold break material that settled out quickly.

I have heard the cold break is actually good for your beer, more food for the yeasties. And I heard it can cause problems... What is your experience with cold break?

Next beer I'm going to whirlpool after the chill and try to leave all the break behind. This batch I just poured it all in and its taking forever to clear.

hot and cold go into mine . Beer always clears up fine

It settles out, especially with a cold crash.

Yea usually it just settles out just no worries. I'm to lazy to separate the cold break.

What exactly is cold break? Hops and such left over after boiling? I send my wort through a strainer into my primary but it still always looks murky. I dont have much patience so I usualy have cloudy beer. Will letting the beer sit for a while clear this up?

Adam78k - How is your left hand milk clone? Im brewing this next weekend from a recipe found here, think its the same one?

ECUbrewer said:

What exactly is cold break? Hops and such left over after boiling? I send my wort through a strainer into my primary but it still always looks murky. I dont have much patience so I usualy have cloudy beer. Will letting the beer sit for a while clear this up?

Adam78k - How is your left hand milk clone? Im brewing this next weekend from a recipe found here, think its the same one?

Click to expand...

cold break is the coagulated proteins that form when you rapidly chill the wort. It looks like big gobs of egg drop soup. I'll find a good picture so you can see what I mean.

Edit- here's a photo from Richbrewer's gallery. He made a starter, and chilled it to pitch the yeast. Here's the result:


Clear wort like that leads to clear beer. The hot break and cold break fall out, and those are proteins that can cause hazy beer.

I don't strain mine out- I have a CFC now, so it all goes into the fermenter.

even with whirl pooling you still get some cold break, less,, I started whirl-pooling a couple brews ago, yes you get less cold break in the fermenter but its still there and doesn't hurt anything..maybe half as much which means more BEER YA
some even say its good for the yeast and not to remove all

I noticed when I just dump everything in the fermentor my beer ends up having a harsh off bitterness. I figured this was the trub of malt proteins and left over hop pellets. Then when I tried to keep most of it out the off harsh bitterness subsided. I just wasn't sure what the effects was to the cold break material.

Yes I to do this.....

I pour everything in and use a secondary. I get yummy clear beer.