cold conditioning ales

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Jack

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I think I might be interested in cold conditioning an ESB I'm planning, but I've never tried it before, so I want to double check a couple things.

According to Palmer, you want to bring the temperature down like you're lagering for a week. Does this mean as cold as I can get it above freezing? I'm planning on putting my carboy on ice for the last week in the secondary.

Is there any chance that I'd crash out my yeast and make bottle conditioning impossible? That's probably my biggest fear.
 
I'd probably bring it down to 38-40 if I were you, but as long as you don't actually freeze the beer, you won't harm the yeast. Yeast die in cold temperatures when the cell walls get punctured by sharp ice crystal formation. Keep that from happening, and you should still have viable yeast when you warm it back up for conditioning.
 
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