How Do They Do It? Commercial 'Bottle Conditoned' Brews W/O Sediment?

Yakima 728
Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
zgardener

zgardener

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 23, 2009
Messages
242
Reaction score
2
Location
Austin, TX
I was pouring a very nice New Belgium Trippel the other day when I noticed that the label advertised that the brew was bottle conditioned. When I looked at the bottome of the bottle, however, I noticed that there was no trace of sediment or fallen yeast that I usually associate with bottle conditioned brews, so, my question is... How do they do it?
:confused:
 
They filter or centrifuge to remove all of the yeast and then add back just enough yeast to carbonate the bottle. So fewer cells and the newer cells are smaller.
 
A lot of them just wait for their beer to clear before bottling. Most of us bottle way too early.


Ideally, you shouldn't even be moving to secondary until the beer is clear. Most of what people think is yeast in bottle conditioned homebrew is a combination of protiens and other things that just hadn't settled out when the beer went into the bottle.

The answer, like everything else in this hobby, is probably "wait longer"
 
Yeah Sierra Nevada is a good example of bottle conditioned beer that has almost no sediment. They filter and add back a precise amount.

Another way is the Champagne Method of inverting the bottles so the yeast goes to the neck, freezing the yeast and ejecting it, then quickly recorking. But not too many people are doing that outside of France or for beer. Drew Beechum did a nice write up of the process for homebrewers http://www.maltosefalcons.com/tech/methode-champenoise-beer
 

Similar threads

MaxStout
I've been invited to do a pro/am brew. I'm stoked!
2
Replies
66
Views
4K
Hoppy2bmerry
Hoppy2bmerry
F
How do commercial breweries bottle
Replies
8
Views
975
CascadesBrewer
CascadesBrewer
zadamxtr
Have I removed all viable yeast?
Replies
13
Views
1K
Kees
Kees
U
Is this mold, or just lees sediment?
Replies
1
Views
1K
user 339788
U
samosbrew
Dry hopping w Grainfather GF30 conical fermenter
Replies
1
Views
894
DoctorJ
D

Latest posts

Back
Top