It's true, leaving clarifier too long will kill your hop profile

I put some in my Nut Brown Ale and left it way too long. Like 3 weeks, because I hadn't hit my target. I've been trying to figure out what is wrong with my batch, and I've figured out that my clarifier was the problem. It tastes plenty malty, but the hops just aren't there.

Sucks for me but even though I missed my target and killed the hop flavor, it's still drinkable. It's a heck of a session beer. Isn't homebrewing great! I get to drink my mistakes. Unlike sport f***ing where you end up raising your mistakes!

i've never used clarifier. But reading this just makes me think that i should never use it.

It's supposed to be OK if you don't wait too long, but I wouldn't know. I normally use Irish Moss in the boil, and haven't had a problem with it.

how long are you suppose to leave it in for?

What kind of fining was it?

I always heard Irish moss at 45 minutes into the boil. But I have the same question as Cheyco - wudja use? When?

Dang, I just tried to find the bottle and couldn't. I'm pretty sure it was gelatin. It was a light tan powder. I put it in like 3 weeks before I kegged and about 2 weeks after it had been in the secondary.

God Emporer BillyBrew said:

Dang, I just tried to find the bottle and couldn't. I'm pretty sure it was gelatin. It was a light tan powder. I put it in like 3 weeks before I kegged and about 2 weeks after it had been in the secondary.

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Gelatin is supposed to be used just a few days (3 days) before bottling (or kegging). Dissolve in water and add to the fermenter.

With gelatin, I don't think it could strip out the hop profile because the stuff floats around for a couple of days and then sinks to the bottom (taking proteins and whatnot with it.) After this, it just stays on the bottom and shouldn't be able to pull anything else out of the beer (unless you are rousing the secondary or something.) I might be wrong there, but that's the impression I get with the way fining agets work.

-walker

I thought I had read that reason you didn't add it more than 3 days ahead of time was that it would kill the hops. I dunno, but something took the taste out of this beer.

God Emporer BillyBrew said:

I thought I had read that reason you didn't add it more than 3 days ahead of time was that it would kill the hops. I dunno, but something took the taste out of this beer.

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That might be true. When I was reading up on using gelatin, I thought that it was suggested to do it 3 days before bottling because that's all the time it needed to do it's business, and no additional clearing would happen after that.

Like I said, I might be wrong about it.

On a related note: I used gelatin ONE TIME. I didn't think that it actually made much of a difference in clarity and felt it certainly wasn't worth the time spent for yet another step/procedure in my brewing regime (not to mention that it's just one more chance to contaminate a batch.)

-walker

Yeah, I think the moss is the way to go. can't contaminate and it's just tossing it in during your boil.

Anyone heard of a product called Supermoss? My LHBS guy suggested it because it also contains a yeast nutrient, supposedly. Anyhow he tells me to throw it in the wort in the last 15 min of the boil. The reason I ask is that it looks like gelatin, kinda a tan powder. I've only used it once but after two weeks in the secondary, not much hop flavor came though with the beer.

I use a powder that is called "Clear Wort" that I add for the last ten minutes of the boil. It's basically the active ingredient of Irish Moss.

I don't think there's any reason why anyone should be afraid to use it, but on the other hand neither am I religious about it. In my first batch I forgot about it alltogether and eventually the beer cleared well anyway.

Aside from that I'm not too fussed about clearing. The main thing is the taste and I actually find that a bit of haziness can look really beautiful in the beer.


Cheers,

Jens-Kristian

Well, my LHBS guy disagreed with my theory same as Walker. He says the clarifier wouldn't do that. Still, I know he's brewed a lot of beers, but I don't know that he knows more than some of the people here.

For those that are interested, I found out some stuff about Super Moss from the net and it seems to be made by the friendly boys and girls at 5 Star chemicals (Makers of StarSan).

And it seems to simply be ground up Irish Moss. Here's a bit from thier Website:

"SUPER MOSS is a negatively-charged, red seaweed based, Kapa and Lambda carrageenan
coagulant designed to attract the positively-charged, haze forming proteins together in the
brew kettle and primary fermenter then settle out. Supper Moss has been formulated to mix
rapidly in cold water. This feature allows it to be added directly to the bowl without creating fish
eyes of undissolved carrageenan. Properly used, it can help reduce chill haze."

So there you go, for those that are interested like I was.

God Emporer BillyBrew said:

Well, my LHBS guy disagreed with my theory same as Walker. He says the clarifier wouldn't do that. Still, I know he's brewed a lot of beers, but I don't know that he knows more than some of the people here.

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He may have brewed a lot of beer, but if he didn't use clarifiers in the fermenters, then he really doesn't know, does he?

I've heard it said before that a fining agent can strip hops, but I don't know that I ever saw it from a credible 'expert', and it might be an urban legend of sorts.

From my one experience with gelatin, I wouldn't say the hops were stripped, but (a) I only used it 3 days before bottling and (b) the beer I used it in was a brown ale that was very light in hops character to begin with.

brew on!

-walker

Imperial Walker said:

He may have brewed a lot of beer, but if he didn't use clarifiers in the fermenters, then he really doesn't know, does he?

-walker

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...zackly!

OK, I might not be an "expert" but clarifiers are just that. They strip solids from the wort to make a clear looking beer. I use all sorts of finnings without any flavor loss. I have used gelatin, issinglass, irish moss/whirfloc, sparkoloid and polyclar in my brews. As you can tell I'm hung up on clear looking beer and although my beer tasts great when hazy it isn't the same as clear beer. I have even gone to the extreme of filtering my beer to be put into kegs. Nothing I have done yet has stripped any flavor from my beer. That's my 2¢ worth.