Maturing Ales?

I usually do 10 days in the primary and 4-5 weeks in the secondary. After I can eyeball that the beer is clear I let it sit an extra week so anything my eye isn't seeing has some time to settle out.

Is this what most people do? I've been reading a lot of extract threads where dudes are going one week primary - one (or two) week secondary - bottle/keg.

for a standard, not too heavy ale, I just use the 1-2-(maybe)3 rule. 1 in primary (actually start taking grav readings after a week and see usually like you 10 days) 2 weeks in secondary and at least 3 in bottles.

4-5 weeks in secondary seems like a long time unless your making something really strong and heavy, or with a lot of fruit and other adjuncts that would take a long time to clear.


You just have more patience than I do!

yeah - for a hefe or something I would probably just blitz through it and keg it.

I just pitched some WL001 California Ale yeast in my last brew (this is my first time using it) last Saturday. Its still rocking out at full bubble in the airlock today. I'm excited to see how it turns out.

Lately my proceedure has been 3 weeks in primary, 1 week in secondary (if I use a secondary, sometimes I just go straight to bottle).

For my Ordinary Bitter, which was a small beer at around 1.038, I just did 2 weeks in primary and then bottled.

For my Christmas ale, which is much bigger at 1.075, I'll go 3 - 4 weeks primary, 2 weeks in secondary, then bottle. I prefer to bottle condition beers that need a long time to mature.

How long do you typically bottle condition for?

drsocc said:

How long do you typically bottle condition for?

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Depends on the beer. Normally, the bigger the beer the longer you should wait. Small beers like bitters are ready to drink as soon as they are carbonated. I brewed my Christmas beer on March 1 and I plan to let it sit until Christmas. I'm no Paul Masson...[thread=55733]I've been known to drink beer before its time[/thread].

drsocc said:

How long do you typically bottle condition for?

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I don't crack my first beer of the batch until 3 weeks have passed in the bottle...it's hard to wait, but I know that before 3 weeks the beer will most likely not be fully carbonated and/or will be green. But it still I guess depends on the style...I know my stout took more like 6 weeks before it was perfect. My orange ginger dortmunder was dead on at 3 weeks. My pumpkin Porter took nearly 3 months to be drinkable...I figure it was because of all the fermentables from the pumpkin, mollases and brown sugar in it.