Beyond the crisp, clean, clear lager

[Upstate12866]

This past year I tried a few lagers and liked them quite a bit. I was afraid lager required a special setup, but it's been OK in a lazy, ambient temperature situation like mine (50-65 F). I thought the yeast was a delicate little flower but it is tougher than it's reputation implies!

I noticed how light and wispy 34/70 and California lager yeast can be in the bottle. Without special tools, I am always dodging yeast clouds.

This got me thinking. Has anyone embraced the haze and made a cloudy lager? My lager recipe is pretty similar to a pale ale already, and I usually put wheat in there too. In some ways it seems like a NEIPA in that we have a neutral yeast, pale malts with some wheat, turbidity unless I work to reduce it, etc. Alternatively, what would stop someone from just replacing ale yeast for lager in a NEIPA recipe? Just curious if such a concept exists out there. It seems like there are fewer variations on lager styles, which seems odd given how neutral the yeast can be.

Full disclosure, I've already started breaking some rules with lagers Besides adding wheat to most recipes, I made a multigrain with corn, wheat and oats, and I currently have a lemon-orange lager priming in bottles.

 

[VikeMan]

You might want to look into:

- Kellerbier
- India Pale Lager

 

[Snark_Wolf_Brewing]

+ 1 on the Kellerbier. It's pretty much the German equivalent of what we'd call Lite Lager here in the US, but way more flavorful.

 

[Upstate12866]

Thanks for those tips, I will check those out!

 

[passedpawn]

This past year I tried a few lagers and liked them quite a bit. I was afraid lager required a special setup, but it's been OK in a lazy, ambient temperature situation like mine (50-65 F). I thought the yeast was a delicate little flower but it is tougher than it's reputation implies!

I noticed how light and wispy 34/70 and California lager yeast can be in the bottle. Without special tools, I am always dodging yeast clouds.

This got me thinking. Has anyone embraced the haze and made a cloudy lager? My lager recipe is pretty similar to a pale ale already, and I usually put wheat in there too. In some ways it seems like a NEIPA in that we have a neutral yeast, pale malts with some wheat, turbidity unless I work to reduce it, etc. Alternatively, what would stop someone from just replacing ale yeast for lager in a NEIPA recipe? Just curious if such a concept exists out there. It seems like there are fewer variations on lager styles, which seems odd given how neutral the yeast can be.

Full disclosure, I've already started breaking some rules with lagers Besides adding wheat to most recipes, I made a multigrain with corn, wheat and oats, and I currently have a lemon-orange lager priming in bottles.

First rule of homebrewing: there are no rules. That's why we do it.

You keep saying lager, but I'm sure you mean pilsner. Pilsners are always light, but lagered beers can be any style - the BJCP classifications include a lagered robust porter (at least the old version did). I've used lager yeast in a stout and fermented cold.

If you want to minimize the yeast in your bottles, consider cold-crashing with gelatin before you bottle. Of course, kegging completely eliminates the problem, but you might not want that.

 

[Upstate12866]

You are exactly right, I think I did mean pilsner. That is about where my mind is at with my question.

 

[monkeymath]

I'm currently visiting to Regensburg in Bavaria. Last night I went to "Brauhaus am Schloss", a restaurant with a Biergarten and its own brewery (apparently it's owned by Paulaner, but they are brewing their own beers on site, with sexy copper tanks inside).
Anyway, their regular beer was called "St Emmeram Hell" and advertised as an unfiltered honey-colored lager. According to the description, it is lagered for four weeks.
Now, I've never seen a homebrew lager that came anywhere close to just how f*ing murky that stuff was. I wonder how they do it. Maybe they add some super powdery yeast on purpose, I don't know.
I had a similar experience once with a "Kellerbier" by Riegele, which is a really good brewery in Augsburg, Bavaria.

Why am I telling you this mildly interesting anecdote? The sort of "rustic", "natural" and "untreated" associations with hazy beer are gaining popularity and there is a growing market, even in "it-must-be-so-because-it-has-always-been" Germany. To the point where brewers are even purposefully enforcing a rather visually unappealing murkiness.
Even the large soulless you-can-find-me-at-every-gas-station-across-the-country breweries like Krombacher and Becks are pushing their unfiltered beers.

 

[Miraculix]

All this unfiltered hype is purely a marketing thing. A means to sell more beer, not to make beer taste better. It is always advertised as "naturally cloudy, unfiltered". People buy everything nowadays when it is "natural". If anyone of them would make a blind taste test, everyone would say the yeasty beer tastes crappy compared to the clear beer (not talking about hefeweizen, but lager and ales). But nobody does it and actually, most of the people do not know how it could taste like without the yeast. The Kellerbier hype here is also just a product of this marketing stuff.

As for the cloudy beer in the restaurant, it is very simple. Use a cloudy lager yeast, ferment till it is done, put it on gas, do not wait, serve. There is a difference between neipa hop based haze and yeast haze. I do not like either, but I would not try replace hop haze with yeast haze. That just tastes like crap.

 

[madscientist451]

As for the cloudy beer in the restaurant, it is very simple. Use a cloudy lager yeast, ferment till it is done, put it on gas, do not wait, serve. There is a difference between neipa hop based haze and yeast haze.

I thought I remembered something called protein haze or turbidity, so I looked it up, here's a decent explanation:
https://www.allagash.com/blog/what-makes-beer-hazy/?ao_confirm
I've had some decent hazy beers, and IMO its could be a marketing ploy, however SOME hazy lagers do have different mouthfeel and flavor.
We don't get a big selection of hazy German beers over here, but every now and then I enjoy one of these:

 

[Beermeister32]

There are a number of hazy, yeast-laden German beers out there, look for “naturtrub” on the label. The ones I’ve had I haven’t been to crazy for, seems to me we work so hard at getting these beers cleaned up and clear, why the heck make them murky with yeast. If you wanted that, take one of your bottle conditioned beers, swill it around and drink the yeast in your pour. Why bother.....!

Moving over to the beyond lager beers - THIS is the one you want to hunt down.... Triple Hop’d Lager by Bitburger and Sierra Nevada.... FANTASTIC!!!

 

[Upstate12866]

One thing I've learned is that anything can be good, even if it's not good. Half of life is what we decide to think about things. Beer and food are full of examples that defy better judgment. Therefore I feel no shame

Once thing that struck me previously is how un-natural or refined (pilsner) lagers are presented. Compared to ales, the below average beer consumer like myself gets the impression that lagers are downright modern or industrial. You don't hear much about some old farmers who uses a lager strain like any old other yeast, drinking it fresh, making it without a personal cave vault, adding fruit or spices, etc. This it's doubly odd since I would assume folks had no idea lager strains were any special variant biologically. "Farmhouse lager" seems uncommon to my ear. Just an oddity I've noticed from my very uninformed perspective. It seems this was inaccurate though!

Very cool to learn about the next hot thing that will surely sweep up the beer world! I visited Germany in 2008, over in Dresden. I drank a lot of Radeberger and had my first Schwartzbiers and gluwein. I gotta go back again before too long...

 

[Miraculix]

I thought I remembered something called protein haze or turbidity, so I looked it up, here's a decent explanation:
https://www.allagash.com/blog/what-makes-beer-hazy/?ao_confirm
I've had some decent hazy beers, and IMO its could be a marketing ploy, however SOME hazy lagers do have different mouthfeel and flavor.
We don't get a big selection of hazy German beers over here, but every now and then I enjoy one of these:
View attachment 731406

Yes, of course, there's also protein haze, that's true. This one actually does not take like anything and can be an indicator of a good mouthfeel. Just include around 20% unmalted grains and you will get there.

The German beers are usually just unfiltered, that's all. And if they taste good with yeast haze, they would be even better without.

 

[Witherby]

You do you but IMHO proper Franconian Kellerbier is unfiltered but not hazy. Here’s my current pale Kellerbier after only two weeks of lagering.

I didn’t have a single hazy beer in my 2019 Franconia beercation even from small family owned breweries. I have no problem with hazy lager if that is what you want but just don’t call it a Kellerbier!

 

[Dland]

Every now & then, I forget to add the Whirlfock to a batch of Pilsner, CAP, or similar. Result is different flavor, w something extra added to it, not as crisp & clear, but still fine.

 

[bwible]

All this unfiltered hype is purely a marketing thing. A means to sell more beer, not to make beer taste better. It is always advertised as "naturally cloudy, unfiltered". People buy everything nowadays when it is "natural". If anyone of them would make a blind taste test, everyone would say the yeasty beer tastes crappy compared to the clear beer (not talking about hefeweizen, but lager and ales). But nobody does it and actually, most of the people do not know how it could taste like without the yeast. The Kellerbier hype here is also just a product of this marketing stuff.

As for the cloudy beer in the restaurant, it is very simple. Use a cloudy lager yeast, ferment till it is done, put it on gas, do not wait, serve. There is a difference between neipa hop based haze and yeast haze. I do not like either, but I would not try replace hop haze with yeast haze. That just tastes like crap.

There are a number of bourbons out there now, too, that are going unfiltered. I think Jim Beam Repeal and Distiller’s Cut are 2 I’ve had. Supposed to be harkening back to pre-prohibition days or something. Advertising, as you said. Or marketing.

I’m with you, I was never on board the cloudy beer train. It just goes against everything we learned as brewers. Cloudiness is considered a fault, or at least it used to be, in all but a couple styles like Hefeweizen. And there are detailed instructions everywhere how to fix that fault in your next batch. Why intentionally make faulty beer? We don’t intentionally put our homebrew in green bottles and sit it in the sun for a couple hours to make it taste like Heineken either, do we?

 

[Upstate12866]

I'll fully admit to being poorly equipped, lazy, cheap, impatient, and... cheap!

Like the difference between still a bit hazy and crystal clear in a lager with no clarifying agents is often a matter of a couple months of aging right? (Or other methods like cold crashing Im not set up to do). My thought process has been, I see lager yeasts actually aren't a whole different species of life from ales in that they ferment to FG quickly at my temps (around 50-55 in the winter) and actually haven't been bad in the 60s. I'm not getting DMS bombs or perhaps my palette is so ignorant I can't tell. So I was thinking, why haven't people just said screw it and drink a pale lager young, and forego the crystal clarity. (Basically treat it more like an ale?) Or alternatively, wondering if there are historical styles that didn't emphasize clarity in lagers. But there's not a ton of styles or ideas that came to mind at the end of this line of thinking. One thing I learned is a useful term to put in Google: unfiltered lager.

I think I am mostly being lazy and looking for ways around clarifying or aging

This is all great food for thought and Im really happy to check out what more experienced folks think. It's an admittedly odd premise.

 

[VikeMan]

I'm not getting DMS bombs or perhaps my palette is so ignorant I can't tell.

DMS is not a function of yeast/fermentation/maturation. It's a function of grain bill, boil length, and wort cooling. Perhaps you meant Diacetyl? With good process, diacetyl should be cleaned up to below taste threshold levels by the end of fermentation (sometimes with a diacetyl rest). It's not a function of post fermentation cold conditioning (lagering). In the days of olde, german brewers relied on continued yeast activity to clean it up during a slow ramp down to lagering temps, which they started before FG had been reached. But I don't know that anyone still does that.

 

[Upstate12866]

DMS is not a function of yeast/fermentation/maturation. It's a function of grain bill, boil length, and wort cooling. Perhaps you meant Diacetyl? With good process, diacetyl should be cleaned up to below taste threshold levels by the end of fermentation (sometimes with a diacetyl rest). It's not a function of post fermentation cold conditioning (lagering). In the days of olde, german brewers relied on continued yeast activity to clean it up during a slow ramp down to lagering temps, which they started before FG had been reached. But I don't know that anyone still does that.

Yes I missed those up! I meant diacetyl from fermenting straight through with minimal or no diacetyl rest or aging.

 

[Beermeister32]

I’ve been drinking my 4/14/2021 Citra Pils using WLP833 Bock (equals WY2487 Hella Bock - Ayinger) this week. Nearly 90 days old at this point. I’ve sampled it every couple weeks. FANTASTIC!!!

Every time I bring up a 90 day lager period, I get flooded with stories of 7-day grain to glass and warm lager stories about 1 week lagering and the bunch...

.......Gotta tell ya... 90 days is MAGIC!! Something about cold lagering at 34F for 3 months turns good beer into perfection! I know you can drink it sooner.. Despite the studies it’s not needed ... 90 days makes a drinkable lager PERFECTION!!!!!

 

[Snark_Wolf_Brewing]

I’ve been drinking my 4/14/2021 Citra Pils using WLP833 Bock (equals WY2487 Hella Bock - Ayinger) this week. Nearly 90 days old at this point. I’ve sampled it every couple weeks. FANTASTIC!!!

Every time I bring up a 90 day lager period, I get flooded with stories of 7-day grain to glass and warm lager stories about 1 week lagering and the bunch...

.......Gotta tell ya... 90 days is MAGIC!! Something about cold lagering at 34F for 3 months turns good beer into perfection! I know you can drink it sooner.. Despite the studies it’s not needed ... 90 days makes a drinkable lager PERFECTION!!!!!
View attachment 734992

Nice!!!!!!

 

[VikeMan]

I’ve been drinking my 4/14/2021 Citra Pils using WLP833 Bock (equals WY2487 Hella Bock - Ayinger) this week. Nearly 90 days old at this point. I’ve sampled it every couple weeks. FANTASTIC!!!

Every time I bring up a 90 day lager period, I get flooded with stories of 7-day grain to glass and warm lager stories about 1 week lagering and the bunch...

No one week, warm lager stories here. I agree that an appropriate lagering period is pretty much essential to a true to style pilsner and most lager styles, though I think 90 days is often longer than necessary. As the lagering period increases, more stuff falls out of suspension (a good thing), but with diminishing returns. But even with the diminishing returns, longer would definitely be better (diminishing returns doesn't mean 0 returns), except for the fact that staling processes are also happening in parallel. So there's a tradeoff involved.

So how long should a lager be lagered? I'd say until it has subjectively crystal clarity and crispness, which is going to depend on the beer (not just the style, but also recipe/process details) and on personal preference.

 

[monkeymath]

I’ve been drinking my 4/14/2021 Citra Pils using WLP833 Bock (equals WY2487 Hella Bock - Ayinger) this week. Nearly 90 days old at this point. I’ve sampled it every couple weeks. FANTASTIC!!!

Every time I bring up a 90 day lager period, I get flooded with stories of 7-day grain to glass and warm lager stories about 1 week lagering and the bunch...

.......Gotta tell ya... 90 days is MAGIC!! Something about cold lagering at 34F for 3 months turns good beer into perfection! I know you can drink it sooner.. Despite the studies it’s not needed ... 90 days makes a drinkable lager PERFECTION!!!!!
View attachment 734992

As a means of celebration, you might even want to bring appropriate glassware next time
I also love the note "good tasting"

I do feel somewhat tempted to "properly lager", but it does take up an awful lot of space. And the energy consumption required to keep a constant 2-4 degrees celsius for a period of 3 months is actually not all that negligible.

 

[Beermeister32]

Yup, those are my sampler cups, I keep a ziplock bag of them in one of my beer refrigerators out in the garage. Saves having to go inside the house each time I want to sample the kegs.

Electricity - a lot of people lager kegs with their kegerators anyway, some on tap, some aging nicely waiting their turn... I have taps on 4 of my lagering kegs for pulling a sample pint whenever I’m thirsty... total of 6 kegs lagering currently.

Definitely takes up space, that’s the dirty little secret nobody tells you when you start brewing!

 

[VikeMan]

I do feel somewhat tempted to "properly lager", but it does take up an awful lot of space. And the energy consumption required to keep a constant 2-4 degrees celsius for a period of 3 months is actually not all that negligible.

During fall/winter heating months, think of it as an auxiliary space heater. In the final reckoning, every watt-hour has been turned into heat.

 

[Romex2121]

Not trying to get off topic but Im really liking your tap set up ,
are you happy with it / is there anything you want to change ??
I’ve been thinking about setting something up like what you have in the pic. but was unsure of any downside such a set up would have .
I’ve looked at a few flow control taps on Amazon & other places online but not sure which would be a decent choice.
My picknic tap is ok but I hate having all the 3/16” tubing coiled up to get a decent pour plus I don’t like the beer just setting there in the tubing between pours….

 

[Beermeister32]

Yes they are very handy. Here is a picture showing construction. Use the coupler off the cheap Chinese taps, they allow full shuttle movement. I built Perlick and Intertap versions. They work great!

 

[Romex2121]

Good deal , think I might just have to place an order today , Thank You.

 

[Beermeister32]

Here are the parts needed, most available on eBay. Have at it!

 

[Romex2121]

Thanks ,,
Your parts list was very helpful .

 

[bwible]

This got me thinking. Has anyone embraced the haze and made a cloudy lager?
…
Full disclosure, I've already started breaking some rules with lagers

I have never understood today’s fascination with “haze”, except as your second sentence above states - people just can’t be bothered to follow “rules”.

 

[Beermeister32]

Kellerbier, Naturtrub, Zwiekelbier and the like are usually hazy unfiltered lagers. Sorry if I'm butchering the German.... I like mine as clear as possible.