lager beer

[Mr impatient]

Hi guys, just to get this out the way, I don't do beer but the wife likes a nice lager, something akin to Carlsberg, Grolsh etc. I am set up for wine and don't have a clue about beer or lagers. I have used kits from the suppermarket in the past (30 years ago) but never had anything anyone finds remotley tasty.

I have been told to make it from scratch, so any takers on giving me a recipie and basic instructions, please. EG Malt or barley or hops or all three, is wine yeast ok or does it have to be a beer yeast?

 

[Rob2010SS]

I've only done one lager, as I'm not a huge lager fan. The recipe and information on what I did is located here.

It didn't come out how I wanted but it came out SUPER easy to drink and actually, quite tasty. If I were to do it again, I'd darken it up to be maybe a 4 or 5 SRM.

The hops that I used (Wakatu) gave it a faint lime zest flavor. I'd probably increase the hops by about 25% on the next one but keeping IBU's roughly the same.

Feel free to use it or tweak it, or wait and see what someone else posts.

 

[GoeHaarden]

Not trying to be crass but you might need to put in a little leg work here, and do some research. Way too much to type a how-to on lagers, or brewing for that matter since you have done neither...

 

[waldoar15]

Well, I guess the first question is can you ferment (and then lager) at lager temps?

 

[SmokinBrews]

Woo boy. This is a can of worms these days. You typically pitch lager yeast at 48 deg. F and step up the temp as fermentation goes along to get to a diacetyl rest and then crash it cold (lager) in the 30’s.

But certain lager yeast strains allow for fermentation at ale yeast temp and shorter maturation. I just brewed a schwarzbier with saflager 34/70 at 66 degrees Fermentation temp. It was in high growth phase for 5 days and I let it mature for 5 days before racking to a keg and fining with gelatin. I drank my first pour this evening. It’s a great beer. No off flavors or Esther’s.

So you can lager many ways these days with a variety of lager yeast strains.

 

[Mr impatient]

Well, I guess the first question is can you ferment (and then lager) at lager temps?

I think I firment quite well with the temperatures we are seeing in the UK at the moment, I do have an enviroment that gives me a constant 65 degrees which is ideal for wine which is what I do, but I would like to branch out. So what is a larger temp?

 

[Mr impatient]

Woo boy. This is a can of worms these days. You typically pitch lager yeast at 48 deg. F and step up the temp as fermentation goes along to get to a diacetyl rest and then crash it cold (lager) in the 30’s.

But certain lager yeast strains allow for fermentation at ale yeast temp and shorter maturation. I just brewed a schwarzbier with saflager 34/70 at 66 degrees Fermentation temp. It was in high growth phase for 5 days and I let it mature for 5 days before racking to a keg and fining with gelatin. I drank my first pour this evening. It’s a great beer. No off flavors or Esther’s.

So you can lager many ways these days with a variety of lager yeast strains.

I reckon the worms have had a go at leaving before this tin was opened, lol. I am going to buy a book and read up, there is a lot of terminology in the answers to my post I don't recognise, and processes that seem similar to winemaking but probably aren't, eg who is Esther?

 

[beermanpete]

Esther is Fred's sister-law ;-}

Esthers are chemical compounds produced by the yeast that taste somewhat like over-ripe fruit. In limited amounts it can be pleasant but in larger amounts is generally considered a flaw.

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

Hi guys, just to get this out the way, I don't do beer but the wife likes a nice lager, something akin to Carlsberg, Grolsh etc. I am set up for wine and don't have a clue about beer or lagers. I have used kits from the suppermarket in the past (30 years ago) but never had anything anyone finds remotley tasty.

I have been told to make it from scratch, so any takers on giving me a recipie and basic instructions, please. EG Malt or barley or hops or all three, is wine yeast ok or does it have to be a beer yeast?

For my money, a blonde ale is just as pleasant as a lager like Carlsberg or Grolsch. Your cellar temps are perfect for a clean yeast like US-05. Use dry malt extract to get yourself started. Use 6 pounds , but also steep a half pound of Munich 20L. Do a 45 minute boil with an ounce of Saaz and then throw in an ounce of Tettnanger when you turn off the heat before you cool the beer. Scale this recipe down if you are doing less than 5 gallons.

 

[Miraculix]

Your quest will be easier than it looks like.

Do a smash, single malt single hop lager. ...ok, you want one additional malt, so it is technically not a smash anymore.

You want 95% pale malt or Maris otter malt (I'd use the latter one) and 5% melanoidin malt. Your og should be around 1.05.

Mash around 67 degrees for 1h, then use saaz as your hop of choice. I would use the majority of the hop at 60 min and probably 20-30% between 5 and 10 minutes. Try to get 25ibus out of it.
Use mangrove Jack California lager and don't think about the temperature. This lager yeast can handle all temperatures and flocks better than all other lager yeasts I have tested.

Let us know how it turns out!

Edit: or if you want to keep it really simple, just buy some light dme, instead of the malt, and do everything else as mentioned above.

 

[Tribe Fan]

IMHO, this would be a good place to start.

https://beerrecipes.org/Recipe/1255/beautiful-basic-light-ale.html

You can substitute a german noble hop like Hallertau, for the cascade hops for a less citrus, more traditionally bittered beer. I would also suggest using this yeast:

https://www.whitelabs.com/yeast-bank/wlp060-american-ale-yeast-blend

I just did a batch using this and it is pretty clean, meaning not a lot of flavors added from the yeasts.

The irony in homebrewing is you can make big flavorful beers better than you can buy, but crisp, clean light American style lagers are actually more difficult.

The most popular beer I've ever done was a crisp, low alcohol (4+% ish) cream ale. It disappeared in half the time of any others I've done and was a very simple recipe like this. I wanted to get close to a lager without the hassle of lagering and this did the trick.

If you do wine, you probably have a good homebrew store relationship already. Use high quality extract and hops that have been stored properly.

Having done some wine here's a few other suggestions:

- Have adequate headspace in your fermentation vessel. At least a gallon if you do 5 gallon batches.
- After you've measured your SG and know it's done fermenting, let it sit for another week or two on the yeast cake. The yeast will clean up by-products in that time which is important for this style of beer.
- Generally, ale yeasts need to be kept below 75F, 68F to 72F is generally ideal, when fermenting, above that can produce a lot of off flavors you probably won't like and will be pretty pronounced with this style.
- Think about how you are going to dispense the finished product. You can't bottle like wine, the contents need carbonation and that means pressure. Personally, I use and re-use Grolsh style brown bottles. The bottles are about 3 bucks a piece, but I have some I've been using for 15 years. The brown ones protect the beer from light which will produce the skunky smell if left unprotected.

Overall, this is very doable. Using malt extract and ale yeasts will take a ton of complexity out of the process. Ferment for 2-3 weeks, bottle and you can be drinking this in 4 weeks. Should peak at about 8 weeks.

PS - This style of beer, like many, will not age well. Plan on a batch size you will go through in 3-6 months. Cellar bottles below 72F. 24 hours above 80F can ruin it.

 

[dmtaylor]

I think you can keep it simple and make a pretty good lager on your first try. Key recommendation: Use S-189 yeast. I recently made a maibock with this yeast fermented at 64 F and it turned out fresh and clean and delicious and I think will medal in competition. More suggestions: Use at least a pound or two of real pilsner malt, crushed, and do a mash in a bag by holding the temperature at 149 F (65 C) for at least 40 minutes, then pull the grains out, add some extract, bring to a boil, add hops (how about an ounce of Hallertau), and brew and ferment as normal. One more thing: Don't rush it. I left my maibock in primary for 6 weeks before it finished. Yours might not be done as quick as you want, but let the yeast tell you when they are done, which is when the yeast settles out and the beer is no longer hazy. Follow my standard instructions for the rest:

 

[corbmonster]

Do you use temperature control for your wine fermentation?

 

[Mr impatient]

Do you use temperature control for your wine fermentation?

Hi, I dont have proper temp control, but I made another room out of an outhouse that only has a single brick thickness to the walls which I insulated well. I use a small1kw heater and over the winter it stays relatively warm as long as the kids remember to close the doors lol. and I have individual thermometer strips for each demijohn

Through the summer, and in hot wether like this one, I use a table in my hallway which is thermostatically controlled to 65 degrees if it goes cold which being in the UK is the norm, but the hallway never seems to deviate that much in summer. Through the winter we only use the solid fuel fire to keep the gas bills down so the hallway temps drop considerably which is why the back room and the heater come in to play. I have looked at carboy temperature stuff with jackets etc, but they are well beyond my price range.

 

[Mr impatient]

There is so much information you guys have given me, thank you all. I am going to be a busy bee this winter.

 

[Miraculix]

Again, you do not have to look at the temperature if you choose the right yeast. Use mangrove Jack California lager. I tested almost all of the other lager yeasts that work at room temperature and the mj yeast is superior to all of them, from a general perspective.

Boil some hops to 20-25 ibus, add extract, let it cool, throw in the yeast, job done.

 

[Mr impatient]

Again, you do not have to look at the temperature if you choose the right yeast. Use mangrove Jack California lager. I tested almost all of the other lager yeasts that work at room temperature and the mj yeast is superior to all of them, from a general perspective.

Boil some hops to 20-25 ibus, add extract, let it cool, throw in the yeast, job done.

Its the terminology that gets me, what is ibus? And do I measure it with a hydrometer?

 

[AZCoolerBrewer]

Its the terminology that gets me, what is ibus? And do I measure it with a hydrometer?

It stands for International Bittering Units. You can’t actually measure IBUs without sending a sample to a lab, but if you use an online calculator like this one: https://www.brewersfriend.com/ibu-calculator/ you can get pretty close. I don’t think the calculations take into account if you add an ingredient like coffee, the natural bitterness of alcohol, or bitterness from carbonic acid from carbonation.

 

[Kharnynb]

basic lager:
malt:
4 kilo's pilsner malt
300 grams carapils/carapale

hops
25 grams hallertau at 60 minutes boil left
25 grams hallertau at 20 minutes boil left
50 grams hallertau at 5 minutes boil left

mash malts for 60 minutes at 66 degrees celcius.
boil for 90 minutes with the hops added at times stated

ferment with w37-70 at about 15 degrees celcius for 3-4 weeks.

depending on your brewing setup for how much mash/sparge water, aim for 20 liters at end of boil

 

[Brewfreedom]

I've found Saflager 34/70 to be very forgiving with temp control. If you don't have temp control but have a garage and live in a cold climate winter is the best time to play around with Lagers. Did this for years before literally just getting a proper connical and temp controls. As long as you give the saflager a few days at room temp for D rest and crash it in the fridge it will clean up fine.