Ale's Similar to Lagers

[irishbean]

Hey guys, rookie question. I'm four batches in. My wife enjoys lagers like Boston Lager and Yeungling. Is there anyway to produce something similar with ale yeast; I'm not equipped for lagering.

 

[Spectre216]

You could try a cream ale with us-05 (around 62-64). It should come out pretty clean. You could also try Nottingham (around 57-59) for a clean ferment as well. If you can ferment around 55-60 you could also try using a kolsch yeast as well. These will all be clean ales, but still not as clean as a lager.

 

[hannibalmdq]

You could try a cream ale with us-05 (around 62-64). It should come out pretty clean. You could also try Nottingham (around 57-59) for a clean ferment as well. If you can ferment around 55-60 you could also try using a kolsch yeast as well. These will all be clean ales, but still not as clean as a lager.

I've run Notty at 58/59 twice and it does produce a very clean ale. I would not, however, call it crisp. It is very clean though and it does accentuate a malt bill.

I'm actually running a Notty faux pilsner now at 55/56. Notty's spec sheet said that with a bump in pitching rates you can run it at 54. I pitched a whole rehydrated pack of Nottingham into 2.75 gallons of 1.050 wort so it was a very healthy pitch. I'm very curious to see the results. Notty flocs hard and can mute hops.

Also, a lot of people claim that WLP029 produces a very lagery ale if you pitch at 56 and ferment at 58. WLP029 accentuates hop character so depending on the style of lager your trying to approximate, it could be very good choice. I tried it once but pitched at 62 and fermented at 58 (it was like 2 AM and I wanted to go to bed, I hadn't quite learned that pitching in the morning was an option). It wasn't super crisp but it was clean. I'll probably try it again soon just to give it a fair shot by pitching low.

The faux pilsner was an impromtu brew so I didn't have time to kick up a starter of WLP029, thought it may have been the better choice. It's a sulfury ale yeast and was probably the way to go for that style.

 

[dfhar]

If you're going to make a pseudo-lager by fermenting with ale yeast in the 50s, that means you probably have temperature control....which begs the question:

Why don't you just use lager yeast?

To the OP, without temp control your best bet for a clean beer is US-05. Try Jamil's blonde ale:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f62/jamils-blonde-ale-35824/

 

[hannibalmdq]

If you're going to make a pseudo-lager by fermenting with ale yeast in the 50s, that means you probably have temperature control....which begs the question:

Why don't you just use lager yeast?

To the OP, without temp control your best bet for a clean beer is US-05.

I can't speak for the OP but while I do have active temp control via a son of ferementor build I can't go much below the mid-50s and have no capability to ramp down to the 30s for extended lagering.

I've thought about just bottling a lager after primary, carbing, and then cold condition the bottles in the fridge for an extended period, but I don't really have the fridge space to cold condition a full batch anyway. We've only got one fridge and it's normally packed to the brim with foodstuffs.

I'm not really chasing psuedo-lagers that hard, because I know that the only way to really get a lager is to brew one, but I am curious to how close I can get with what I have and how clean a fermentation I can coax from an ale yeast.

 

[joyceman]

Have you tried WLP 810? Sounds like your temps would work perfectly with that yeast.

 

[castillo556]

Use Kolsch yeast and ferment in the mid 50s.

Lager for 2-3 weeks in mid 30s.

Boom. Pseudo lager.

 

[unionrdr]

I call then hybrid lagers, as I use the same malts & hops that lagers & pilsners do. I ferment them with WL029 kolsch yeast. But it's "sweet spot" is 65-69F. It has a bit of a crisp finish & good balance between malt & hop flavors using this yeast. I've brewed it a few times with good results. Now if I could just clear the slight haze a bit...

 

[mkyl428]

Brew up some Centennial Blonde & ferment at a low temp., like 58° that will make a fairly lager like ale & it's pretty good too.

 

[dfhar]

There is more than one kind of Kolsch yeast. WLP029 is from Fruh, and I would ferment that one in the mid 60's. Don't try to go down to the 50's. The brewers at Fruh also agree:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/how-brew-frueh-koelsch-brewmaster-54080/

Wyeast 2565 is a completely different strain (from the Paffgen brewery, i believe), and that one will go down to the mid 50's no sweat.

 

[hannibalmdq]

There is more than one kind of Kolsch yeast. WLP029 is from Fruh, and I would ferment that one in the mid 60's. Don't try to go down to the 50's. The brewers at Fruh also agree:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/how-brew-frueh-koelsch-brewmaster-54080/

Wyeast 2565 is a completely different strain (from the Paffgen brewery, i believe), and that one will go down to the mid 50's no sweat.

WLP029's listed range is 65 - 69. However, a number of people swear that you don't get the crispness of a lager unless you run it in the upper 50s. I've discussed a bit with Brulospher and he's run that yeast from high to low and settled on pitch at 56 and ferment at 58. His Munich Helles recipe specifically call for that yeast and that profile.

Googling around, plenty of people use that profile for WLP029 and love the result. Caveat, lots of people like it in it's listed range too. Double caveat, that yeast strain will work down in the upper 50s. Anecdotally, I got 83% percent attenuation the one time I used it and I ran it at 58 so it sure didn't seem to mind the chill.

 

[NickTheGreat]

My BMC friends (and non BMC friends) really like Yooper's Cream Ale
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/ag-cream-ale-33242/

It is the "right color" and not overly hoppy, so people like it. But it has a little bit more grain and gives it personality. I'm not sure I'd compare it to Boston Lager or Yuengling, but . . . I'd dare say it'd convert people away from BMC lagers.

 

[unionrdr]

The WL029 yeast was the steadiest fermenting one I ever used, but not done in 4 days. Clean, crisp lager-like flavor & balance @ 65-69F. Mine didn't go over 69F & ages quite well. Two weeks fridge time to emulate lagering gives the crisp finish & balance.

 

[castillo556]

I used WLP029 for an Oktoberfest. I was my first attempt at a pseudo lager.

I fermented in the mid 50s. The yeast did not mind at all. In fact, it was one of the longest and steadiest fermentation I have seen (Not a pro, only 18 brews).
The airlock was steady burping for 7 days.

After two weeks the gravity was 1.012

Lagered for a week at 40 F and then another week at 34 F

FG was 1.010. That yeast still got to work even in the the 40s.

What I also noticed was after primary there was still a fruity yeast profile at the end. After the 2 weeks lagering it was completely crisp with no fruity yeast taste.

 

[D-Train]

I was recently reading a BYO article about Vienna Lagers and came across this tidbit. Something to think about...

If you can’t maintain lager temperatures, you can still make a Vienna lager. A little-known fact about lager yeasts is that they can be used at ale temperatures. Your beer will be more estery than a standard lager, but will still taste like lager beer. Many times homebrewers who wish to replicate a lager beer at ale temperatures are told to use a clean ale strain (or a “steam” beer strain) of yeast. However, a clean ale does not really taste like a lager. A “dirty” lager, however, will still taste lager-like — it will just have more yeast-derived aroma.

If you do use a lager yeast at ale temperatures, you must make a starter and aerate your wort well. Low pitching rates and low aeration levels contribute to ester production as well as temperature, so you need those other two variables taken care of. I would actually make a larger starter than normal for an ale-temperature lager fermentation — 4–5 qts. (~3.75–4.75 L) per 5 gallons (19 L). And, of course, get the temperature as low as you can steadily hold it.

 

[andrewmaixner]

california commons / San Fransisco steam ale yeast. It's a hybrid that can be lagered, or used at low ale temps: https://www.wyeastlab.com/rw_styledetails.cfm?ID=143

I did a classic american pilsner with is this summer, used a swamp cooler (picinic cooler with water and a 2L jug of ice in it, added or removed every couple hours) to keep the temperature at 58-60 for the first 4 days, then let it go ambient to 68. Turned out pretty well.

 

[unionrdr]

Seems to me I read that in last month's or this month's BYO?

 

[uncleleon]

Bottom fermenting (lager) yeast fully ferments raffinose, top fermenting (ale) yeast does not. Just the facts ma'am.

Don't let this discourage anyone from making the cleanest lightest ale they can. Cheers!

 

[m00ps]

As far as I know there are 5 types of hybrid ale/lagers.
Cali common / steam beer
Kolsch
Altbier
Baltic porter
Cream ale

I've seen recipes for all using both lager and ale yeasts, but there's a few blends offered like wlp080 cream ale yeast. I've used that and I like it a lot. There's also another from white labs called cry havoc that's supposed to work well at both ale and lager temps. For all of these beers I usually see people either fermenting at ale temps then lagering or lager temps and not lagering

 

[unionrdr]

I posted version 2 of my Hopped & Confused hybrid lager in my recipes. Having used WL029 kolsch yeast to get the lager-like qualities. It tastes like some kind of Euro lager to me.

 

[Spectre216]

I can't speak for the OP but while I do have active temp control via a son of ferementor build I can't go much below the mid-50s and have no capability to ramp down to the 30s for extended lagering.

I've thought about just bottling a lager after primary, carbing, and then cold condition the bottles in the fridge for an extended period, but I don't really have the fridge space to cold condition a full batch anyway. We've only got one fridge and it's normally packed to the brim with foodstuffs.

I'm not really chasing psuedo-lagers that hard, because I know that the only way to really get a lager is to brew one, but I am curious to how close I can get with what I have and how clean a fermentation I can coax from an ale yeast.

Although not ideal, I have found ways to ferment and lager in my Son of Fermentation chamber. Mainly just load the main chamber with ice (or frozen jugs) and you can get it down there. Like I said though, not ideal. Might be less headache to just go with a psuedo lager.

 

[hannibalmdq]

Although not ideal, I have found ways to ferment and lager in my Son of Fermentation chamber. Mainly just load the main chamber with ice (or frozen jugs) and you can get it down there. Like I said though, not ideal. Might be less headache to just go with a psuedo lager.

The lowest I ever got loading up my chamber with ice just was the low 40s for an attempt at using gelatin to fin for a few day. The thought of swapping out all those jugs for an extended true lager doesn't excite me.

Until I'm set up properly to do a lager, I'll probably just settle for the hybrid styles.

 

[progmac]

Hey guys, rookie question. I'm four batches in. My wife enjoys lagers like Boston Lager and Yeungling. Is there anyway to produce something similar with ale yeast; I'm not equipped for lagering.

What is the coldest temperature that you can ferment at?

 

[m00ps]

Hey guys, rookie question. I'm four batches in. My wife enjoys lagers like Boston Lager and Yeungling. Is there anyway to produce something similar with ale yeast; I'm not equipped for lagering.

You won't be able to brew anything remotely close to yeungling or bud or corona or any adjunct lager. They use mostly corn for the sugars and there is no flavor at all to hide any imperfections you'd have at a homebrew level. I had a brewing professor that tried 4 times to make his wife bud light. Every time he said it tastes like dumping a shot of vodka into the water from canned corn

 

[uncleleon]

Here's my yuengling attempt

4lb flaked maize
1lb flaked rice
2lb 6row
1lb pils
2oz brown malt
2oz c40

Willamete to 19 IBUs at 90 min

Safale lager yeast (2ltr starter) at 40 1 week
Ramp up a degree or 2 each day till 50 for 2 weeks
Driest at 65 for a week
Coldcrash lager 4 weeks at 34

 

[progmac]

Although not ideal, I have found ways to ferment and lager in my Son of Fermentation chamber. Mainly just load the main chamber with ice (or frozen jugs) and you can get it down there. Like I said though, not ideal. Might be less headache to just go with a psuedo lager.

i also lagered in my SOFC. five days @ 52F swapping one gallon of ice per day. After that I bumped it up to mid 60s. It turned out really well, though I've moved onto using a dedicated fridge now.

 

[hannibalmdq]

I posted this in another thread about low temp ale yeast but I thought I'd post this here too.

I've been tracking my Faux Pilsner with Notty for the last six days. I pitched 1 packet of Notty into 2.75 gallons of 1.050 wort and held 55 for the first 2.5 days. Then I raised it about 2 degrees a day.

48 hours - 50% attenuation
60 hours - raised to 56.5 F
72 hours - 65.5% attenuation
84 hours - started raising to 60 F slowly
6 days - 80% attenuation

I'm going to let it sit for a little before packaging, but Notty did the job once again. I am a fan of ramping temperatures towards the end of active fermentation, but this brew was held below the 57 degree lower bound of Notty until at least 70% attenuation. It was slower than a normal Notty ferment, but not be an extreme margin. I had krausen within 12 hours pitching at 55F. Depending on how many cells you believe are in a rehyrdrated pack of Notty, I pitched somewhere between 13% and 100% more yeast that needed for a .75M cells/mL/Plato pitch rate.

The few drops from my rest of my refractometer pipette sample where clean tasting and hoppy. Hard to get a feel for taste off a 2 mL sample but I think this is going very well.

Other thoughts, I didn't really pick up any fruity ale flavors, but again, it's early and tough to get a true impression of taste off of suck a small sample. Oh, and these are beer temperatures, not ambient.

 

[m00ps]

I posted this in another thread about low temp ale yeast but I thought I'd post this here too.

I've been tracking my Faux Pilsner with Notty for the last six days. I pitched 1 packet of Notty into 2.75 gallons of 1.050 wort and held 55 for the first 2.5 days. Then I raised it about 2 degrees a day.

48 hours - 50% attenuation
60 hours - raised to 56.5 F
72 hours - 65.5% attenuation
84 hours - started raising to 60 F slowly
6 days - 80% attenuation

I'm going to let it sit for a little before packaging, but Notty did the job once again. I am a fan of ramping temperatures towards the end of active fermentation, but this brew was held below the 57 degree lower bound of Notty until at least 70% attenuation. It was slower than a normal Notty ferment, but not be an extreme margin. I had krausen within 12 hours pitching at 55F. Depending on how many cells you believe are in a rehyrdrated pack of Notty, I pitched somewhere between 13% and 100% more yeast that needed for a .75M cells/mL/Plato pitch rate.

The few drops from my rest of my refractometer pipette sample where clean tasting and hoppy. Hard to get a feel for taste off a 2 mL sample but I think this is going very well.

Other thoughts, I didn't really pick up any fruity ale flavors, but again, it's early and tough to get a true impression of taste off of suck a small sample. Oh, and these are beer temperatures, not ambient.

Do you usually take that many samples from your beer before its even a week old? Or was this an experiment to track how the yeast performed when cold?

 

[hannibalmdq]

Do you usually take that many samples from your beer before its even a week old? Or was this an experiment to track how the yeast performed when cold?

I only monitor the initial days this close when I want the data.

Over the last year I've been working mostly with Notty, WLP001 and WLP028 and I now know how they work in a variety of worts and at a variety of temps so I let them do their thing. I tracked ferments in more detail in the past. Now I just take a reading or two (when I remove the blowoff tube and move it out of my ferm chamber and before bottling), but mostly they just sit undisturbed.

For moderate 1.050 OGs those three strain are normally at about terminal gravity or about two or three days. Notty is the fastest (2 to 3 days), chico the second (2 to 4), and WLP028 (3 to 5) is marginally slower. After that I ramp temps a bit and then remove them from my ferm chamber altogether. Notty flocs like a rock, chico takes a few days, and WLP028 always lingers for me until about the 2 week mark.

Since I was running Notty lower than I've ever run it, I wanted the data so I would have an idea how the yeast performs and could get a ballpark estimate for when I could go ahead and raise the temps. Turns out it's slower, but not much.

Taking readings with a sanitary 3 ml pipette and a refractometer is super quick and allowed me to get to know my yeasts a little better so I could figure when it was safe to increase temps or free up my fermentation chamber for another brewday.

 

[m00ps]

Right, it sounded like you definitely knew what you were doing....I've just seen too many threads of inexperienced brewers popping the lids off their bucket twice a day to see how its progressing so I thought I'd make sure...