Breweries Aging Beer?

[Vaureywwc]

This odd thought just came to me, how do most large scale breweries age their brews? I know for us homebrewers racking into a carboy is easy enough, do breweries use a second fermenter to age, or do a lot of them go straight into kegs and age from there?

 

[bobeer]

Ive seen them sit in a fermentor and ive seen them sit in kegs in a cold room. I think it just depends on what the brewery has and what their processes are.

 

[NTexBrewer]

If I remember correctly at a micro brewery that I visited they have conical fermentors so they can just dump the yeast out of the bottom and then condition the beer that way.

 

[Gameface]

This odd thought just came to me, how do most large scale breweries age their brews? I know for us homebrewers racking into a carboy is easy enough, do breweries use a second fermenter to age, or do a lot of them go straight into kegs and age from there?

From what I understand it is common for a brewery to use a fermentation vessel and then a bright tank, which is used mostly to store the beer while it clears so they can use the fermenter for another batch.

Second fermenter isn't really the right way to think about it, just as in home brewing, you shouldn't be doing any fermenting in a secondary vessel. If you want to use a secondary vessel to remove the beer from most of the yeast and to bulk age you should only do so after fermentation has completely finished.

 

[pedimac]

A brewery near me specializes in sours and funk beers. They have a massive warehouse full of barrels, fun to walk around.

 

[GRBC]

It is my understanding that with the exception of specialty beers like sours, barley wines, etc, that a standard craft brewed ale (ipa, brown, blonde, etc) is moved through the brewhouse (fermentation vessel, brite tank, etc) and to packaging (kegs/cans/bottles) pretty quickly - like 7-10 days, so they can keep production rolling. I don't think bulk aging is a thing for most craft beer.

 

[Vaureywwc]

I have no idea for the life of me, why I didn't just know this. Because all the answers were incredibly obvious..

Going to be one of those weeks.

 

[Dave84]

I wouldnt say any large ones age their beer, and very few micros too. They look at it more in terms of clarity than flavour profile. Most real ales i've had on cask have tasted young for instance, but most have been in a secondary clearing tank of some sort. I think they rely on filtering to take young flavours away.

Thats how i look at it anyway

 

[william_shakes_beer]

I suspect the large breweries focus on eliminating flaws in their fermentation process rather than aging them out. There's a lot more you can do with a microbiologist on staff to evaluate yeast and probably a congress mash facility to evaluate each batch (carload) of malt.

 

[max384]

From Anheiser-Busch: http://anheuser-busch.com/index.php/our-heritage/commitment-to-quality/brewing-process/

Lagers like Budweiser and Bud Light are especially challenging and take about 30 days to brew, twice as long to make as many types of ale.

5. Primary Fermentation: The wort is cooled and clarified, and the yeast is added; for six days, the yeast ferments the wort to beer.

6. Beechwood Aging: During lagering, the beer is krausened, naturally carbonated and aged on beechwood chips for 21 days to mature the flavor of the beer. Anheuser-Busch is the only major brewer in the world using beechwood aging.

7. Finishing: To keep the lagered beer flavor and clarity intact after packaging, brewers must remove yeast and some unstable protein materials through a process called finishing. The beer is “chillproofed” and filtered for clarification before being released for packaging into bottles, cans or draught keys.

 

[Teromous]

I have no idea for the life of me, why I didn't just know this. Because all the answers were incredibly obvious..

Going to be one of those weeks.

No worries. I actually enjoy threads like this. Here's a picture of how Cantillon bottle conditions and ages their beer: