Has anyone tried Clarity Ferm (Brewers Clarex) from White Labs?

[cheier]

On my high gravity beers this didn't do anything. I really think this needs to be used in conjunction with filtering to reap the benefits. Just dumping it into a fermentor did nothing for my clarity.

It won't do anything for your clarity of yeast and other particulate that are still floating around in the beer. It only helps with chill haze, which can't be filtered out of the beer. I agree that filtration or some other type of fining (I use polyclar) would be required to clear the beer sooner. I have a barley wine that didn't go crystal clear for at least 4 months without filtering or fining.

 

[gaviga]

I and Charlie would beg to differ with you - go to this link - "http://www.examiner.com/beer-in-national/gluten-free-beer-reduced-gluten-beer-offers-real-beer-taste-for-celiac-impaired" (For some reason the URL option does not work on this site, so I just posted the URL.)

And I have used Clarity Ferm successfully to remove/break down glutens so that the beer was safe for my celiac friends. I did 2 different 10-gallon batches where I split them between 2 fermenters, one with and one without Clarity Ferm. I tested both after fermentation. The 5 gallons without CF came in off the charts for gluten content, while the other 5 came in under 5 PPM.

The reason that White Labs (and the makers of Brewer's Clarex, DSM) doesn't say that it removes gluten is because they do not want the hassle of dealing with the product that was designed as a clarifier. I use EZGluten (ezgluten.com) to test my results and so far they have been consistent.

 

[cheier]

If you're referring to my comment about it not getting rid of gluten, I will note that I do stand by my remarks, on the basis that rendering gluten inert will still fool a standard ELISA based quantitative gluten analysis test, even if the proteins still exist in solution. They will just simply not react to the test because the proteins no longer exhibit the behaviour the tests were designed to detect. They don't detect glutens at a molecular level. If the molecule sticks in the test, then you have a positive result for gluten. If not, because it is rendered inert, the test will not show detectable gluten.

To truly do an analysis on whether the gluten protein actually breaks up and drops out of solution, you would need to put a sample under a mass spectrometer to detect the protein molecules. This is research I would like to do, but time and money are issues.

EDIT: My opinions on the matter are a direct result of discussions with White Labs and Health Canada regarding the possibility of labelling a product gluten free. At best as far as I can tell, it could be called celiac safe, but not gluten free. If the enzyme does break up the proteins, it still couldn't be classified as gluten free unless you could prove that broken proteins don't cause issues in gluten sensitive people. Further research and testing would need to be done for Health Canada to let you call a beer celiac safe using this enzyme. White Labs is interested in further research on this.

 

[gaviga]

My celiac friends provided me with the proof I needed. But for the scientifically-minded brewer, here is a scientific explanation of what exactly happens with Brewer's Clarex/Clarity-Ferm (from "http://noglutennoproblem.blogspot.com/2010/10/product-review-estrella-damm-daura.html"). I am not a scientist, but I was able to understand this:
peterbronski [the author of the post] said...
Hi Otis... Thanks for your comment and caution. As you probably know, Brewers Clarex isn't the only way brewers reduce the amount of gluten in their beers - selecting low-protein varieties of barley, several steps of the brewing process, and prolonged cold storage (or other clarifying methods) all incrementally serve to reduce the total gluten present in a beer.

As far as peptides go, I think your concern is understandable, but - in my opinion - unfounded. I've interviewed several prominent Celiac researchers and brewing scientists on this topic, and have also read the peer-reviewed journal articles on the topic. Here are some things to keep in mind:

For starters, if you're interested in the citation for the original research mentioned in the LiveScience article link you provided, here it is:

"www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20650871"

Brewers Clarex is classified as a prolyl endoprotease, which basically means a "protein eating" enzyme that specifically targets the amino acid proline. The research you cite found that three peptides - each about 12 amino acids long - seem to cause many of the Celiac related problems. Scientists have previously sequenced barley hordein (for example, in this study in Biomedical and Life Sciences: "www.springerlink.com/content/a112273645778415/") and found that proline occurs more frequently than every 12 amino acids. It then stands to reason that barley hordein "digested" by proline-seeking Brewers Clarex would yield peptides too small to cause a Celiac reaction.

This seems to hold up in more recent studies. One study published in a 2006 issue of the American Journal of Physiology ("www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16690904") and a 2008 study published in the journal Gut ("www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17494108") both found that the prolyl endoprotease used in Brewers Clarex sufficiently degraded gluten to levels safe for Celiacs. They determined this not only by testing for full gluten, but also by looking for T cell immune reactivity to partial gluten peptides. In other words, the barley hordein peptides remaining after using Brewers Clarex are either too small or not the right type to cause a Celiac gluten response.

 

[jamesseth]

Thanks for that great info gaviga, lots of great reading in those articles. My wife has been symptom free after my beers so far with the Clara ferm!

 

[cheier]

Thanks. That is just the kind of research I was looking for. Looks like I'll have a bit of reading to do. I'll hopefully get an opinion on the matter from Health Canada once I can get a handle on it.

Cheers!

 

[fastricky]

I tried it and didn't think it did much for eliminating chill haze. I still wound up filtering the beer.

 

[swolfe]

This seems to hold up in more recent studies. One study published in a 2006 issue of the American Journal of Physiology ("www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16690904") and a 2008 study published in the journal Gut ("www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17494108") both found that the prolyl endoprotease used in Brewers Clarex sufficiently degraded gluten to levels safe for Celiacs. They determined this not only by testing for full gluten, but also by looking for T cell immune reactivity to partial gluten peptides. In other words, the barley hordein peptides remaining after using Brewers Clarex are either too small or not the right type to cause a Celiac gluten response.

Wow, that's a very interesting study!

Do you know if there are any guidelines, e.g. down a 5mL vial of Clarity Ferm and then you can have a slice of pizza? My Celiac girlfriend would love that...

 

[rglarson13]

I'm interested in using Clarity Ferm to brew a beer that my celiac friend can drink.

How does it work? I just dump the vial in along with the yeast, then everything else like normal? (i.e., let it sit in a bucket for a couple weeks, rack it to a carboy for another couple weeks, cold crash for a few days, then keg it.)

 

[mgenti]

How does it work? I just dump the vial in along with the yeast, then everything else like normal? (i.e., let it sit in a bucket for a couple weeks, rack it to a carboy for another couple weeks, cold crash for a few days, then keg it.)

Yep, I just throw it in exactly when I pitch my yeast. I'm not sure if there is a minimum time it needs, I've just waited till fermentation is over.

 

[scsibug]

Wow, that's a very interesting study!

Do you know if there are any guidelines, e.g. down a 5mL vial of Clarity Ferm and then you can have a slice of pizza? My Celiac girlfriend would love that...

Presumably the highly acidic environment of the gut, along with digestive enzymes would destroy the Clarity Ferm before it could break down gluten in food. However, it sounds like Clarity Ferm is similar to or the same as AN-PEP (Aspergillus Niger Prolyl Endoprotease), which has been used in human trials, almost exactly as you describe (down some AN-PEP, and then bring on the gluten...). See: http://clinicaltrials.gov/show/NCT00810654

 

[gguess]

A real important note that I received from WhiteLabs is to add Clarity Ferm immediately after the wort cools. I tried a few batches of adding when dry-hopping 7-10 days after start of fermentation and found that the batches do not pass EX Gluten test or my gut test. My lucky brother-in-law now gets 20gal of fine ale.

Info from WhiteLabs

The effectiveness of Clarity Ferm does depend on it's proper use. One parameter is the time of addition, which is the beginning of fermentation. This is very important because Clarity Ferm works by hydrolysing the proline proteins in the beer so that they don't react with each other to form long chain molecules which we view as chill haze. Once these bonds are formed (during fermentation), the Clarity Ferm will not break them, so it's a preventative measure, not a curative one. Therefore, adding the Clarity Ferm to finished beer will not have nearly as great an effect as adding it to wort. This is one reason we don't promote Clarity Ferm as an agent for producing gluten free beer, since we cannot control how it's used, and if used improperly it will not be effective. So to get the most benefit from the enzyme, add it just prior to pitching your yeast.​

Something else that might help with the gluten levels is A journal article by Anita Van Landschoot "Gluten-free barley malt beers", Cerevisia, Volume 36, Issue 3, October 2011, Pages 93–97
Finds that tannin levels during brewing can reduce gluten in the final beer (per the abstract, I'm still trying to get the paper).

 

[gaviga]

This is in the instructions that come with Clarity Ferm. As a clarifying agent or as a gluten reducing agent, it must be added with or just prior to the yeast being pitched. I add it after I rack the chilled wort into my carboys. I add the Clarity Ferm, pitch the yeast, oxygenate, then I shake the carboys as an extra step to get everything mixed up and fully oxygenated. Great fermentations and gluten-free beer!

 

[osagedr]

I have some of this stuff in my fridge but keep forgetting to use it on brew days.

 

[gaviga]

Check the date - Clarity Ferm does have an expiration date.

 

[biertourist]

Polyclar (PVPP) is the only additive product of which I am aware which can reduce chill haze.

In my opinion, the best way to reduce haze is to use proven techniques which don't allow haze precursors (high-molecular-weight proteins and polyphenols)

Procedures like:

If you use a protein rest in the mash, don't let it go on too long.
Add hops after you start to see hot break.

Cheers,

Bob

Chill haze can be reduced by a number of additives; PVPP traps polyphenol molecules and pulls them out of solution. Silica gels, hydrogels, or xerogels can trap proteins in a similar way to which PVPP works on polyphenols. -They need to be filtered out like, PVPP, though.

Benotonite, commonly used in wine making can be used in beer but generally isn't; I can't remember why.

Tannic acid works to precipitate protein but creates a super fluffy break material that causes large beer losses.

Papian enzyme breaks down proteins much like a protein rest but I generally wouldn't recommend it as it can easily go way too far and kill your beer head.



I strongly disagree that preventing a long protein rest will help at all; the first thing that happens during a protein rest is that high molecular weight proteins (the chill haze forming ones) get broken down into smaller proteins, then poly peptides, then peptides and amino acids. A long protein rest could certainly be detrimental to beer head but should actually help reduce chill haze.

Waiting for the hot break to add hops I also don't understand. The hops introduce additional polyphenols; during the boil they'll combine with proteins and form our break material; I'd like more information on this but my guess is that this will likely increase chill haze precursors, not reduce them.



Adam