help clear a hazy brew - multiple possible causes

[JLem]

I have a beer currently sitting in a secondary carboy that is quite cloudy/hazy. It's an experimental beer of sorts - I used lots of adjuncts and acidulated malt, fermented it with a wine yeast, racked it onto cranberries, and added a vial of Brettanomyces claussenii. The whole recipe/story can be seen here if interested.

The beer was started back at the end of January and has been sitting on the cranberries and Brett for about 2.5 months now. I'd like to rack the beer off the cranberries soon and thought I might try getting rid of the haze. I am not set up to filter so I was going to use some finings. However, I am not sure which to use, or in what combination (or even if they work in combination). I see several possible causes of the haze:

1) Protein haze:
Even though I used a protein rest (~130-135°F for 15 minutes), this brew had a fair amount of wheat and corn - over 40% of the grist were adjuncts.

2) Yeast haze:
I have no idea about the flocculation characteristics of my primary yeast (BM45), or wine yeasts in general. I noticed too that the beer was quite cloudy when I transferred it from primary - not sure if it was protein or yeast then either. Also, this is my first time using Brett, so I thought it might be contributing to the haze as well.

3) Pectin haze:
I used fresh-frozen cranberries. I decided to pasteurize them by giving them a warm bath (~165°F for 20 minutes) before mushing them up. I had hoped this wasn't warm enough to set any pectin, but I've never done this sort of thing before. I threw some pectic enzyme in there when I racked the beer over.

So, any suggestions on what to try? I've never used finings before so could use some advice. I have some gelatin and pectic enzyme. I can get my hands on some Polyclar (or something similar). Should I use all three? Or something else instead of or in conjunction with these? If I use multiple finings can I use them all at the same time?

Please help!

 

[JonK331]

Since you already added some pectic enzyme I would try adding gelatin. I've had really good results clearing both protein and yeast haze with it. As an experiment I cleared a hefe with gelatin and it turned to a crystal weisse quite nicely. Gelatin works best along with a cold crash though so if you're not ready to do that you might wait.

 

[gregger]

+1^ on the gelatin, but I have never cold crashed. I recommend what Jon says as well. You may get great results. Tons of threads exist on how to use gelatin.

Basically, heat two cups of water on the stove just below boiling, stir in gelatin until dissolved, cool down, place into secondary and rack beer on top. Let sit a few days.

 

[JLem]

Ok. I'll give gelatin a try. I'm actually not sure if the beer is done yet - with the Brett in there I'm not sure how low FG will be (and I haven't checked it in a while). Maybe I'll rack off the cranberries now but hold of on the gelatin until later.

Thanks for the input.

 

[Inhiding]

Ok. I'll give gelatin a try. I'm actually not sure if the beer is done yet - with the Brett in there I'm not sure how low FG will be (and I haven't checked it in a while). Maybe I'll rack off the cranberries now but hold of on the gelatin until later.

Thanks for the input.

Biofine works pretty quickly. I had a batch of "skeeter pee" that was cloudy, yeasty. A few mL's of biofine, a gentle swirl. 8 hours later it was crystal clear with the lees very compact. I was cold crashing the "pee" and it was going too slow, so it was about 38* F when I added it.