I brewed a 10 gallon batch of pilsner on June 30. It was split into two carboys, and they were placed in the same fermentation chamber. A starter of WLP029 was split between them. After fermentation, both carboys were cold crashed and fined with gelatin.
Come bottling time, I had a new siphon. Turns out the hose clamp wasn't tight enough from the factory, and was leaking copious amounts of air into the siphon tube as the beer transferred to the bottling bucket. As I frantically tried to fix it, I inadvertantly stirred up a bunch of the yeast cake in the bottom of the fermenter, resulting in a whole bunch of crud being transferred to the bottling bucket. The transfer was half complete by the time I fixed the siphon, and thinking it was likely to be oxidized, I almost tossed it. I decided to bottle it anyway, but marked the caps of all the bottles.
After fixing the siphon, transferring the second carboy to the bottling bucket went really smoothly. I ended up with a nice clean transfer, no bubbles, and a bucket full of crystal clear beer which was then bottled.
It's now five weeks post-bottling.
The beer from the poor transfer has at least 1/4" of trub at the bottom of every bottle. But when carefully decanted off the yeast, it's crystal clear and tastes great. It shows no signs of oxidation at all.
The beer from the good transfer still pours cloudy. Some bottles have a little diacetyl. It clearly needs more time to condition.
So the results from my inadvertent comparison are counterintuitive. The half of the batch that was transfered with lots of oxygen and trub is ready to drink sooner than the half that was transferred to the bottling bucket without any mistakes.
My takeaway is that more yeast in the bottle leads to faster priming, faster floculation, and clearer beer sooner. I may start making it a habit to stir up a little of the yeast cake while transferring the beer from the fermenter to the bottling bucket.
Come bottling time, I had a new siphon. Turns out the hose clamp wasn't tight enough from the factory, and was leaking copious amounts of air into the siphon tube as the beer transferred to the bottling bucket. As I frantically tried to fix it, I inadvertantly stirred up a bunch of the yeast cake in the bottom of the fermenter, resulting in a whole bunch of crud being transferred to the bottling bucket. The transfer was half complete by the time I fixed the siphon, and thinking it was likely to be oxidized, I almost tossed it. I decided to bottle it anyway, but marked the caps of all the bottles.
After fixing the siphon, transferring the second carboy to the bottling bucket went really smoothly. I ended up with a nice clean transfer, no bubbles, and a bucket full of crystal clear beer which was then bottled.
It's now five weeks post-bottling.
The beer from the poor transfer has at least 1/4" of trub at the bottom of every bottle. But when carefully decanted off the yeast, it's crystal clear and tastes great. It shows no signs of oxidation at all.
The beer from the good transfer still pours cloudy. Some bottles have a little diacetyl. It clearly needs more time to condition.
So the results from my inadvertent comparison are counterintuitive. The half of the batch that was transfered with lots of oxygen and trub is ready to drink sooner than the half that was transferred to the bottling bucket without any mistakes.
My takeaway is that more yeast in the bottle leads to faster priming, faster floculation, and clearer beer sooner. I may start making it a habit to stir up a little of the yeast cake while transferring the beer from the fermenter to the bottling bucket.
