Lagunitas drops the yeast cone based on pH?

[cwheel]

I was listening to the CYBI podcast where they cloned the Lagunitas IPA. I just recently brewed this beer, and transferred to secondary today (7 days after pitching). Part of the reason I did this is that the head brewer from Lagunitas says that they typically drop their yeast cone after 4-5 days based on pH readings. They'll take pH readings, and as long as the beer is getting more acidic from the byproducts of the yeast, they know things are going well, but as soon as the pH starts to *increase*, they drop the yeast cone.

Their claim is that there is plenty of yeast left in suspension to condition, clean, carbonate, etc.

I'm not trying to dredge up the primary only vs secondary argument, but does anyone know what the increase in pH is indicative of, and why the head brewer, who seems very knowledgeable, drops the yeast cake so quickly? Part of the reason they drop it after 96 hours is that they then dry hop for 4 days, but still, the whole timeline seems quick for a commercial brewery??

Here's the podcast for those interested:

http://www.thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/507

 

[remilard]

I was listening to the CYBI podcast where they cloned the Lagunitas IPA. I just recently brewed this beer, and transferred to secondary today (7 days after pitching). Part of the reason I did this is that the head brewer from Lagunitas says that they typically drop their yeast cone after 4-5 days based on pH readings. They'll take pH readings, and as long as the beer is getting more acidic from the byproducts of the yeast, they know things are going well, but as soon as the pH starts to *increase*, they drop the yeast cone.

Their claim is that there is plenty of yeast left in suspension to condition, clean, carbonate, etc.

I'm not trying to dredge up the primary only vs secondary argument, but does anyone know what the increase in pH is indicative of, and why the head brewer, who seems very knowledgeable, drops the yeast cake so quickly? Part of the reason they drop it after 96 hours is that they then dry hop for 4 days, but still, the whole timeline seems quick for a commercial brewery??

Here's the podcast for those interested:

http://www.thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/507

The increase in pH is indicative of yeast lysing.

Nothing about that timeline is fast for a commercial brewery. There are plenty of homebrewers who can brew on a similar timeline.

 

[theredben]

pH is a very important indicator of a beer's conditioning stage. You need to brew A LOT of batches before you get a feel for what pH you are looking for with each specific recipe though.

 

[cwheel]

Thanks for the replies! Both of your responses make sense, although if autolysis of yeast is what Lagunitas is looking for in their IPA (to know when to transfer), apparently it happens quickly (4 days). Is this not really a concern for us home brewers? Or is the idea that leaving a beer on primary for a while will enable the yeast to clean up after their friends that lysed? And yeah, I agree that individual recipes probably have substantial differences, as do yeast strains.

I know that commercial breweries want to get their product out as soon as possible, which is probably one reason why Lagunitas has a total pitch-to-bottle time frame of only about 9-10 days. I was just surprised that they drop the yeast cake after 4 days, although it sounds like this is the norm for a lot of breweries.

Some day I'll have to brew two identical recipes, and transfer only one to secondary, and see what the taste differences are...

 

[theredben]

When commercial breweries are fermenting in 5,000 Gallon cylindro-conical fermentors, the yeast undergo intense heat + pressure and act very different than in a homebrew setting. In a commercial brewery autolysis is a very real concern, but in a bucket/carboy setting has been shown not to be an issue for at least 4-6 months.

 

[cwheel]

Awesome! Thanks for the info...wish Jamil or the head brewer had explained it that way, as it can be confusing for someone who doesn't know the chemical differences between commercial brewing and home brewing.

 

[remilard]

When commercial breweries are fermenting in 5,000 Gallon cylindro-conical fermentors, the yeast undergo intense heat + pressure and act very different than in a homebrew setting. In a commercial brewery autolysis is a very real concern, but in a bucket/carboy setting has been shown not to be an issue for at least 4-6 months.

In a recently published BBR/BYO study the authors detected brothy/meaty flavors in a beer that was left on the entire volume of yeast for 1 month that were absent in one transferred earlier. Anyone who has had autolysed yeast extract in marmite/vegemite is familiar with those flavors.

 

[theredben]

In a recently published BBR/BYO study the authors detected brothy/meaty flavors in a beer that was left on the entire volume of yeast for 1 month that were absent in one transferred earlier. Anyone who has had autolysed yeast extract in marmite/vegemite is familiar with those flavors.

Do you have a link for that?

 

[remilard]

Do you have a link for that?

http://***********/component/resour...xperiment-does-delayed-racking-harm-your-beer

4th paragraph under "results".

 

[theredben]

remilard - I think you are misunderstanding the point of that article. For one thing, it was posted in 2009, so it is not very recent news. In the conclusions section, they state that there are no bad effects of leaving the beer on the yeast for 2-4 weeks. It will change the flavour of the beer, but not in any bad sense.

 

[remilard]

remilard - I think you are misunderstanding the point of that article. For one thing, it was posted in 2009, so it is not very recent news. In the conclusions section, they state that there are no bad effects of leaving the beer on the yeast for 2-4 weeks. It will change the flavour of the beer, but not in any bad sense.

That's pretty recent.

The conclusions says that it will change the flavor in a way that some people like. So if you like brothy beer, your conclusions is different than mine, no?

 

[theredben]

2009 is pretty old when you are talking about the "long primary issue" it has really only been accepted as a common practice in 2010.

You seem to be focusing on the one beer that was described as "meaty" or "brothy", but you seem to ignore the part where they talk about how insignificant the differences were between the beers. While they used those words, it was not describing any kind of a flaw.

If you don't trust leaving your beer in primary for 4+ weeks, then don't. It is your beer after all. But I think the fine folks at BYO would appreciate it if you would not misrepresent the findings of their article.

 

[remilard]

2009 is pretty old when you are talking about the "long primary issue" it has really only been accepted as a common practice in 2010.

I think if you had been brewing for more than a year and if you got your information from places other than this site you would have a different impression of homebrewing history.

People have been doing month long primaries forever.
It isn't currently a dominant practice. You just think it is because you self censor your information sources to a website where the phrase "month long primary" has an uncritical and zombie-like following.

 

[Bensiff]

I think if you had been brewing for more than a year and if you got your information from places other than this site you would have a different impression of homebrewing history.

People have been doing month long primaries forever.
It isn't currently a dominant practice. You just think it is because you self censor your information sources to a website where the phrase "month long primary" has an uncritical and zombie-like following.

I think you guys are getting into the territory of where it depends on what you are trying to accomplish...there just isn't going to be a short/long primary unified theory. I just went from brewday to bottle on a BW in under 7 days. The beer that was bottled before that was 4 months in the carboy as it was getting finished with brett b. I just kegged a brown ale after 6 weeks in the carboy (working too much to do it sooner) and it tastes fine. The next batch I do is probably going to be an APA or IPA where I will probably keg in around 2 weeks to keep the aromatics as fresh as possible.

 

[theredben]

I think if you had been brewing for more than a year and if you got your information from places other than this site you would have a different impression of homebrewing history.

People have been doing month long primaries forever.
It isn't currently a dominant practice. You just think it is because you self censor your information sources to a website where the phrase "month long primary" has an uncritical and zombie-like following.

You are right in saying that the whole "month long primary" is vastly overused on this forum, but the assumptions you make about me in this previous post are pretty bold. Let's try to keep this on topic.