Milkshake Pilsner......

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Keith Adams

Brewing_Akamai
Joined
Feb 22, 2020
Messages
21
Reaction score
10
As the title indicates I have created a Pilsner milkshake.... minus the milk. Attached is a picture. I really don’t know where I went wrong with this one. Anyone have any ideas?
A0757BCC-54B3-45F9-810B-E1533D3F7C81.jpeg
 
Well, i have to say my heart dropped when i read your title... lol.
Then again- who knows what the next craze will be?

If i had to guess from just your picture...
Did you cold crash? Fine? Filter?
Some pilsner strains can be low flocculating i think. So, i vote yeast issues!

I would say any available details about your brew (extract or all grain? Water profile? Mash temps? How did you ferment? Temp? How long? What yeast? Etc. Etc.) will help get you more comments.

How does it taste?
 
Well, i have to say my heart dropped when i read your title... lol.
Then again- who knows what the next craze will be?

If i had to guess from just your picture...
Did you cold crash? Fine? Filter?
Some pilsner strains can be low flocculating i think. So, i vote yeast issues!

I would say any available details about your brew (extract or all grain? Water profile? Mash temps? How did you ferment? Temp? How long? What yeast? Etc. Etc.) will help get you more comments.

How does it taste?

5 gallon batch BIAB - German Pils
11 lbs 11 oz German Pils
13 oz cara-pils
1.5 oz Saaz 60 min
1.8 oz Saaz 30 min
1 oz Hallertau Mag. 10 min
1 oz Hallertau Mag. 0 min
Mash @148 F 60 minutes
Pre-boil gravity: 1.050
90 minute boil - OG: 1.054
1 pkg. of WLP800, pitched at 50 F (4/12/20)

Held fermentation at 50F For 8 days till it reached 1.026. I started ramping up the temp to 66F over 2.5 days. Left at 66F till it reached FG of 1.010, this took another 2 days. I racked into the keg which had gelatin ready to mix in. Dropped the temperature to 38F and left it alone till last Sunday (4/26) where then I hooked it up to gas and let it carb up a little bit.

I’ll attach a picture of what it looked like during a gravity reading. It was a nice light, straw color. I didn’t mess with the water profile. I’ll look up my local report and let you know. I’m wondering if it was still fermenting....?

Yea, just really stumped with this one.
BC51B0DE-5785-4FC1-BDC2-92253E84DB69.jpeg
 
Also, taste wise, I guess it didn’t have any off flavors. It wasn’t full carb’d yet and the look was totally putting me off.
 
Looks just like the yeast starter I have currently going... My guess would be you have tons of sediment in the keg and you'll be pulling it for a while. Is that the actual first pint out of the keg?
 
Looks like it is either still fermenting, or it just needs lagering time. Or you took a bunch of yeast/sediment with you when you transferred to the keg. Or your gelatin is dropping out bunches of stuff. Hard to tell...

I raise my lagers for a diacetyl rest for 5 days, then drop the temp to 34F, and let it sit in the fermentor for 10 days or so. Then I move it to the keg. By this time, my lagers are pretty clear. Be careful to not take a bunch of yeast/sediment with you when you transfer from the fermentor to the keg.

Set it in a 34F kegerator or similar, and let it rest a week, and pull a glass again. See if it is looking better. And keep doing this until it looks clean. Could take like 6 weeks. But, it should get there eventually.
 
Well, considering you never lagered it, I'm not surprised it hasn't dropped clear.
Put it at 30 F for 4 weeks and it'll be beautifully clear.
Also, the Weihenstephan strain is not the best flocculator, so it needs patience.
Use good, proper procedure, which involves not rushing things, and you don't even need gelatin.
Case in point: My recent German Pils with zero post-fermentation fining, 5 weeks from brew day:

Pils 2.jpg
 
My goodness... I also thought somebody wants to add lacrosse to a poor little pils.


What a relief!

I think it's yeast.
Lol same thought. I was like “really, lactose and vanilla in a Pilsner... just make an ipa”
 
Typically, the gelatin treatment is applied to the top of a keg of already fully chilled beer, and if it works it should be obvious in a couple of days.
I wonder if dumping warm beer on top of the gelatin is at the root of the milkshake effect...

Cheers!
 
http://brulosophy.com/2015/06/22/fermentation-temperature-pt-3-lager-yeast-exbeeriment-results/
I was following an experiment done with the same yeast strain where the whole process was accelerated. Seemed to work fine for the experimenter not having lagered for 4-6 weeks. Granted I haven’t had it at lager temperature for more than a few days I wasn’t expecting what I pulled from the keg. To be totally honest this is my first attempt at kegging.

Lots to learn! Thanks everyone.
 
Typically, the gelatin treatment is applied to the top of a keg of already fully chilled beer, and if it works it should be obvious in a couple of days.
I wonder if dumping warm beer on top of the gelatin is at the root of the milkshake effect...

Cheers!
I guess I didn’t know that. I thought it should be mixed throughout the solution. The gelatin was obviously much warmer than the beer. I had gotten it to boil and dissolved the gelatin then let it cool off for a little.

Should the gelatin solution be added in at a cooler temperature as well instead of piping hot?
 
Well, considering you never lagered it, I'm not surprised it hasn't dropped clear.
Put it at 30 F for 4 weeks and it'll be beautifully clear.
Also, the Weihenstephan strain is not the best flocculator, so it needs patience.
Use good, proper procedure, which involves not rushing things, and you don't even need gelatin.
Case in point: My recent German Pils with zero post-fermentation fining, 5 weeks from brew day:

View attachment 677633
truly beautiful
 
I guess I didn’t know that. I thought it should be mixed throughout the solution. The gelatin was obviously much warmer than the beer. I had gotten it to boil and dissolved the gelatin then let it cool off for a little.

Should the gelatin solution be added in at a cooler temperature as well instead of piping hot?
From everything I have read gelatin should be added to beer after it is already chilled below 40f, from what you have said you added gelatin when the beer was at 68f?
 
http://brulosophy.com/2015/06/22/fermentation-temperature-pt-3-lager-yeast-exbeeriment-results/
I was following an experiment done with the same yeast strain where the whole process was accelerated. Seemed to work fine for the experimenter not having lagered for 4-6 weeks. Granted I haven’t had it at lager temperature for more than a few days I wasn’t expecting what I pulled from the keg. To be totally honest this is my first attempt at kegging.

Lots to learn! Thanks everyone.
There are pros and cons to the fast lager technique - I go more traditional and German-style and as you can see it works great without gelatin.

That said, 38F is NOT lagering temp. Lagering temp should be as close to 0C/32F or even lower if your equipment allows. In fact only a week at 30F will do more than 4 weeks at 38F. If you are using a refrigerator instead of a freezer, you might not be able to get much lower than 38F, but that is something to consider when looking at long-term equipment investments. If you plan to do lagers, a little storage time at or slightly below freezing (but not cold enough to actually freeze the beer) will pay HUGE dividends in clarity.

So again, fast lagering is a decent technique when you are in a hurry for something to drink, but much like with "warm lager" techniques, producing an acceptable beer at the end is not the same as saying there is no difference in the end product.
 
I guess I didn’t know that. I thought it should be mixed throughout the solution. The gelatin was obviously much warmer than the beer. I had gotten it to boil and dissolved the gelatin then let it cool off for a little.

Should the gelatin solution be added in at a cooler temperature as well instead of piping hot?
Gelatin (if you choose to use it) can be added hot (the small volume of hot liquid will not appreciably increase the temp of 5 gallons of cold beer), but should be added on top of the beer.
 
Granted I haven’t had it at lager temperature for more than a few days I wasn’t expecting what I pulled from the keg. To be totally honest this is my first attempt at kegging.

Lots to learn! Thanks everyone.
Was that the first pint out of the keg? If you're using a dip tube any yeast will settle to the bottom of the keg and the first pours can be extra yeasty. That looks excessive, though.
 
Well, considering you never lagered it, I'm not surprised it hasn't dropped clear.
Put it at 30 F for 4 weeks and it'll be beautifully clear.
Also, the Weihenstephan strain is not the best flocculator, so it needs patience.
Use good, proper procedure, which involves not rushing things, and you don't even need gelatin.
Case in point: My recent German Pils with zero post-fermentation fining, 5 weeks from brew day:

View attachment 677633
Looks
Nice, can you
Give me your recipe please?
 
There are pros and cons to the fast lager technique - I go more traditional and German-style and as you can see it works great without gelatin.

That said, 38F is NOT lagering temp.

I don't agree with this statement. 38F is a perfectly acceptable lagering temp according to a number of sources (brukaiser, bsgcraft website, John Palmer, etc). It's toward the upper end of the range, granted, but you can certainly accomplish a lagering phase at 38F
 
I don't agree with this statement. 38F is a perfectly acceptable lagering temp according to a number of sources (brukaiser, bsgcraft website, John Palmer, etc). It's toward the upper end of the range, granted, but you can certainly accomplish a lagering phase at 38F
Are you discussing lagering specifically or fermenting lager yeast at 38*f because as you know those are completely different things and I think that’s where the conflict is occurring here
 
Are you discussing lagering specifically or fermenting lager yeast at 38*f because as you know those are completely different things and I think that’s where the conflict is occurring here

No I mean lagering, as in cold conditioning. Lager fermentation is typically between 46-55F and cold storage for maturation can happen between 32-40F. I fully agree that colder is better, and 32-34 is the ideal lagering temp range, I was just taking exception to the absolute statement that lagering cannot be done at 38F.

I don't mean to be argumentative, but I always like to think of how a new brewer might read and interpret my posts. If a person just starting out doesn't have the ability to store their beer at 32, then lagering in the bottom of the refrigerator closer to 38 might be their only option, and they could be discouraged by reading the post above.

Like anything there are no hard set limits in brewing, just a bunch of opinions on what the hard set limits could/should be 😁
 
No I mean lagering, as in cold conditioning. Lager fermentation is typically between 46-55F and cold storage for maturation can happen between 32-40F. I fully agree that colder is better, and 32-34 is the ideal lagering temp range, I was just taking exception to the absolute statement that lagering cannot be done at 38F.

I don't mean to be argumentative, but I always like to think of how a new brewer might read and interpret my posts. If a person just starting out doesn't have the ability to store their beer at 32, then lagering in the bottom of the refrigerator closer to 38 might be their only option, and they could be discouraged by reading the post above.

Like anything there are no hard set limits in brewing, just a bunch of opinions on what the hard set limits could/should be 😁
In agreement. I read the original post as he was advising someone against fermenting at 38*f. So I was just trying to clarify your response of saying it was ok. now that I reread both post, I am in agreement that you can lager at 38*f. It takes longer at that temp Than let’s say low 30s but traditionally beers were lagered in caves during the summer in which the temperature would typically remain in the 40s and even the low 50s based on location. Again this was planned to be done for months so speed of lager was not a priority
 
Back
Top