Now (sadly) trending... no foam (not keg/serving line related***)

[jeeppilot]

I seem to be beginning a trend of no foam issues in several of my past few beers. The beer in question, a Belgian quad and my first highly carbonated beer*, pours like coke. It is carbed at about 3.2 volumes and seems to remain well carbed after pouring. However, any head present during pour is literally just CO2 bubbles and vanishes within seconds. Can someone point to where in my process I might be damaging my foam related elements? Or is there possibly something still in my serving setup?

My Process - I do BIAB with a Corona style mill set pretty tight. Usually get 80%+ mash eff. Full volume mash, no recirculation. I'm a squeezer. CFC chill then pitch. I have good temp control during fermentation (though this brew went high due to my negligence). Serve from keg at 40F with most beers using 12-14 psi "set and forget". My taps all have about 5 ft of line.

Recipe - Belgian Quad

OG - 1.095 - Actual - 1.090**
FG - 1.017 - Actual - 1.013

Belgian Pale Ale malt - 56%
Munich - 16%
Aromatic - 6%
Midnight Wheat - 3%
D-180 - 13%
Turbinado - 6%

Mash Schedule:

135F - 10 min (just cause I could)
147F - 35 min
162F - 25 min

WY3787 on starter - pitched at 65F then free rose to 83F (didn't mean to let it rise quite that high) before bringing it back down to 77F. Fermentation appeared very fast and healthy.

Aged for 6 weeks at 50F then chilled to 40F, set (and forget) keg pressure at 20 psi.

Beer glasses are washed in the dishwasher using those Cascade packs that for some insane reason people feel like eating. Most of my brews have decent head retention, so I don't think that washing/soap residue/rinse aid/etc is an issue.

*This was my first shot at a high carbonation beer. I'm mostly looking at my process instead of my serving setup, but a key difference here is that I carbed this brew to 3.2 volumes using 20 psi instead of the typical 2.5 volumes at 12-14 psi. Even if I serve at 20 psi instead of dropping it to 12psi to serve, I still get ZERO foam.

**I missed my OG short by almost 15 points. I tried to recoup some of that miss by adding a full additional pound of turbinado. So, instead of 1 lb as per the recipe, I had 2 lbs turbinado in the wort. Whats worse, this same issue happened a second time on my most recent brew, a Belgian Tripel, so I'm concerned about the quality of that beer too. (After 2 consecutive big misses, I realized that I did not fully understand one of my settings in the brewing software, which led to this issue, but that's in another post.)

***The tap I have this beer on is usually empty. I've served maybe one or two beers through it since making the kegerator. I was wondering if something in the line, or tap was causing the high carbonation, no foam issue, so I hooked that line and faucet up to another keg that has terrific foam retention. Seemed to have no problem, so I assume its the beer, not the serving setup.

 

[bierhaus15]

If it is not the tap system or the glassware (generally best to not use dishsoap to clean beer glasses) it could be a myriad of things.

High ABV beers (>7% ABV) have less foam stability than mid-strength. Adjunct use decreases foam as well. Did you leave the beer on the yeast for 6 weeks while aging? That alone could be the culprit, as lysing yeast excretes proteolytic enzymes (proteinase A) that absolutely kill beer foam. Also, BIAB is naturally anti-foam, as the lack of lauter and vorlauf ensures you end up with more foam-negative lipids in your wort and finished beer. Overpitching and underpitching yeast, high pH (>4.5), high sodium levels, ect, can also affect foam stability.

 

[jeeppilot]

If it is not the tap system or the glassware (generally best to not use dishsoap to clean beer glasses) it could be a myriad of things.

High ABV beers (>7% ABV) have less foam stability than mid-strength. Adjunct use decreases foam as well. Did you leave the beer on the yeast for 6 weeks while aging? That alone could be the culprit, as lysing yeast excretes proteolytic enzymes (proteinase A) that absolutely kill beer foam. Also, BIAB is naturally anti-foam, as the lack of lauter and vorlauf ensures you end up with more foam-negative lipids in your wort and finished beer. Overpitching and underpitching yeast, high pH (>4.5), high sodium levels, ect, can also affect foam stability.

Can you tell me more about the BIAB foam-negative lipids? I haven’t heard of this before. Also, I don’t think I have ever had a beer on yeast longer than 3 weeks. So that’s not it. I’ll look at my sodium level, but I think it was low. pH was projected to be 5.4 in the mash, but I don’t have a meter to actually see what I’m getting.

 

[Vale71]

High ABV and well attenuated with almost 20% simple sugars in the grist, I wouldn't expect great head retention even if poured perfectly in a well-rinsed glass. I think your issue is mostly with your expectations and not with the beer itself.

 

[Gnomebrewer]

Head retention is often an issue in big Belgian beers - presumably due to the high simple sugar content (I wasn't aware until now that high alcohol content might also be an issue). The 162F rest was a good move - I find this 'dextrin' rest gives better head on my big Belgians that using a single temp rest in the mid-range. However, with a fine grind using BIAB, your mash is probably finished before the dextrin rest starts (my grind is about 0.035" - there's still plenty of conversion to happen by the time I get to the higher temp rest). Maybe try cutting short the 147F rest next time? You could even measure the gravity of the mash to make sure there's still starch to be converted before the 162F rest.

The 135F rest could be part of this issue - it's warmer than a typical protein rest. I'm not quite sure why, but a highly successful commercial brewer that I've brewed with a few times always says to NEVER let your beer sit for long in the high 50's celsius (about 132 to 140F) because it destroys the body (he's super paranoid about it). He does a short protein rest at about 128F then gets it as fast as he can to 145F.

5ft of line at 12-14psi seems short. But if it works for other beers, it shouldn't be the problem.

 

[madscientist451]

Add 5-10% Weyermann Carafoam and see what happens.

 

[jeeppilot]

Head retention is often an issue in big Belgian beers - presumably due to the high simple sugar content (I wasn't aware until now that high alcohol content might also be an issue). The 162F rest was a good move - I find this 'dextrin' rest gives better head on my big Belgians that using a single temp rest in the mid-range. However, with a fine grind using BIAB, your mash is probably finished before the dextrin rest starts (my grind is about 0.035" - there's still plenty of conversion to happen by the time I get to the higher temp rest). Maybe try cutting short the 147F rest next time? You could even measure the gravity of the mash to make sure there's still starch to be converted before the 162F rest.

The 135F rest could be part of this issue - it's warmer than a typical protein rest. I'm not quite sure why, but a highly successful commercial brewer that I've brewed with a few times always says to NEVER let your beer sit for long in the high 50's celsius (about 132 to 140F) because it destroys the body (he's super paranoid about it). He does a short protein rest at about 128F then gets it as fast as he can to 145F.

5ft of line at 12-14psi seems short. But if it works for other beers, it shouldn't be the problem.

I was under the impression that a rest around 135 was ideal for proteinase activity which promotes head retention. That is why I did that rest, but I also just read that doing a protein rest with fully modified malts could result in those foam producing proteins being broken down, leaving a thin, watery beer. So that may well be a part of it.

I was worried about doubling the turbinado when my gravity ended up low. Guess it’s all learning lessons. I am carbing up the Tripel now... I made the same mistakes on this one too. Hopefully the carapils will help combat my mistakes!