Sanitation, shmanitation

[emjay]

On February 13 I brewed a Pliny clone. Being by far the hoppiest beer I've ever done, I didn't realize how stupid it was of me to use leaf hops, and I ended up being unable to siphon anything out of the kettle (thankfully, my next batch will be with a shiny new Blitchmann). Then I remembered I had bought a whole-pail nylon mesh bag, and figured I'd put it in the bucket and pour the wort through it. Rinsed the bag first, but didn't bother sanitizing it. The bag momentarily slipped since I didn't secure it well enough, allowing about a dozen individual hop cones into the bucket, but I quickly fixed it.

After I was done pouring, I realized that the only thing more stupid than doing a Pliny clone with leaf hops, was doing a PARTIAL BOIL Pliny clone with leaf hops. I think I had about 2 inches of wort in my ale pail; the leaf hops had soaked up pretty much the entire kettle.

Frustrated as hell at this point, the kitchen a mess, and me personally exhausted, I said screw it, picked up the bag with hands that hadn't been wash since I had started, and squeezed every last drop of wort that I could out of it. Like squeezing a sponge, the wort flowed all over my less-than-immaculate hands, and because the hops ended up retaining almost nothing, I actually overshot my target OG by quite a bit for the first time ever (I'm pretty much always within 2 points) at 1.092.

Today, about 2.5 weeks later, I opened the bucket to rack it to secondary on top of a huge dry hop charge. Normally I wouldn't secondary but I wanted to get it off the hops that had fallen in when the mesh bag slipped - I thought it had been a LOT more than I later found out there was. I was resigned to the fact that the beer would be disgustingly infected, sour, etc, but I was going to finish it out anyways.

And my god, the smell was absolutely heavenly, easily the best smelling beer (at this stage) I've made to date. Which is funny because exactly a week earlier, and also fermenting right now, is the worst smelling beer I've ever made, a Berliner Weisse.

And the appearance was absolutely pristine, quite clear for a beer at this stage, with a beautiful color. I'm already excited to drink this beer!

So I'm wondering why the beer seems to have survived what I thought would be an inevitable infection. Does the ridiculous amount of hops in this beer make it immune or something? Would the very high ABV kill any bacteria that may have taken a slight hold? Is it that the 3L WLP001 starter that started VERY quickly didn't even let one take hold at all? Or are the chances of infection not even that high to begin with? Or MAYBE (I hope not, and I doubt it) the infection just isn't showing signs after only 17 days?

I know it's impossible to have the right answer for this particular instance, but I'm wondering if infections are really as easy to get as some people suggest. The only infections my beers have ever had are ones I deliberately inoculated them with, and after this it seems that short of throwing in a large bacterial culture, even the most unsanitary practices haven't seemed to nail me yet, although I realize this beer, for the reasons mentioned above, should be less susceptible to infection than probably over 99.9%+ of the beers ever made.

 

[bigbeergeek]

Wow. I'd like to see an update on this in the future. Sorry about the rough brew day, buddy.

 

[BobBailey]

I'd think 3 things came into play. Hops and alcohol are good disinfectants and luck always helps. Hope your early indications of success are borne out with time.

bob

 

[kpr121]

What kind of yeast did you use? If the yeast took off quickly, they could have "beat the bugs to the punch".

 

[gunner65]

Well it is quite simple what ever un-sanitized surfaces/objects that the wort came into contact with did not pick up bacterisa that the yeast could not deal with. Should we throw our arms up and forget sanitizing? No. Next time you may not be lucky.

 

[Homercidal]

There is a good chance that a beer will be fine if you skimp on sanitation. But it's a risk that can be expensive if it turns out the wrong way.

You have the advantage of having plenty of yeast to up the alcohol and tons of hops to help disinfect.

And LOTS of hops sucks when you see how much beer you lose, but it's worth it in the end when you drink it. Always plan on making EXTRA wort, especially when you factor in the dry hops...

 

[emjay]

What kind of yeast did you use? If the yeast took off quickly, they could have "beat the bugs to the punch".

Yeah, that was one of my potential scenarios I listed. The yeast had a VERY fast start, and when I opened it yesterday, the krausen ring coming off the sidewall was so ridiculously thick, I'm not even sure how it held itself up!

As mentioned, I used a 3L (slightly larger, actually) starter of White Labs California Ale (WLP001). Luckily, I always make my starters bigger than they need to be, because I harvest yeast from it instead of the beer, and when I saw that my OG was a fair bit higher than intended, I was able to toss the whole starter in, which coincidentally was almost a perfect pitching rate.

Well it is quite simple what ever un-sanitized surfaces/objects that the wort came into contact with did not pick up bacterisa that the yeast could not deal with. Should we throw our arms up and forget sanitizing? No. Next time you may not be lucky.

Relax, I wasn't seriously suggesting anything of the sort. All I was really doing is sharing what happened, with such an expensive recipe that nobody in their right mind would do this as an experiment.

But it's a bit ridiculous to suggest that no bacteria whatsoever was picked up from me squeezing the hell out of the hops with my bare hands, and almost all the wort flowing over these bacteria-laden appendages. The only thing that could have happened is that, despite bacteria getting in, the environment I created for it was too hostile for it to thrive. I'm probably just lucky it happened with a 10%+ ABV beer with a Tinseth-calculated 277 IBUs. Which particular factor it was, is beyond me... though I'm not sure it even matters or can even be treated separately like that.

 

[gunner65]

I don't need to relax because I am not upset no hostility implied in my post so I guess you misread I was being silly. I also never said that no bacteria was picked up I said no bacteria that the yeast couldn't handle. There is bacteria in the air we breathe and there is most likely some bacteria in your sanitized fermenting vessel just not the type the yeast cannot handle.

 

[mkwasnie]

The big starter has to be the main reason for your beer resisting infection. The crazy amount of hops also might of helped. No alchy in it to begin with so that really doesn't contribute (actually the high gravity makes it more attractive to the nasties). So the starter, hops, and some good luck is what really saved your beer from what it sounds.

Once had a crazy brew day similar and got lucky, but I don't want to push it.

 

[samc]

I've had to resort to similar non sanitary methods in the past. Never intend to squeeze a bag of hops with my bare unwashed hands but it has happened. I don't advocate doing this but sometimes stuff happens.

If I was going to pick a beer to resist infections it would be a Pliny like hop bomb - they are no match for those hops.

 

[BrewMoreBeers]

Not that I would do it, but the monks made beer without starsan... The brewing process is inherently antibacterial. That is why it has been used for thousands of years to "clean" water.

I am by no means saying we should stop following sanitary practices, but rather that our creations are much tougher than we give them credit for.

 

[Wakadaka]

Kind of unrelated, but when you guys were talking about how bacteria was in the air we breathe it reminded me. My biology teacher the other day said that we have something like 10 times as many bacteria cells in our body as we do human cells. Some are good some are bad for us.

Anyways glad to hear it is good at this stage. Doesn't mean i am throwing away my sanitizer, but good to know that even with poor practice you CAN get a good result. In my very limited brewing career and through my research it seems as though an infection is something everyone fears like the plague, but in acutallity is a rare occasion. Then again I have very very little experience so don't listen to me; just an observation.

 

[theredben]

The problem bacteria are not so much the ones in the air, as they are the ones that are left over from the last batch. Most of the ones in the air, and on the floor are not "beer-spoilage organisms". IMO it is much more important how you clean things before you put them away, than how you clean them before use. It is on those last few drops of sugary water in the bottom of you bottling bucket that was not rinsed properly after use that the nasties like Lactobacillus, Pedococcus, and especially Acetobacter will start to grow.

 

[kanzimonson]

I hope your beer isn't contaminated. I've found that contamination usually comes on slowly. If there's a problem, you might not notice it for a few more weeks or even months. But you'll just have to see.

Also, I've never heard of someone doing a IIPA as a partial boil - seems like you'd dilute your bitterness pretty badly when you top up.

 

[musick]

Its been mentioned, but hops lend their antibacterial properties to beer.

Although I still make the effort to keep things sanitized, I am no longer paranoid about wild bugs. IMO, a big starter w/ a fast (2-4 hrs after pitch) start is at least equal to sanitization techniques.

That said, I clean carboys immediately when empty and love my acidified bleach solutions.

Microbial micorflora differ from region to region, and even block to block. Keep this in mind. Always better to be too clean, but IME, many homebrewers are too worried about contaminants.

 

[emjay]

The problem bacteria are not so much the ones in the air, as they are the ones that are left over from the last batch. Most of the ones in the air, and on the floor are not "beer-spoilage organisms". IMO it is much more important how you clean things before you put them away, than how you clean them before use. It is on those last few drops of sugary water in the bottom of you bottling bucket that was not rinsed properly after use that the nasties like Lactobacillus, Pedococcus, and especially Acetobacter will start to grow.

I agree. After racking onto 7oz of dry hops in secondary, I tuned the bucket with near-scalding water a few times, scrubbing the entire thing (with a non-abrasive cloth, scratches are the worst...) and it's been soaking in StarSan the last 24 hours. This incident was just a momentary lapse... I'm normally quite anal about sanitation. After this experience, I'm wondering if I take the sanitation thing a bit TOO far, but all the possibly unnecessary sanitation is not much more work than the basic cleaning and sanitary practices. So I don't think it will change anything.

I hope your beer isn't contaminated. I've found that contamination usually comes on slowly. If there's a problem, you might not notice it for a few more weeks or even months. But you'll just have to see.

Also, I've never heard of someone doing a IIPA as a partial boil - seems like you'd dilute your bitterness pretty badly when you top up.

My recipe was adjusted to account for the top-up water... which means I had even more leaf hops than the recipe would otherwise have, which only further compounded the problem with using less water! Besides, even if I didn't adjust for it, lowering the hop utilization on anything resembling a Pliny clone would still result in a hugely hoppy beer.

As far as the infection goes, there's no doubt that bacteria doesn't grow in beer nearly as fast as yeast does, which is why a fast start is a good mitigation strategy. All the beers I've deliberately infected have shown signs much sooner than this though, but granted, the cultures I use have many more cells than might typically initially infect a batch as a result of poor sanitation. But with the beer at over 10%, and as hoppy as it is, if it hasn't taken any noticeable hold yet, I seriously doubt anything is going to develop at this point.

 

[emjay]

Tasted it today after pulling my first hydrometer sample since pitching, and it tastes divine.

A friend who is a relative beer noob saw me with the stuff from the test jar poured into a glads and asked, "is that your applewine?" So I said sure, and gave him a taste. The reaction on his face was priceless! But surprisingly, once the bitterness dissipated, he absolutely loved the lingering aftertaste.

What's astonishing to me though is just how dry I got it for a beer with an OG of 1.092 - a pound of dextrose, careful ramping up of temperature, and some amylase added when pitching got me to a FG of 1.010 (nearly 11% ABV)... an apparent attenuation of 87%. I've pulled that off with belgians before, but achieving that with WLP001 just astonished me.