Warm Fermented Lager Thread

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Not sure what happened, but the Centennial lager I brewed back on the 7th is a poopty dumper. Horrible "soapy" flavor, I'm getting the floral notes from the Centennial but the beer itself is bad. I'm thinking it was the yeast. The only other WF lager I brewed that went south was done on 3rd gen 34/70 (fruity beyond drinkability) so that might be it. I'm old but I CAN learn from my mistakes after a few tries. I've had better luck with S-23, so I brewed up a batch of my Crystal lager Thursday night with that. Looks promising a few days in. Bit depressed because it was the first dumper I've had in quite some time, my record has been stellar since I got my fermentation fridge. Poopy.
 
seatazzz said:
Not sure what happened, but the Centennial lager I brewed back on the 7th is a poopty dumper. Horrible "soapy" flavor, I'm getting the floral notes from the Centennial but the beer itself is bad.
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I haven't noticed it, but have read that Centennial and Cascade give a soapy flavor.
 
ncbrewer said:
I haven't noticed it, but have read that Centennial and Cascade give a soapy flavor.
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It seems to be a genetic thing, around 15% of people perceive coriander/cilantro as soapy, and Centennial soapiness seems to be tied up with that.
 
Northern_Brewer said:
It seems to be a genetic thing, around 15% of people perceive coriander/cilantro as soapy, and Centennial soapiness seems to be tied up with that.
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And some people think cilantro taste/smell like doll hair. I did not understand that one until I pulled some mature plants, and the stalks had a strong plastic like smell.

Could soapy be a phenolic thing?
 
How long do you folks see Mangrove Jacks California Lager yeast take? I brewed a Schwartzbier a couple of weeks ago OG was 1.049, pitched a hydrated pack of MJ54, fermented at 68 for a week then 72. It had a huge krausen that dropped, but bubbles still remain on the surface and an occasional burb through the airlock. Seems like a long time, but this is my first try with this yeast.
 
EDF713 said:
How long do you folks see Mangrove Jacks California Lager yeast take? I brewed a Schwartzbier a couple of weeks ago OG was 1.049, pitched a hydrated pack of MJ54, fermented at 68 for a week then 72. It had a huge krausen that dropped, but bubbles still remain on the surface and an occasional burb through the airlock. Seems like a long time, but this is my first try with this yeast.
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What is the SG at the moment? That is the only way to tell if it is finished. Airlock activity is no indication of active fermentation. It is probably just relasing Co2.
 
the last 3 lagers were made from 34/70 and the same yeast cake all were done at my usual ale temp rate start at 60 ramp up to 70 in 7 days stay there till day 10 then chill, but what was odd was the 34/70 keeps finishing in 5 days and a perfectly clean taste but I did follow my schedule then chilled at 34 for a week while carbing and adding gelatin, my family couldn't put them down, I've also done a no chill on the last 2 overnight and back on the same cake, not as clear to start but the taste is right there
 
EDF713 said:
How long do you folks see Mangrove Jacks California Lager yeast take? I brewed a Schwartzbier a couple of weeks ago OG was 1.049, pitched a hydrated pack of MJ54, fermented at 68 for a week then 72. It had a huge krausen that dropped, but bubbles still remain on the surface and an occasional burb through the airlock. Seems like a long time, but this is my first try with this yeast.
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I have been leaving mine for 3 weeks in the FV. 2 or 3 days to cold crash, then i add finings leave for 2 more days, force carb overnight and drink.
 
ba-brewer said:
Could soapy be a phenolic thing?
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Unlikely - the most common mutation associated with the soapy thing is in OR6A2, which is a gene that seems to be tied up with the perception of aldehydes, and terpenols like linalool probably come into it somewhere as well. See eg here.
 
Beer666 said:
I have been leaving mine for 3 weeks in the FV. 2 or 3 days to cold crash, then i add finings leave for 2 more days, force carb overnight and drink.
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I figured I’d do the same, what’s weird is the thin layer of foam/bubbles that stayed for a week and a half after the krausen dropped. This is my first time using MJ54, didn’t know if others had seen that. Anyway, most is gone now and it’s starting to clear.
 
ba-brewer said:
And some people think cilantro taste/smell like doll hair. I did not understand that one until I pulled some mature plants, and the stalks had a strong plastic like smell.

Could soapy be a phenolic thing?
Click to expand...

Not really. Phenolic usually comes across as medicine-y or bandaid-y (trust me I know from experience). This one is definitely soapy, even down to kinda feeling soapy in my teeth. There's also a slight vomitous note in there as well. I'm thinking now it's a combination of the yeast and the hops (they are pretty old but were kept cold). Just going to write this one off and stop using 34/70 past two generations. I like what S-23 does better anyhow.

Another issue might be fermentation temperature. I do have a ferment fridge, but can only cool down, not warm up at this point (going to get a heat lamp this week and see if that helps). I know that it was fermented on lager yeast, but if it fluctuated too much at night that could be a factor?
 
seatazzz said:
Not really. Phenolic usually comes across as medicine-y or bandaid-y (trust me I know from experience). This one is definitely soapy, even down to kinda feeling soapy in my teeth. There's also a slight vomitous note in there as well. I'm thinking now it's a combination of the yeast and the hops (they are pretty old but were kept cold). Just going to write this one off and stop using 34/70 past two generations. I like what S-23 does better anyhow.

Another issue might be fermentation temperature. I do have a ferment fridge, but can only cool down, not warm up at this point (going to get a heat lamp this week and see if that helps). I know that it was fermented on lager yeast, but if it fluctuated too much at night that could be a factor?
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I did a search for soapy off flavor and it mentioned the break down of fatty acids in trub. If you don't wash your yeast maybe it is possible to get some old break/trub getting carried over for a couple batches. Not sure how much old trub it would take foul a batch.
http://howtobrew.com/book/section-4/is-my-beer-ruined/common-off-flavors

I used to do with lagers with cooling only and not think it ever caused issues. A seedling heating mat works good for a heat source and get direct heat to the fermentor.
 
Hey everyone. I have been reading up on this warm fermented lager thread and it has me thinking I need to try it. I have been brewing ales for about 6 years and have always wanted to do a later but don't have the fridge to lager. I would love to try a Munich Dunkel and was wondering if anyone has a recipe that they could share that they really enjoy so that I can give this a go. Thanks and cheers!
 
Just finally dumped out the 34/70 bad one. Gave it one more chance to crash, didn't help. I knew it probably wouldn't, but what the hey. Crystal lager on s-23 I did last Thursday is promising, however; krausen dropped after just 4 days and it's down to 1.015 now. Tastes great and is starting the cold crash tonight with an eye to kegging this weekend. All is not lost!
 
Been watching this thread for a while now and decided to give the warm lager idea a try. Not going to do a lager though. Brewing a 10 gal batch Tuesday of a tried and true recipe that probably is closest to a Kentucky Commons style as far a styles go. It's something I brew year round but change the mash temp summer and winter. 156F in the summer for something a little drier/lower alcohol, 150F in the winter that's a little sweeter/higher alcohol. The mash difference results in about 0.5 difference in ABV.

Tuesday I will be switching to the 150F mash. I thought it would be a good time to try the MJs M54 yeast. Though not a lager recipe I figure this will give me an idea how the yeast acts at 66F fermenting. The other 5 gal with be done with Safale-05, my usual yeast (and temp) for the recipe. Figure I can compare the fermentation aspects and come up with a somewhat different beer flavor/etc-wise, using the Safale beer as a baseline. Plan to do a "fresh" taste test of the two and will probably give the MJ batch a couple months or so of lagering then taste test against a fresh Safale batch (I brew this particular beer about every 2nd-4th batch, pretty much a main stay beer in my keggerator).

So I figure I will learn some about the yeast and if there are no major issues/off flavors/diacetyl I will give it a try on a lager early spring (when I normally brew a few batches of lagers to lager for summer). Plus who knows, it might give a better flavor to my recipe which would be a bonus.
 
I post way too much in this thread, but I love my lagers. Racked 10 gallons of an experimental Black Lager (kinda session-y porter recipe with Cascade & Chinook hops) onto the S-23 I just kegged off of today; split the slurry between two carboys and less than 6 hours later both have high healthy krausen and the ferment fridge smells fabulous. I'm a mite concerned since I'm pretty sure this is the 6th generation of this yeast batch; but the lager I kegged today is delicious with no off flavors, and the speedy start to fermentation for this one has me hopeful. I've read a lot about re-pitching yeast, and the consensus I seem to find is NEVER use yeast past 5 generations. We'll see.
 
dkeller12 said:
Hey everyone. I have been reading up on this warm fermented lager thread and it has me thinking I need to try it. I have been brewing ales for about 6 years and have always wanted to do a later but don't have the fridge to lager. I would love to try a Munich Dunkel and was wondering if anyone has a recipe that they could share that they really enjoy so that I can give this a go. Thanks and cheers!
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This is one I did back in September. Also my first warm fermented lager (and lager and general). This is for a 12 gallon batch. I really like how it turned out.

Batch Size: 12 gallons
Mash: 60 minutes @ 152F
Boil: 60 minutes
OG: Target: 1.055, Measured: 1.054
FG: Est: 1.013, Measured: 1.013
ABV: 5.4%
IBU: 25.7

Grains:
20 lb - Belgian Munich (local hb shop didn't have german munich) (80%)
2 lb - Caraaroma (8%)
1 lb - Carafa I (4%)
2 lb - Aromatic (4%) - I used this malt to try to get the Belgian Munich base malt closer to German Munich

Hops:
1.0 oz - Perle - Boil 45 minutes
2.0 oz - Perle - Boil 15 minutes

Yeast:
34/70: Used one packet per 6 gallons into the fermenter, no starter. Fermented at ~65F (temperature of my basement)
 
Thank you Cool_Hand_Luke. I will give that one a try. I was hoping that someone would respond, so thank you.
 
I splashed out for the palmer and zainsheff classic recipes book. This has a recipe for every style as a good starting point. You can find their dunkel recipe online with a little searching. I love this book and it is so helpful answering the question, what do I want to brew next.
 
IMG_3660.JPG


My Oktoberfest which is drinking nicely!
 
applescrap said:
I splashed out for the palmer and zainsheff classic recipes book. This has a recipe for every style as a good starting point. You can find their dunkel recipe online with a little searching. I love this book and it is so helpful answering the question, what do I want to brew next.
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I think Jamil does a good job in explaining how the different beers should be brewed. When I am going to try a new style I take a look BCS to see how his recipes look. I think he likes roasty beers more than I do so will tone the roast malts down a little if I brew one of his recipes.
 
Update on the Black lager...tasted it today. Gravity where I want it, but the flavor is a bit meh. Dark malts are a bit overshadowed by the lager 'bite' and the hops, but it's there. Going to give it a good crash and let it lager for a week before kegging. The crystal lager that was kegged in order to give the yeast to this one, however....best one yet. Great flavor, not sweet like the last two have been, just a nice strong lager flavor. Happy!
 
So I brewed a Baltic porter over three weeks ago with about half the yeast cake of 34/70 from an Octoberfest. Both were fermented at 60F and fermentation was normal for both. I’m drinking the Octoberfest now and it’s quite tasty, but rather cloudy despite being fined in the keg with gelatin and sitting for a few weeks. Not a big concern, but I think it may be a factor with the porter.

The porter kicked off super quickly since the yeast cake was fresh and I oxygenated the wort. Fermentation lasted for maybe 4-5 days and then seemed to finish up. I gave it another week or so before checking gravity. At this point it was still very cloudy and smelled a bit sulphury. The SG reading was 1.022 and my OG was 1.070. I’ve given it another week and a half but it hasn’t cleared up at all and the SG has only dropped to 1.021. I raised the temp up to 68F after the first reading but that hasn’t seemed to help.

I was hoping for the FG to be a little lower, in the 1.016-18 range. Would it be worth pitching some ale yeast? Or some of a fresh pack of 34/70? Has anyone had a similar experience of this yeast not clearing and/or finishing a bit high?
 
I just kegged this beer and it's going to be awesome, it's the fourth generation from a very clean yeast cake ferminted from 60F to 70F in a week and another over night no chill batch, this is my time for ambers and browns to shine and this warm lager is better than anything of them I've brewed, thanks for the idea ;)
https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/724487/ozarks-amber-lager
 
@RoyalGallon said:
I had another go at the Bud recipe yesterday this time using the S-189 yeast instead of the M84 I used last time. I'm also changing the fermentation profile from the 17C->13C they use in the brewery to follow Brulosophy's Lager profile.
Ironically it appears to be the complete opposite 13C->18C!

I kept some of the the gluey brew from last time and primed it in bottles. Tried one on Saturday and I must admit it's improving. It's not good or Bud but it's approaching drinkable. Maybe a few more weeks and I'll have salvaged some beer.
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So the Budweiser recipe made with S-189 came out significantly better than my previous attempt. Don't get me wrong it's not as light and clean as commercial Bud by quite a way but it is a pretty good lager. There's still a little too much ale type notes in the flavour - I'm wondering if they'll die down a bit as I have it on store, in keg, at 5C.
I'm classing this as a win though!
Bud v002.jpg
 
@RoyalGallon said:
So the Budweiser recipe made with S-189 came out significantly better than my previous attempt. Don't get me wrong it's not as light and clean as commercial Bud by quite a way but it is a pretty good lager. There's still a little too much ale type notes in the flavour - I'm wondering if they'll die down a bit as I have it on store, in keg, at 5C.
I'm classing this as a win though!
View attachment 596935
Click to expand...

If you are not tired of trying out yeasts and wanna check liquid strains, you can try wy800 which also gives very clean beers at room temperature.

Edit: I meant wlp 800
 
Last edited:
Miraculix said:
If you are not tired of trying out yeasts and wanna check liquid strains, you can try wy800 which also gives very clean beers at room temperature.
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Definitely not tired!
This is my ongoing project sort of every other brew try and get something as light and low flavoured as Bud. I reckon if I can do this then all the flavours I get in my other brews are intentional. So it's a test of competency if you like.

I'll add wy800 to my list of improvements to be made. Thanks.
 
@RoyalGallon said:
Definitely not tired!
This is my ongoing project sort of every other brew try and get something as light and low flavoured as Bud. I reckon if I can do this then all the flavours I get in my other brews are intentional. So it's a test of competency if you like.

I'll add wy800 to my list of improvements to be made. Thanks.
Click to expand...
I like your approach, I see it the same way.

Edit: I meant wlp800!
 
applescrap said:
The color of this one is nice. Cant wait to see it.
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I’ll be sure to post pictures. I’ve been having issues lately with beer I’ve brewed not turning out as dark as expected so hopefully you are right.
 
@RoyalGallon said:
So the Budweiser recipe made with S-189 came out significantly better than my previous attempt. Don't get me wrong it's not as light and clean as commercial Bud by quite a way but it is a pretty good lager. There's still a little too much ale type notes in the flavour - I'm wondering if they'll die down a bit as I have it on store, in keg, at 5C.
I'm classing this as a win though!
Click to expand...
I used S-189 for a märzen (at 66°F I think). It did taste a lot like an ale for a few weeks.
It'll improve.
 
Last edited:
I think we had quite a few people here in the thread that were not too happy with 189 and I somehow also remember reading about it's genetics being from the group that does not work so well at ale temperatures. Good to hear that this improves with time.
 
Last edited:
Miraculix said:
that were built too happy with 189
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?? Auto-incorrect strikes again.

I read only favorable reviews for it on this thread, which is why I used it. (I took notes when I read through) :)
"I've used S-189 at 70F with pretty much no perceptible off flavors. It does wonders in a märzen."

Unfortunately I think I oxidized my märzen by trying to cold crash and gelatin fine, and the beer really didn't come out that great.
So, I really can't provide a good review of S-189 myself. It tasted good when it was young with the ale character, before it started to turn.
Kind of a bummer, but lesson learned.
 

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