How long cold conditioning does it take for your lagers to drop clear? Not necessarily “filtered” looking clear, but clear…
Usually after 2-3 weeks at 32, my ales are brilliantly clear, but my lagers tend to hold onto the haze for a bit longer. I had a Czech pils this summer that refused to clear (until I persuaded it with gelatin)
My Oktoberfest (with WY 2206) was brilliantly clear within 5-6 weeks. The last German Pils (Wy 2124) I did still hung onto a tiny bit of haze even after 4-5 weeks.
fwiw, my cooler is set at 32 (perhaps a degree or two lower- the beer doesn’t freeze, but the condensation tends to ice up on the bottom of the freezer)
Do you brew all grain (can’t remember)? It sounds like your haze shows up in Pils based malts. Do your Pils malt based beers show a lot of protein coagulation in the boil? Mine do - like a big bowl of egg drop soup. Do you do a 90 minute boil?
Yep, I’d put my money on water chemistry as well. I always had this problem with lighter beers. If your O-fests are clearing fairly quickly, then hopefully this means your water is only moderately alkaline. FWIW, here’s my boston lager clone next to the real thing after 5-6 weeks of lagering. 8)
water chem it is! I’ll have to package up a sample and ship it out. Hopefully Friday.
So the water being a bit alkaline would cause this? What other problems could this be causing that I’m not noticing?
First I was happy with extract brewing and said I had no need to do all grain… then I went all grain and said my beer was fine and I wasn’t gonna worry about the ph. A few colorphast strips later I said I wasn’t gonna worry about water chemistry… ha ha what’s next?
No open fermentations in my basement until I get rid of mamas cat ha ha. I don’t even wanna open the carboy to take a hydro sample with the litter box down there
my lafers have all come out clear. most of my beer does. unibroue yeast does a nice job on belgian/farmhouse brews and lagering seems to work well for me. I lagered the last batch 6-7 months and it was amazing.
