IDK. When a mfr says, “Be sure to give beers made with XYZ yeast a sufficient diacetyl rest.” I tend to believe them and give it a day or two at 65°F or so to rest.
I guess I could take a hydrometer sample and taste test it. …but a day or two doesn’t hurt one way or the other IMO so I let it rest in those cases.
My last lager, made with diamond, tasted it great on day 8. I decided to keg. A week later it was a diacetyl bomb. It’s been sitting upstairs ever since. Hopefully, time will fix it.
Any way you can add some krausen to that beer?
If it took a week after kegging to appear, it’s unlikely a fermentation flaw that a d rest would have prevented. At least as far as I know
I have always gone by the information in this presentation from Kara Taylor of White Labs.
The diacetyl rest raises the temp to speed up transformation of precursor to diacetyl where it can then be reabsorbed by the yeast. Precursor is tasteless. If you remove beer with precursor from the yeast that precursor will slowly become diacetyl. If the yeast is gone, then no reabsorption can occur.
I brewed a similar beer today. I increased the volume by 0.1 gallons. I plan to take that extra 0.1 gallon at high krausen and add it to the diacetyl beer.
Henceforth, I will go back to doing a diacetyl rest. Easy cheap insurance. YMMV.
[emoji106] Keep us posted on the outcome. [emoji1696]
i had the exact same thing with diamond lager on the first beer i used with it, second beer (just checked my notes since it was from a year ago) i warmed up after 5 or 6 days to mid 60s and no diacetyl.
im not going to explicitly say it, but lol some people will always disagree with certain brewing opinions and in the end you simply have to choose what you go with and what you dont.
i think a factor re: the value of a d-rest or not and diacetyls existence in the finished and packaged beer that explains why some people don’t believe in it could be having strong temperature control during fermentation AND very stable temperature to store the packaged beer. somewhat related but re: hop creep’s existence or not - a similar thing, i was listening to vinnie cilurzo discuss his battles with hop creep (heh - indicator - it does exist!) and that the enzymes that cause it are not active if the beer is stored in the 50s or lower after packaging. my beer ends up needing to be in the 60s to bottle condition and often ends up all the way up to the low 70s by june let alone july.
these things like hop creep or the value of a d-rest, which are widely noticed and discussed do exist, but may be absent or heavily mitigated dependent on a ton of individual’s factors.
and to clarify the diamond beer i had the issue with, i distinctly remember tasting it on bottling day and noting “wow this is so aromatic, pleasant and flawless.” then 10 days later yeah, completely different flavour with flaw.
Diacetyl is a sneaky bastard. Sometimes it shows up unexpectedly when you thought a rest wasn’t needed. It’s happened to me with Diamond, S-189, and pretty much every lager yeast I’ve tried. Not always, but maybe 50% of the time. But, “rest” assured… time heals all diacetyl. No actions are needed from humans, other than patience. In my experience, the oft-touted D rest of 2-3 days is woefully inadequate in a lot of cases. In my experience it can take closer to 3 WEEKS to get rid of all of it. Don’t do anything fancy. Keep the beer in the 50s or 60s Fahrenheit, but no need to add more krausening yeast, or worry. Just leave it be for a while. The yeast will process the diacetyl at their own pace, leaving you with a lovely beer when they get around to it.
Other than an early test taste, batches aren’t in drinking rotation for approx 2 1/2 months.
The pipeline is big enough to ensure brews everyday. I don’t’ have the issues discussed above.
If I may suggest, instead of touting the speed of grain to glass, increase pipeline and/or be patient.
Cheers
As long as errors aren’t made I would agree. My only problem with a pipeline with such a long tooth to tail is mistake detection. Time cures all may not be true when a mistake is made at the beginning of a pipeline only to realize it was repeated numerous times. IOW, I’d rather dump three batches than six.
For example, I recently went thru a series of batches that tasted soapy to me. I pinpointed what I think was the culprit and rectified the mistake but not until three beers entered the pipeline. I was able to brew in quick succession using yeast known for a quick turn. If my pipeline was longer, that could have been a debilitating issue. This way I was able to solve the issue in a matter of week vs months.
I like more of a Goldilocks approach which I found to be about a three week schedule for a three keg rotation which suits my batch size, drinking rate, and lifestyle.
I guess the moral of the story is to not make mistakes. Unfortunately, I’m human and I do dumb things from time to time.
That was a good presentation.
The precursor oxidizes to produce Diacetyl. I’ve had had beers turn buttery after packaging due to O2 exposure.
It is interesting to hear the dynamics in opposition here - rack beer too soon and the diacetyl precursor may turn into diacetyl, yet racking early means more yeast is left in suspension to prevent the precursor from turning to diacetyl. Damned if you do and damned if you don’t. I just re-pitch plenty of healthy yeast from batch to batch and it takes care of the issue - at least for me, so far…but my beer doesn’t get above 50F after racking from primary post crash. YMMV, Cheers!
I always have a batch ready to go. I need 24 22 oz bottles to bottle a batch. After I have about 12+ bottles I brew a batch
Between my drinking and progress of fermentation I’ll have 24 bottles when ready to bottle. I taste test early
(after 2 weeks +/- fermentation, and 3 weeks bottle condition @ 75f), and maybe 2 other tastes a week or so later.
If the progress of the taste test shows no hope, I dump bottles and brew another batch. Only done a few times.
Pipeline is big enough for one failure. I drink one or two every day, usually one. Haven’t bought beer for home in 3-4 years.
I also add 1 rounded teaspoon organic cane (not beet) sugar to each 22 oz bottle before filling, and bottle carb/condition for 3 weeks @ 75f,
so this may also have something to do with it ? I don’t’ keg or force carbonate.
Cheers
This beer is finally diacetyl free and on tap. It’s a Pils with Magnum hops. I can finally taste the hops rather than movie theater butter.
I took this beer out of the fridge and set it upstairs where it was warmer for two weeks. A lot of that time it was still only at 60F due to cold weather. I thought the beer was better and put it back in the fridge, but when I went to pour a pint it still had a faint butter taste. That day I took the keg back out of the fridge and added a healthy dose of fresh Diamond slurry from another Pils I had kegged minutes earlier. This time with fresh yeast and much more of it, I thought the diacetyl would clear up faster. It did. I only left it out of the fridge 3 days. I was drinking it last night and it was great.
PS. I use floating dip tubes so I wasn’t worried about adding slurry to the serving keg.