Wort - Clear, or Cloudy?

General Homebrew Discussion
1

After brewing up what looks to be a very nice Amber Czech Lager, we at Bel Air Brewing were all amazed at the clarity of the wort.

A three step infusion mash was employed, with a recirculation of the wort thru the mash tun. We noticed immediately the clarity of the run off, going from the mash tun directly to the boil kettle.

This carried forward to the brew kettle also. After cooling the boiled wort to about 68 degrees, with a very nice cold-break, we started running into the fermenter.

Again, the wort was a beautiful amber-ruby-red color. Brilliantly crystal clear. It helps that we only use whole leaf hops, and they are extremely effective at filtration of the cold break / trub from the run off. Looking inside the boil kettle after run off was complete, our eyes feasted on gray/brown mud, very thick, that was resting on top of 6 ounces of Saaz hops.

Does having a hyper-clear wort indicate the potential quality (good or bad) of the finished beer?

2

Some say it doesn’t matter. Some say it’s critical. I fall somewhere in between: I prefer clear wort into the kettle and into the FV but if I get a bit of trüb it’s not the end of the world.

3

I haven’t found clarity of wort to necessarily be an indicator of beer quality.

4

Does cloudy wort equal cloudy beer?

Does crystal clear wort equal clear beer?

If clarity is not an issue, why do so many recommend recirculating the mash run off until clear?

5

A1. No.

A2. No.

A3. Brewing textbooks say it’s bad for long term storage.

6

Cloudy wort does not equal cloudy beer.

Clear wort does not equal clear beer.

In terms of mash runoff, “clear” means free of chunks, not that you can read a newspaper through it.

7

Ok…we could read a newspaper through our wort, during all of phases of brewing yesterday.

Time will tell on the other questions. Stand by for a full report on what we experience.

8

Yeah, mine is usually that clear too, but I’ve found that it almost never matters if it isn’t.  I don’t go out of my way to make it clear.  If it so, it is.  It it’s not, then carry on.

9

Define long-term storage please.  How many months are you referring to?

I have a boil kettle with a ball valve and I used to leave quite a bit of wort in the kettle to avoid picking up ANY of the sludge at the bottom for fear that it would negatively impact the brew.  After reading Denny’s opinion in prior posts elsewhere on the forum that wort clarity doesn’t matter, I no longer sweat it and still get IMO good beer.  It leaves me more time to sweat some other detail of the process.

Thanks in advance for your answer.

10

Correct me if I am wrong,  but I have read that a small amount of trub making it into the fermenter is good for yeast health (not a lot mind you, as Dave Houseman has told me in the past).  But I agree with Denny and Lazy Ant that if it is not totally clear, I don’t sweat it.

11

Sorry. I can’t. I am just repeating what I’ve read. Those texts (Kunze, Bamforth, et all) would need to be researched. http://www.lowoxygenbrewing.com/brewing-methods/trub-seperation-why-and-how/

Some Low Ox brewers are reporting beers six months + old taste the same as day one but I can’t testify to that because I am a ‘production brewer’.  (Edit:  of course, they’re doing more than just removing trüb)

For me, beer is made to drink not save. I produce beer for that purpose.

I have a constant rotation pipeline where I brew a beer, ferment it, move it to condition/lager/mature/carbonate, move it to the serving side, tap it and drink it. Once ready to drink and tapped, a keg might last three weeks around here (but more like two) @ ~30 ea 20 oz pints. .

See post #2 (above).

12

You are correct.  It provides FAN.  And as I’ve said, informal tests have shown that beer fermented with trub was clearer and preferred in taste tests over beer that had the trub removed before fermentation.