Chilled to Perfection

Do your beers sometimes deserve the nickname “Big Muddy”? You know what I mean—you pour your slaved-over, beautifully nuanced, Macadamia Nut Brittle Brown only to find your glass filled with something more appropriately named “Nutty Mud Slide.”

Humans are visually oriented creatures who “drink with our eyes first.” It’s an evolutionary trait—our ancestors who were smart enough to not drink stagnant muddy water, lived. The rise of cheap, clear drinking vessels forced beer to play the clarity game, lest it be considered fetid. Fortunately, there are some simple tools to achieve clarity, and we’ll cover the simplest this month. (Next month, we’ll get into my other favorite techniques.)

The easiest and my favorite: Take advantage of yeast’s natural tendency to go dormant. When exposed to cold, below normal fermentation temperatures, yeast makes like a bear and hibernates. It clumps (“flocculates”), and the resulting larger particles drift slowly to the bottom of the fermentor. A brief 24-hour exposure to near-freezing temps can have profound results.

More than yeast gets the cold shoulder hint. For instance, chill haze, proteins that become visible when chilled, will grab yeast, hop tannins and everything else you can imagine. A week or two at near-freezing temps can cause all but the most recalcitrant beer to go clear. I tend to avoid a rapid chill. I’ll drop the temp about 10 degrees every few days. And I pressure-rack to avoid disturbing the settled gunk.

MACADAMIA NUT BRITTLE BROWN
For 5.5 gallons at 1.061, 16 IBU, 21 SRM, 6.1% ABV

Malt / Grain / Sugar
5.0 lb. Maris Otter / Golden Promise malt
4.5 lb. Munich malt
1.0 lb. crystal 60L
0.5 lb. pale chocolate malt
1.0 lb. candi syrup D-45

Mash
60 minutes at 154°F.

Hops
0.25 oz Magnum (pellets) | 14.0% AA | 60 minutes

Extra Ingredients
8 oz raw macadamia nuts (roast in a 325°F oven until toasted, then lightly crush them and add to the last 15 minutes of the boil)

Yeast
WLP005 British Ale ■