The Definitive Knock-down, Drag-out Cloudy Beer Debate Thread

The taste of yeast? I had marmite once, no thanks!

 

Jeff, it would appear that you have a 'baseline' here. For the case of beers that are cloudy/murky due to yeast, do you taste "marmite" in those beers? Or perhaps a more broadly worded question: are you of the opinion that there is a flavor associated with yeast that is in suspension in beer?

Cheers!

 

If there is enough inthe beer you can get that kind of taste, but then it is turbid with yeast, the milk shake beer.

 

Check. So to go one step further, suppose you have two yeast samples in two small glasses in front of you. One yeast is the yeast used for brewing the beer. The other yeast is a different one that was used for bottle conditioning that same beer. Would you expect them to taste different or taste pretty much the same?

 

Depends on the beer, I think. A Kristalweizen tastes like a Hefeweizen to me, the first has the yeast removed by filtration, the second usually has a lager strain in the bottle. It has been a long time since I made a Hefeweizen with a hefe strain still in it for comparison.

 

Having brewed with Conan yeast (Heady Topper) many times, I've found that a big factor is the yeast. As with Conan yeast, it is a poor flocculator, meaning that it doesn't fall out of solution when done fermenting and leave beer more clear. Couple that with the insane amount of hop particles in these NE and VT beers and that's a big part of it. Because many brewers don't like to filter their beers (I know I don't), the haziness stays and is just a style of the area because more often than not, Tree House, HF and Trillium aren't using the WEST COAST yeast strains that defined the style originally.

I say keep them coming!

 

Central City Red Racer (Red Betty) is now filtered, having been very hazy and full of floaties in the past. I preferred the unfiltered version.

 

Many of the West Coast Breweries use yeasts like BRY-96 and BRY-97 that came from Ballantine in Newark NJ way back when.

BRY-96 = Chico
BRY-97 = Anchor

Those originally are from the east coast!

 

I think yeasty is a fairly low-level descriptor, in the same way as (for example) apricot. It's also hard to have an objective flavour descriptor for apricot, and although you could give particular aspects (sweet, fruity, stone fruit), they are all 'higher-level' descriptors. You can do the same for yeast (umami, marmite, bread, meaty), but again they are all descriptors higher up the heirarchy of the flavour family tree.

 

Proteins from the wheat, possibly the yeast can add haziness, dry hopping also can, but for the beers you listed it's because they are wheat beers. I'll try and keep this simple, think of how when you cook an egg it turns white. A similar process is occurring when you brew with wheat thus creating that "haziness" typically found in wheat beers. It's basically just broken down proteins and they can eventually settle to the bottom of the bottle, keg, can, whatever. The reason why these are typically hazy is because most wheat beers are usually unfiltered, so all the things that can cause a beer to be hazy are still in it.

 

I love a cloudy IPA!

 

Tell me that isn't the most beautiful beer you've laid your eyes on!

 

@breadwinner Here's the link to an article on beer clarity that I wrote in 2013 (page 28, sorry for the lack of direct link): http://www.westcoastersd.com/pdf/September2013_forweb.pdf

We use DE to filter all of our pale beers, and also stabilize them with silica gel and pvpp, which remove haze causing proteins and tannins that would not normally be removed via DE alone. This ensures that beer does not become hazy on the shelf.

In my opinion, this process creates a rounder, cleaner, brighter flavor that does take off some of the "fresh hop pellet" edge on the aroma that you get in cloudy, fresh IPAs at least. You lose some overall hop impact but if you use enough hops to begin with, you still have plenty of aroma and I do think that flavor is generally improved by reducing the astringency caused by excessive tannins and yeast in suspension.

When it comes down to it, filtering is mainly done for appearance and any flavor changes are secondary. I personally prefer hoppy beers unfiltered but with low suspended yeast and no hop chunks, so a light to moderate haze at most. definitely not opaque--that's just lazy brewing no matter how the brewer rationalizes it, and has no aroma/flavor benefits. Unfiltered, even unfined beer can be pretty clear with some lagering time and good malt/water chemistry/pH. Our ales get pretty clear after some lagering time as our yeast is highly flocculent and pretty much all drops out after a few days cold (not that we have a "few days" to spare, and filtering allows you to get more clear beer through the cellar than time and gravity do). Too much yeast and hop material in suspension just creates muddy, coarse beer that gets in the way of all the balanced, delicate flavors underneath. I don't think we need crystal clear beer for its own sake, but the trend toward beer geeks accepting turbid IPAs is legitimizing a lot of lazy/poor brewing practice in the industry these days.

I went to brewing school (where they teach you the dogma of clear beer) and work at a brewery that brews completely bright beer, so take that for what it's worth. But I was a beer geek before all of that and Alpine Nelson is still probably my favorite IPA, haze and all. I could get a lot deeper in the philosophical weeds right now but I'll leave it here for the time being.

 

Thanks for the pointer to the article. That article and your post here provide clear, and direct answers for the non-brewer (e.g., me) to some of the questions that have been coming up and a few things make much more sense now. The article has been put in the queue for a re-read.

 

flocculate...reach a new low. Yep...

 

The "Bros" rating of Vicinity is a total joke and discredits all further ratings.

 

Or a new high...

But in any event you'll be fine so long as you are willing to pass on having frosted sticky puns for breakfast when you can have a hot roll with honey, instead.

 

Thanks for this, very informative.

In many of the IPAs in question, it seems that the tannins and yeast in suspension is not harming the flavor and many people seem to dig the appearance (I personally think the hazy IPAs photograph very well). If that is the case and if you as a brewer were shooting for maximum hop flavor, unfiltered would seem to be the way to go, wouldn't it? Or put another way, is it fair to say if a brewer chooses not to care about appearance at all, and their only concern is hop flavor, that unfiltered would be best (especially if the suspended yeast is not adding too much astringency or muddling the flavor)?

It has been suggested by some in the know, that some of the IPAs in question use wheat (probably flaked) in the grain bill and yeast that does not flocculate much at all. If we assume, as before, that we're only making choices in the name of ideal hop flavor and mouthfeel, it seems that many of the ingredient or process choices towards clear beer would be at odds with that philosophy, and not necessarily "lazy" brewing, especially considering the freshness IPA mantra that might preclude much lagering time at all.

I want to agree with you, but I haven't experienced an IPA that is super clear AND has all the flavor profile components that are found in these hazy IPAs. I have not found their profiles to be muddy or coarse.

I'm not a brewer, just a guy cobbling together some things, so please correct and inform me on anything I may be misinterpreting or missing. As an aside, I love the clear Firestone Walker IPAs, just not as much as I love most of these new-wave hazy IPAs.