Northeast Pales/IPA/DIPA

I'm not following some of this. The reason could be that I have no experience with the style. No commercial examples find their way to me, and I have not tried to brew one, yet. But here are a couple things that don't jibe for me, yet.

1. Sure, oxygen would be a problem if you didn't take steps to avoid it. But steps can be taken. At the homebrew level, kegging systems can be flushed with CO2 to drive out oxygen. At the commercial level, oxygen controls would be at least as sophisticated.
2. You are suggesting that the yeast strains play a role in why this beer has to be hazy, but the yeast strains I have seen discussed are English strains, and English brewers pride themselves on clarity, so I doubt that the yeast is not a barrier to clarity.

@JackHorzempa -- you pinged me above. Not sure why.

 

1. I agree that there are steps on the home-brew scale to reduce oxygen, and I agree that every step will help in making better hoppy beer, clear or murky.
2. I can really only speak to the 2 strains I've used the most. Wyeast 1318, and dry S04 yeast. Both of these strains when used to ferment highly hopped beers result in a very hazy beer, 1318 leaves a haze that doesn't drop out hardly at all with months of cold conditioning. I've seen this in every hoppy beer i've made with it. The beers have had varying grain bills, some with flaked grains, some without. The only constant has been my hopping rate. 10-18 oz's of hops depending on my gravity. Small beers get a 4-5 oz dry hop, and bigger beers get 6-10 oz dry hop. I have not tried fining with gelatin, and then dry hopping, that could help precipitate out some of the things these dry hops are apparently sticking to, but honestly I personally enjoy the haze in this style of beer. If the beer looks like OJ...I'm okay with that.

 

Peter, since you are a smart scientist I was hoping that maybe you could educate me on the science of "VDKs are carrier compounds for essential oils" that Shane Welch (@Sixpoint) brought up. I have no idea what the term "carrier compound" means for example. Do you agree that the presence of 'excess' VDKs in these sort of beers could be the 'vector' for why they have a murky appearance? As a homebrewer, do you think it makes sense that breweries like Trillium, Tree House, Tired Hands,... would not follow a proper fermentation protocol so that 'excess' VDKs exist in their beers (i.e., New England style IPAs)?

Any other scientific insights you made have on this phenomenon of murky hoppy beers that are referred to as New England style IPAs would be appreciated as well.

In a previous post I mentioned: "Why does a yeast strain like Wyeast 1318 (London Ale III) produce a clear beer when brewing a traditional English beer style like an English Bitter Ale but when used to produce an American style IPA which uses a lot of late hops it produces a hazy/murky beer? Does the yeast flocculate readily for a less hoppy beer but that same yeast strain stays in suspension when there is a 'boatload' of hop essential oils?"

Do you have any 'answers' to those two questions above?

Cheers!

Jack

 

Jack -

Carrier compound meaning it increases the solubility of that substance in question, as it can "bind" to it in solution.

This does not affect the "murky appearance" as you noted. If you see my prior post that is due to the beer being unfiltered and the polyphenols from the dry hopping.

Also, I have never heard of a brewer not conducting a complete fermentation intentionally in order to have elevated VDKs.

thanks

 

Shane,

Below is a photograph of a DIPA (my version of Pliny the Elder) that I brewed last fall using US-05. This is from my hydrometer sample after a total of three weeks (one week of primary fermentation and two weeks of dry hoping). I dry hopped my 5 gallon batch with a total of 4 ounces of American aroma hops which are high in essential oils (1 ounce each of Centennial, Simcoe, Amarillo, and Columbus). This beer was unfiltered and as you can read very high in hop polyphenols (and essential oils). This beer is my no means murky like Tree House, Trillium, Tired Hands, ... type beers.

I am personally convinced that the murkiness of beers like Tree House, Trillium, Tired Hands,... is not just a case of beers being unfiltered and high in hop polyphenols.

Cheers!

Jack

 

Jack -

What temperature was the beer when you took that photograph? Polyphenol solubility is a function of temperature, as is other haze-forming compounds.

"I am personally convinced that the murkiness of beers like Tis not just a case of beers being unfiltered and high in hop polyphenols."

A true scientist would remove the dry-hopping and filter the beers to prove that hypothesis ;-)

 

Room temperature (e.g., 68 degrees F). After a few weeks of bottle conditioning I would refrigerate the beers (i.e., 40 degrees F) and those beers were non-murky as well.

Please educate me. How would polyphenol solubility manifest itself over various temperatures (e.g., 68 degrees F down to 40 degrees F)?

Cheers!

P.S. I would never purport to be a "true scientist" which is why I tagged you and others (including @pweis909) on my posts. I am always looking to get educated.

 

In my opinion (and I do want to emphasize the word "opinion") the breweries that brew with Peter Austin (Pugsley) systems/methodology do intentionally conduct fermentations to permit perceptible levels of diacetyl. They utilize the Ringwood yeast strain (Wyeast 1187) which is known to produce elevated levels of diacetyl during mid-fermentation and because of the fast fermentation of the Peter Austin (Pugsley) method the beer is cold crashed prior to permitting the yeast to 'clean up' the diacetyl. The poster child brewery here is Shipyard Brewing Company. I refuse to buy Shipyard beer!!

A brewpub chain in my area (Iron Hill) uses the Ringwood yeast as their house ale yeast strain since they like the fact that this strain flocculates very well and it results in very bright beer that does not require filtering. They follow a proper fermentation process (proper in my opinion) whereby they permit the yeast to finish its job (i.e., clean up the diacetyl) before serving the beer. Some brewers refer to this step as being a diacetyl rest; I prefer to just view it as proper fermentaton process where you let the primary fermentation to 'complete'.

Cheers!

Jack

 

Jack -

The vast majority of WBAYDN photos are taken between 33-40F. Part of the haze (but not all) can be attributed to this temperature at which the photo was taken.

Solubility of certain compounds increases with temperature, especially certain haze-causing proteins. Simply put, as the temperature increases, so does solubility. And as temperature decreases, the compounds precipitate out of solution, thus forming the haze.

Ringwood Ale yeast and other classic British strains are used for these exact purposes. They ferment fast, and the yeast flocculates quickly. This is ideal for brewpub environments so you can maximize throughput. However, sometimes, as you note, they don't "complete the job" meaning reabsorb or reconvert the VDKs back into innocuous compounds. As a result, you sometimes get a butterscotch flavor once the volatile hop oils have dissipated.

 

I did not notice any additional haze for my homebrewed DIPA when I refrigerated it. In fact it seemed to me that after a few weeks of bottle conditioning and refrigeration my DIPA was even clearer than the hydrometer sample photograph I posted above.

Iron Hill Brewing knows how to properly ferment with the Ringwood yeast strain (proper per my perspective). I have never perceived diacetyl in any of the beers they brewed using this yeast strain. As far as I know from my conversations with an assistant brewer at one of their locations their 'method' is to simply permit sufficient contact time in the fermenter. He confessed to me that he is unable to perceive diacetyl (he is personally taste 'blind' to diacetyl) so the head brewer every day smells/tastes the beer and once the diacetyl is no longer perceptible to him he proclaims the beer done and the beer is served. The only 'test instrument' here is the head brewers palate.

Cheers!

 

My science expertise does not lend itself much to the details of what could be going on here. My guess is you really need to specialize in brewing chemistry to have enough background to speculate with much confidence. However, in case you want me to speculate without confidence, I will say that I would expect big molecules like proteins could be important for "latching on" to smaller compounds like hops oils. If this is the case, than taking steps to remove those big molecules might impact the hops. I would not intuitively think that a smaller molecule like VDK would not play a role, but intuition from a non-expert, does not merit much credibility

I'd love to have a clear explanation about a lot of these things, but I'm in no position to work it out for myself. If there is a credible expert or two out there on these matters, I hope they write it up as a geeky BYO or Zymurgy article.

 

I wish I didn't find these turbid messes of a beer so damn beautiful.

 

Pat, what I can state with 100% certitude is that your homebrewed beers look much better than Hoof Hearted DIPA.

Cheers!

 

This is a diacetyl joke, right? This glass looks to be filled with butterscotch pudding.

 

Made this observation elsewhere, but I think it's relevant here as well. The discussion about haze has been focused on hoppy beer -- pales/IPAs/DIPAs. But, how is the conversation affected when breweries producing these beers start putting out hazy beer in other styles?

To wit, Tree House just released Old Man, an ESB. Trillium has released a kolsch-style beer called Sprang. Both of these, based on pics posted to Untappd, look quite hazy indeed (with a bit of variation, of course). I could be wrong here, but my assumption is that neither of those beers are hopped at the levels of their respective breweries' pale ales/IPAs/DIPAs. If that's the case, does it change our discussion here? If those beers, which are in styles traditionally quite clear, are still so hazy, and if they're not heavily hopped, can we really assume the haze in some of these breweries' beers is due to heavy dry hopping? And, can we assume it's due to yeast? Possible TH used the same yeast for an ESB as they do for their hoppy beers, but I'd guess -- again, just an assumption -- that Trillium would use a kolsch strain for Sprang. Lotta questions here, but I just think it's worth exploring the fact that some breweries are producing traditionally clear, lesser hopped styles at a very hazy level.

 

Sprang/Big Sprang is an ale (it's a "Kolsch inspired ale", not a Kolsch). And it is very heavily hopped. I'll ask them tonight how much relative to their IPAs.

On the other hand, their wild honey single hop DIPA Artaic is not a haze bomb (although I wouldn't call it clear).

 

Any info on the yeast strain used for Sprang? And, at 4.9%, my assumption was that Sprang was not as heavily hopped as their pale ales/IPAs, but, obviously, it totally could be. Again, traditionally, not a super hoppy style, thus the assumption it was hopped at the same levels as their other stuff.

 

Trillium is very open with information on grist and hops, but haven't said anything about their regular yeast strain except that it is high flocculation (yes, high). I don't expect them to tell what strain they use, but I'd be happy to ask if they use a different strain for Sprang than for their IPA.

 

Yeah, man, would def be interested to see if they used a different strain. Could be relevant here re: theories that the haze in NEIPAs is due to yeast strain.

 

@Sixpoint , do you have any support for the claim that VDKs enhance solubility of hop aroma compounds? I wasn't able to find anything published to support this (to be fair, I only searched for about 6 minutes before I came back here to ask you). I was looking for data from wine or from beer, since there's so much overlap with those compounds and terpenes in grapes. Alternatively, if your experience is purely anecdotal and not analytical, could you give me more detail?