Full Circle: Time to Start Respecting AAL

I *seriously* need to learn how to brew just so I know what you and Jack are talking about half the time.
Keep it coming please! Love the knowledge drops!

 

Typically, US brewers used the phrase "secondary fermentation" to describe their use of the Kräusening process to carbonate their beer "naturally", like in the circa 1970s Olympia item below. Other brewers, like Anheuser-Busch did include the time kräusening with their overall lagering period, like Oly's "second aging and fermenting period".



I agree that the Tuborg ad's "The first fermentation...gives natural carbonation..." is perplexing. Copywriter error/confusion/typo?

 

If you like beer, it's worth researching how it's made -- heightens the enjoyment, at least for me.

 

The Olympia ad mentioned concerning krausening: “…is not used by most other brewers…”

I am uncertain of the year of that ad but would you have a guess on how many breweries of that timeframe did conduct krausening? Was krausening more ‘popular’ in earlier times (e.g., prior to Prohibition)?

Cheers!

 

I submitted an article for publication last week with the working title: “The Benefits of Homebrewing over Buying Beer”.

I will shoot you more information once it gets published.

You too can homebrew!!

@premierpro

 

Ah, never really considered that question - based on ads and brewing journals, etc., it was a minority but there were a LOT of brewers kräusening after Repeal. Like which ones? Well...some examples can be found on my Kräusening page. I'd guess many of those brewers (the ones that survived...) eventually converted to force carbing but at least one, P. Ballantine & Sons, actually switched over to it in their final couple of years.

Sure, I'd guess it took a while to convince the old time brewmasters to change and for brewery owners to buy the equipment. Pabst brewmaster Fritz Theurer (1884 to 1902), hired on the recommendation of Anton Schwarz, developed a process and held a number of US patents for what today is generally called "force carbonation". The Master Brewers of The Americas in the 1970s were dividing the two methods into "Traditional" and "Mechanical".

 

This is the problem IMO.

Periodically some local newspaper or magazine will print an interview/article with three or four local craft brewers--the cool kids-- all agreeing that what they really like after work is to crack open a couple Coors Banquets. 2 or 3 times over the last decade I've read one of those and decided to buy a single.

Bottom line: I don't think it's a very good beer--chemical aftertaste and a strong banana ester.

I did sort of enjoy the corn lager Bierstadt Lagerhaus made, but then you get into, why am I paying craft prices for something with this little flavor. Would rather drink their Pils or their Helles.

 

I'd love to read that!

 

Was the krausening vs. not a tradeoff on method of carbonating the beer? Were there any other considerations here?

Cheers!

 

"Here's to good friends
Tonight is kinda special
The beer we pour, must be something more,
So tonight, tonight--let it be Lowenbrau"

I was at a very impressionable age when that ad dominated the airwaves and it was probably at least a piece of what made me, a few years later, a craft beer drinker--the idea that one the one hand there was beer, but on the other hand there was "special" beer. I don't know who the Don Draper was behind that late '70s-early '80s campaign (I think) but I believe he was one of the fathers of the craft beer movement of the late '80s and early '90s.

 

I guess this thread is for those who don’t respect adjuncts…?

 

Where do you come down on adjuncts (i.e., corn, rice)?

Cheers!

 

Shouldn't krausening make for a more shelf stable beer by both having active yeast use up any residual oxygen in the beer and cleaning up any diacetyl precursers?

 

Michael, I will first caveat that IMO:

Diacetyl

Perceptible diacetyl should be ‘managed’ by a proper fermentation schedule and should not require the addition of ‘new’ wort (i.e., krausening) to handle this. If a brewery requires krausening to ‘fix’ a perceptible diacetyl issue they did something ‘wrong’ prior.

Oxygen uptake

When beer has completed primary fermentation, dissolved oxygen (DO) should not be an issue at that stage of the brewing process. There really should not be a need for krausening in this regard.

As a further discussion about DO at commercial brewers, the largest concern is introducing DO during the packaging process (e.g., beer transfers to the packaging line, oxygen ingress into the can (or bottle), etc. A quality brewery should implement a high quality packaging line to keep DO levels low prior to sealing the can (or capping the bottle).

Cheers!

 

There was yeast in the aging tank whether being krausened or not. Essentially all of the lager beer brewers filtered and pasteurized to deactivate (or microfiltered to remove) the yeast just before bottling or canning, so there likely wasn't an advantage. Also, krausening with new wort means that some oxygen is probably introduced to the secondary fermenter. It's hard for me to see how the method of CO2 introduction by itself could have much of an effect on the final product. It might have required the brewer to extend the aging, which could do something. I think Oly, at least, used the krausen to add late hopping for flavor and aroma. This, I think, could be the effect most noticeable to the beer drinker. (I noticed, but I wasn't a big fan of the distinctive Oly hop character in the 70s).

 

That wasn't the Tumwater?

 

Confusion or subterfuge? I am guessing the ad writers called the aging step the "second fermentation" (where little CO2 is produced). They probably captured the CO2 from the primary fermenters and introduced it into the beer in the finishing tanks (like most everybody else).

 

We'll never know. The whole thing might have been my imagination. When they acquired Hamms, they brewed it in Tumwater. It tasted normal to me (but they could have used municipal water rather than artesian for that one??).

 

Are you stating that Olympia dry hopped their beer? Do you have any references (i.e., further reading) here?

Cheers!