I will apologize in advanced for the long preamble to my question, but here goes... Trillium Congress St was the first beer that got me in to the hazy NE style IPAs. I had my first ~ 3 years ago and would guess from then until now I've had about 10 different batches (bottles, cans and a growler). Anyways, two weeks ago I bought a case of Congress St cans and it was the same great beer as always, until last night. I opened a can from my 5th four pack and upon pouring into the glass there was a disgusting amount of floating sediment. By the time they settled to the bottom of the glass it looked like a pile of cigarette ash in my beer. I was always under the impression these floaties were caused by excess yeast, and beers either have them or don't. For example, every bottle of Otter Creek Backseat Burner I've ever had has floaties in it. But this is the first time I've experienced them in Congress St, and it was by far the most I have ever seen in any beer. Does anyone know what could have caused this? And I don't think it was batch variation because my other four 4pks I drank did not have any floaties. Thanks for your help!
From a brewers perspective, and after transferring and cleaning a fermentation vessel today. Things happen when you do not filter your beer sometimes no matter how much you try to get it out. That cigarette ash like stuff can also get sucked through on the transfer. What is it? Yeast and hop particle mixed in with proteins. Stuff that didn't quite drop out because the yeast isn't floccing out for whichever reason and the pump pulled it through. IThis is just going to happen sometimes, and sometimes more often because choices options things etc. It's probably seriously nutritious and will give you some champion level farts. But. I wouldn't touch it either.
The can that you opened could have been the last one filled from the canning tank and picked up the extra floaters that were close to settling at the bottom, especially if it was the only can affected.
The end of the run definitely picks up some trub and floatation devices. But. It's still a sometimes. Not always the deal. Brite tanks receive temperature crashed beer. So there will probably be a few spots that floaters settle where they may once the motion in the ocean from being pumped over stops. Taking the filter off of beer. You are going to have to factor in at every instance where you are moving beer from point a to point b. There are moments.
Once I open a can or bottle from batch that has yeast bits and it takes over the beer, I pour the remaining cans or bottles very slowly and have found, in a 16oz can, that if you leave 2-4 oz behind it retains most of its clarity, and most of its orig taste imo, then I slowly sip what's out of can until it hits. And yes, I will testify to the champion level farts, oh jeez it was bad.
OK here goes. . . In big brewing you have to whirlpool or there is protein stuff in the beer left from the cold break? YES? This is not yeast.
Not quite. We whirlpool because it enables us to not pump through hop trub and make life hard on the heat exchanger. The heat exchanger is our cold break. Whatever temp the wort happens to be coming in at from the boil kettle after the whirlpool rest to our desired temp to start fermentation off at in a few seconds.
I've had about a dozen Schlafly Grapefruit IPAs from (if I recall correctly) five different batches (draft once, single bottles & variety packs with different brew dates). All but a few bottles (one or two batches) had massive amounts of floaties. One bottle didn't taste right, but the others tasted fine. I just pour carefully and leave it in the bottle. A little bit always inevitably escapes into the glass, but it's not really a big deal. I contacted Schlafly after the first time it happened. They said it was the grapefruit puree that caused it. I don't know exactly what it is, but it's happened in multiple batches, but not all of them. It's not appealing, but I don't mind dealing with it when the beer comes in those cheap variety packs. If I'd paid 3 bucks (or more) per beer, I might think otherwise.
