Let's talk about barrel aging beer

Unfortunately I don't remember when I read about the infection caused during bottling. It might have been speculation at the time based on the fact that, as I mentioned, the kegged beer seemed okay. And yes, GI, along with many other brewers, use some sort of pasteurization to ward off infection to the consternation of the faithful because aging teh beer only oxidizes it now rather than the yeast continuing to evolve the beer.

 

The only craft brewery that I am aware of that chooses to pasteurize their barrel aged beers is Goose Island. Do you have specific examples of other craft breweries here?

It is my understanding that implementing pasteurization is quite costly from an equipment cost, operational cost and dedication of floor space perspective and that is why (and other reasons) the vast majority of craft breweries do not pasteurize their beers.

Cheers!

 

Bo & Luke from Against the Grain in Louisville has always advertised itself as "... aged for 3 Kentucky months..." in the barrels. It's released around early November so those are late summer/ early fall months, presumably with some wide temperature ranges day to night.

I would say that it is a beer that is very bourbon forward in my opinion, but they also structure the grain bill to mimic bourbon and are likely getting among the freshest barrels in the industry (there's literally a bourbon distillery across the street). So I'm not sure what role the temp swings would really play. I've never actually seen any other brewery make any reference to their barrel conditions like that

 

Barrel houses (for beer) are not climate controlled to the best of my knowledge. If they are, it is only in loose terms, unless that space is being dually used (take, for example, a brewery that has barrels held in the same area where they do all their brewing. Obviously there is some climate control going on.) Climate controlling the space is costly, unnecessary, and more or less is in opposition to the preferred characteristics of the finished product (unless you want a very subtle barrel). You WANT that expansion and contraction. You don’t want constant temps.

Goode Island aged King Henry, BCBBW 13, BCBBW 14 and BCBBW 15 all in “third use” barrels. 2016 to present, when they have brewed a BW (or Wheat wine) they have only used standard “second use” barrels, like with all of their BBA beers.

There are plenty of theories about the source of the infection, but the bottle caps is not one that I have heard or put stock in.

@FBarber may choose to add some additional information regarding infection…

 

Also Missouri is in the middle of the country, so transportation to all parts of the US (realizing population is greatest on the coasts) is made most easily and cheaply from that location. I'm sure that was involved not only in the decision to barrel in Missouri, but in the purchase of Boulevard itself.

 

I know boulevard does.

 

Anchor, New Belgium and New Glarus pasteurize all/some of their beer.

 

Short's Brewing here in Michigan does some pasteurization because of infection issues with their beers that used unusual ingredients about 10-15 years ago, but I don't know its extent of application to their standard beers. They don't have a very large barrel program, and I don't know if pasteurization is applied to it.

 

Flash pasteurization is more compact than tunnel pasteurization, you can Google flash pasteurization and view images of those. Tunnel units take up a lot of floor space. The one at Yuengling's Tampa Brewery covered more space than many Craft Breweries.

 

Jeff,

The only craft brewery that I heretofore knew that uses flash pasteurization is Anchor Brewing. I suppose that based upon JK's post above we can add New Belgium and New Glarus to that 'list'? And Boulevard flash pasteurizes their barrel aged beers as indicated by @spicoli00 (link below). And you mentioned Yuengling. So, a grand total of five craft breweries utilize pasteurization (six if we add Goose Island to be considered a craft brewery). Do you have any other craft breweries which can be added to the list?

Cheers!

https://www.craftbrewingbusiness.co...sh-pasteurization-quality-assurance-protocol/

P.S. On a related note I recently purchased a four-pack of Boulevard Magic Drip Barrel-Aged Wheated Imperial Stout w/ coffee that I will be discussing in an upcoming NBW thread.

 

Weldworks, Evans, Central Waters. From this article and the page fot the manufacturer. More out there im sure, but not looking at many pages.
https://www.craftbrewingbusiness.co...kering-with-quality-efficiency-and-packaging/

 

"With the pasteurizer, eliminating infections in their barrel aged beers and creating shelf-stable products, particularly for their Froot Camp smoothie sour series, were two of the biggest reasons to bring in this equipment."

Do you think they only use the pasteurizer for those classes of beer?

Cheers!

 

Probably one of the most memorable beers this past year. I once heard it referred to as a "BCBS killer"... maybe so, maybe not, but it is EXCELLENT value.

 

Yuengling (as @hopfenunmaltz notes) uses tunnel pasteurization, not flash, and for this topic that brewery can't really be called a "craft" brewery, since the company likely has been pasteurizing their bottled products since the 19th century and the unit hopfenunmaltz saw at their Tampa brewery was likely one installed by Schlitz when they built the place in the 1960s or its replacement.

The Schaefer- and Schoenling-built breweries Boston Beer Co. now operates likely also have/had tunnel pasteurizers - as did BBC's previous contract brewers like Pittsburgh, Stroh, Heileman, Genesee, Matt and Miller - but Koch has usually avoided the topic, although I still recall one comment in which he claimed that he like the slight hint of "carmelization" that pasteurization gave bottled Boston Lager. (Unfortunately, I've never found that source where I read that again).

Its likely that many contract-brewed craft beers coming out of old-line breweries like Genesee, Matt, City, etc., are being tunnel pasteurized - Sixpoint Shane found out the hard way that a brewery built for packaging a pasteurized product is an iffy place to try to can an unpasteurized beer.

 

As a production brewery making a number of styles, i woulld think they would only us
use flash pasteurization when it would have a benefit. Not on Juicy Bits, I would think.

 

The barrels used to age Goose Island Brewery Yard had been used to age beer once or twice before. That was a a conscious decision because we didn't want any flavour to be picked up from the barrels. I think around one in eight of the barrels didn't turn out well and the contents were dumped.

 

Which beers would that have been. Sours?

 

I think not. As we didn't want anything in the barrel to interfere with the beer.