Czech Lager Yeast Advice

As Chris astutely mentioned: “The decocted vs non-decocted debate is never going away...”

Whether HSA is something to be concerned about is likely similar.

Dr. Charlie Bamforth, a brewing scientist (professional) has expressed his thoughts about HSA: “If the effect exists, it is small”.

Let the debate among the professionals continue?

Cheers!

 

I'd be interested to try your beers, since you're limiting 02 on your decoctions. Over the years I've found more and more Czech Beers to be sweet and cloying due to the oxidation. I'm still a sucker for a properly decocted Pils.

This was vaguely brought up somewhere else, but I'll brink another thought to this. I wonder how much the difference in flavors between decoction and step infusion mashing is caused by the maillard reactions and how much is caused by the shear forces along with TBI from the pumping of the decoction. This would be an interesting study to read.

 

I'd agree on the Bohemian although I've used Munich / Bavarian and find them clean/neutral enough to be similar enough for a faux-Czech pilsner.

 

Sauergut addition to my Pils this morning, The wort was quite light, especially for having 20% Munich.

 

Back in the day the two thick mashes, or dickmaische, along with the clear mash, or lautermaisch, would have been scooped out of the maischbottich, or mash tun, with large scoops, into the kessel, or kettle. No pumps would be involved. I don't think a home brewer would be out of bounds if he splashes his mash around a bit transfering the thick or thin mash into a kettle for boiling..

 

I would like to start off by saying that I greatly appreciate your efforts in using decoction mashing for brewing lager beers. I think your efforts are laudable and sincerely hope that they garner the apprecication that they deserve.

But I also think that one thing to keep in mind is that the triple decoction mashing process was not invented by the Czechs for brewing Pilsener. The triple decoction was known in the 1800s as the "Alt Bayerisches" brewing method, or "Old Bavarian" brewing method. Then came the zweimaischverfahren and the einmaischverfahren with either one thick and one thin mash, or only one thick mash. The triple decoction would originally be used for schenkbier as well as lagerbier in Bavaria.

Here's a note on mashing when brewing Pilsner from a Swedish logbook from september 1902:


"Boiltime of the mash 1st 15 min 2nd 15 and the thin mash 10 min: Own malt"

I.e a triple decoction, which was nothing special back in the day. In the US in this time period a typical brewery would use the American double mash instead to produce lager beers, forgoing the decoction and instead converting and boiling the adjunct whilst using an infusion mash to convert the main malt mash. Over time European brewers adopted infusion mashing which is standard practise today.