Extreme gushers

Had a bottle of Stones Smoked Porter with Chocolate and Orange Peel gush then the remainder continued to foam like a volcano for the next hour. It was amazing to watch. Needless to say I got none of it. Took me about an hour to clean the kitchen ceiling, wall, floor and bar though.

 

I just had a bottle of the Blaugies/Hill Farmstead La Vermontoise gush like mad, but fortunately with limited actual beer loss, and there is a bottle of Logsdon Seizon Bretta in the refrigerator that I was planning to get to soon (thanks for the heads up, cavedave) so I could be working on a set of three.

 

Google extreme gushers, but definitely not at work

 

in my experience I have had a few Cascade sours gush pretty bad

 

Never had any of the GI sisters gush on me, even at 3 years old. Maybe let them sit in the fridge for a few days before you open and always have a glass nearby. Especially when Brett is involved.

Last gusher was Lost Abbey Inferno, which was unusual at the time as they were having problems with flat beers.

 

I had aged a Night Shift Barrel Society beer that gushed when I opened it. After messaging the brewer, I think we figured what went wrong. The bottle had been chilled in the fridge for weeks, and I put it out on the counter to warm before drinking but neglected to first open it. The warming of the bottled beer raised the CO level. Ended up leaving it to warm for an hour, then it gushed on opening. Lost 2/3rds of the bottle.

 

So in order to avoid said gushing you would open immediately after taking out of fridge? had this happen before

 

Any Beers that have been re-fermented in bottle (bottle conditioned) can gush if too warm, not finished carbonating (more common with home brews), or opened too quickly. I found that any bottle conditioned hoppy beer will always gush if they're opened at room temp. Cooling the bottles ahead of time calms down the yeast and helps a lot. Some lighter Belgian beers will usually be pretty well carbonated and I heard they prefer them that way. But don't quote me on that.

 

Yes, I believe that's what they were telling me. I haven't had this problem before, but then again, I don't know if I've ever warmed it that long before either.

 

The first batch of beer that I brewed did this. I had to open them in a big bowl. My best guess was that I bottled it too soon. There's bottle-conditioned, and there's volcanic. They were better after about 18 months, and chilled in the freezer (or outside) , before opening. It was a porter, and if I remember correctly , ~7.8% ABV, so the flavor wasn't hurt by the aging.

 

The coldness of the beer helps to keep the CO2 suspended in the beer, thus less likelihood of a gusher. However, if it is a bottle-conditioned beer that was bottled too early, coldness is not likely to prevent a gusher.

Many gusher complaints that I read in these forums seem to be about bottle-conditioned Belgian beers, maybe because many of those styles carry a higher-than-average carbonation level by design. But it may also be because many beers from Belgium are bottle conditioned, thus the law of large numbers may cause the frequency of those complaints.

However, a cause of many of these occurrences may be as simple as setting a bottle-conditioned beer down on the counter a little too hard before opening it and dislodging the sediment, which then provides nucleation points to release the CO2 upon popping the cap or cork.

The moral of the story is to be next to a sink and have your glass ready when opening any bottle-conditioned beer.