Lager Poll

Pat,

It certainly is traditional to conduct a lagering phase when making lager beers. I have always conducted a lagering phase for the lagers that I make. For a mid-gravity lager (e.g., OG = 1.050ish) I lager for 6-7 weeks at temperatures below 40°F.

During the lagering phase the principle process is that proteins and polyphenols precipitate out to the beer. There is also some additional conditioning occurring due to yeast activity. The net result is that you obtain that ‘crisp’ taste that is associated with lager beers.

If you are happy with how your Helles tastes right now you could certainly package and start drinking it when it is carbonated. Since you keg your beers you can even conduct a bit of an experiment. Keg, carbonate and chill you beer. Feel free to start drinking it when it has sufficient carbonation but make sure that you don’t drink it all right away. Make sure you have some left 6-7 weeks downstream. See if you think that the beer tastes ‘better’ with 6-7 weeks of cold conditioning. In this way to can evaluate whether conducting a lagering phase is worthwhile for you.

Cheers!

Jack

 

Jack, thanks for this. If I'm understanding you correctly, you may have answered something I've wondered about for some time, which is: does the presence of carbonation impede the yeast action and polyphenol/protein drop out that we want to achieve during lagering? From what you've written above, I take it the answer is "no"?

 

“ …does the presence of carbonation impede the yeast action and polyphenol/protein drop out that we want to achieve during lagering?”

According to Mr. Wizard of BYO (who is Ashton Lewis; a professional brewer) the answer to that question is indeed “no”.

In a response to a question about lagering he recommended lagering in the bottle vs. conducting a bulk lagering:

“If you want to hold your Pilsner for a couple of months prior to drinking I would suggest the hold step after bottling because the bottle has everything you need for lagering; yeast, beer, fermentable sugars and a mechanism to hold the carbon dioxide in the container (the bottle cap). This is of course not traditional for lagers.”

http://byo.com/stories/techniques/article/indices/41-lagering/2393-plate-chillers-lagering-mr-wizard

Cheers!

 

I wonder how Mr. Wizard envisioned pouring the beer from the bottles without resuspending the polyphenols (etc.) that had settled out in the bottle. My guess is that although he is a pro brewer, he's never done it this way and didn't really think it through.

 

Thanks for this. It more or less solves a problem I've been wrestling with: I've got a pils that I've been thinking of entering in a contest (everything went well with brewing and fermentation, tastes great so far, etc) but was worried I won't have sufficient lagering time. Now I know that I can just keg and carbonate the beer, and sample it right up to the last minute to determine if it's contest worthy. Could go either way as far as the contest, obviously, but at least I know I can't do any harm by doing this. Thanks again.

 

You are most welcome.

I hope that your Pilsner is a winner!!

Cheers!

 

Aren't the first and third answers in the poll basically the same answer?

 

I've done it this way. I didn't do anything but decant off the bottom sediments, just as I would any bottle conditioned beer. If I was slurping down lots of extra proteins and polyphenols, I didn't know the difference.

 

Peter,

It would think that the proteins and polyphenols are on the bottom of the bottle along with the yeast sediment. Careful decanting (which you should do with homebrewed bottled beer anyway) will result in tasty lagered beer.

Cheers!

Jack

 

How clear is your beer? A big reason for lagering is to let your beer clarify in the absence of the ability to filter it.

 

I totally understand the whole reason behind the thread, but the way you phrased the question, answer 1 and 3 mean the same thing. If you said "Do you lager your lagers", 1 and 3 would be different.