Lager question

Let me play devil's advocate...your lager will suffer more than your fermenting beer would if you let the lager be and fermented the beer using a ghetto cooler, imho. But to answer your question, yes the temp swing will affect your lager...but not much. Cheers

 

I on the other hand do not think it will affect your lager or much other than resetting the time frame. Lager brewers put there bottles on the shelf warm all day, still good beer.

Starting your lager warm and waiting until fermentation started to chill would have more effect on the flavor.

 

I have lagered in secondary, bottled and bottle conditioned a few weeks, and then finished lagering in the bottle. Works fine.

 

I did a lager recently where I upped the temperature so I could ferment another lager (35 F to 50 F). I can't say whether that was the cause, but the lager had a mild soapy, plastic taste and aroma.

Take it for what it is, but now I don't fool with changing lager temperatures.

 

That flavor was not caused by the temp change otherwise BMC would taste like this.

Did you have it sitting on a big yeast cake? I generally do not believe in homebrewers having yeast autolysis issues because of low pitching rates. But those flavors/aromas do point that way.

 

This taste change happened sometime after transferring to secondary, lagering, and carbing. I doubt it was yeast autolysis since there were few yeast in suspension after transfer.

It seems more likely that it was either a O2 effect or maybe some minor infection. That said, I can't rule the temperature change out as a variable.

 

Every Lager I make goes from my lagering temperature of 32 degrees to basement temperature of 65 degrees. If there is an off flavor from this I am not aware. I once left beer in a cooler from the end of October to the end of April. I paused for a second and thought... No way am I dumping six beers without trying them. They were not prime but after chilling they were very drinkable.

 

Put me in the camp that doesn't think this will be a problem. You have already lagered a few weeks. The flavor profile should be set from fermentation. This temporary swing in temperature wouldn't effect an ale that was fully fermented, so I don't think it would for a lager either.

Think about your diacetyl rest, you are raising the temperature during the tail end of fermentation. This has its own reasons, but the effects are not negative. For what it's worth, I often let the diacetyl rest go for a week. Still no problems.

 

Did the beer darken any? Darkening is a tell tale sign of oxidation. But soapy/plastic are not oxidation aromas.

 

Wouldn't sweat it