Is There A Trend Towards Unfiltered Beer, Even Non-Cask?

JasonTremblay · Post by **JasonTremblay** » Wed Jul 11, 2012 3:58 pm

Howdy,

Yeast is also a factor when it comes to having bright bottle-conditioned, cask-conditioned beers. Something like WLP007 flocculates out to form a pancake that's tough to bust up with a stir plate (seriously, it looks like you have a swirling vortex of snot). But ... if you have a slug of it at the bottom of your bottle or cask and it comes loose during the pour, you'll get a nasty looking yeast slug in your glass.

So, bright or chunky.

Chico / California Ale falls out of suspension reasonably well, but doesn't clump like WLP007. If you disturb the yeast cake, it'll diffuse smoothly throughout the beer.

So, decently bright or cloudy.

Cloudy NA cask beers are, IME, largely due to poor cellaring exacerbated by our love for yeasts that are medium flocculators.

Tapsucker · Post by **Tapsucker** » Thu Jul 12, 2012 1:21 am

markaberrant wrote:
G.M. Gillman wrote:Mark, do your beers drop bright on their own or do you fine them?
I have never fined or filtered. I typically use a dry yeast (reportedly the same as used by Sierra Nevada), takes 2 weeks at 4C, sometimes 3 weeks to drop bright. Even my extremely hoppy beers clear up, I've seen some double IPAs from other homebrewers that look like pea soup.

Many english strains will drop bright within 1 week.

2 weeks sounds very long for the yeast to drop. I do at least two weeks of secondary, but at fermenting temperatures, then I cold condition around 5C for 48 hours. Works like a charm.

Tapsucker · Post by **Tapsucker** » Thu Jul 12, 2012 1:24 am

Steve Beaumont wrote:A few thoughts on filtration/haze/etc.

1. IMO, German kellerbier (aka ungespundet, zwickel, etc.) works better than yeasty, dry-bodied ales because lagers take to sulphur better than do ales;
2. Sweet-bodied ales, on the other hand, are still able to take a bit of yeasty bite because they have that malty sweetness to offset the tang;
3) Ditto well-hopped ales, the bitterness of which again hides, or at least subdues, the tang;
4) Bitters and best bitters are best served clear because they don't have either the hoppiness or the sweetness to cover the flavour of the yeast, again IMO;
5) Cloudy cask ales in North America are, I suspect, more about cellarmanship than they are about the beer itself;
6) The different family of yeasts used in weissbiers harmonizes well with the beer, which is why IMO kristal weizens seem to be missing something.

Sorry, that was more than I meant to post. One thing just wound up leading to another.

A final point. It may surprise some to know that most of the well-known and widely distributed Belgian and Belgian style wheat beers are actually centrifuged or otherwise treated to remove the majority of the yeast. The cloudiness is mostly just chill haze resulting from the use of unmalted wheat.

All good points, thanks.

markaberrant · Post by **markaberrant** » Thu Jul 12, 2012 9:51 am

Tapsucker wrote:2 weeks sounds very long for the yeast to drop. I do at least two weeks of secondary, but at fermenting temperatures, then I cold condition around 5C for 48 hours. Works like a charm.

It is well known that US-05 does not drop bright incredibly fast, especially compared to the liquid equivalent.

Tapsucker · Post by **Tapsucker** » Thu Jul 12, 2012 11:26 am

markaberrant wrote:
Tapsucker wrote:2 weeks sounds very long for the yeast to drop. I do at least two weeks of secondary, but at fermenting temperatures, then I cold condition around 5C for 48 hours. Works like a charm.
It is well known that US-05 does not drop bright incredibly fast, especially compared to the liquid equivalent.

US-05 is what I have been using. I guess I've been really lucky, or there is another factor.

JeffPorter · Post by **JeffPorter** » Thu Jul 12, 2012 2:56 pm

One question I have, is if I drank, say a Naughty Neighbour or a Boneshaker that was filtered, what taste differences would I likely notice?

Does the yeast in those hoppy IPA/APAs add anything to the flavour?

markaberrant · Post by **markaberrant** » Thu Jul 12, 2012 3:09 pm

Tapsucker wrote:
markaberrant wrote:
Tapsucker wrote:2 weeks sounds very long for the yeast to drop. I do at least two weeks of secondary, but at fermenting temperatures, then I cold condition around 5C for 48 hours. Works like a charm.
It is well known that US-05 does not drop bright incredibly fast, especially compared to the liquid equivalent.
US-05 is what I have been using. I guess I've been really lucky, or there is another factor.

It does drop out a large compact yeast cake quickly (I go from primary to keg within 7 days), but for US-05 to truly drop "bright" takes a good 2-3 weeks of cold conditioning.