Lagering

[Paul Cannell]

I brewed a Plisner with some lager wyeast recently.

I have had it in a cupboard under the house for 3.5 weeks between 10c and 14c.

I don't know much about lager yeast because this is the first time I have used it. Given it's been fermenting for 3.5 weeks and the krausin has gone i'm assuming I have missed the opportunity for a diacetyl rest (don't even know what that is). The plan is to transfer it into a keg and put it in the fridge with the other kegs at about 3c or 4c for a month or so before tapping.

Question is, should I hook it up to the CO2 right away or let it lager for the month and then carbonate?

Any other suggestions welcome!

[Peter Smith]

take a gravity reading, I raise temp from 12 to 18 for diacetyl rest and leave there for 5-7 days then back down to 1-2C over another 5 days and leave it there.   its amazing how the rest does the final bit of ferment    this is a good video as well with different opinion on accelerated ferment / lager

There seems to be a lot of confusing info on web regarding if it is too late to do a late rest or not...

http://vimeo.com/59712178    

[Paul Cannell]

alright thanks for that, i'll give it a go

[Paul Cannell]

Original gravity was 1061. Just measured it now at 1019. As you can see in the photo, it's quite grainy (i suppose its yeast?) and bubbly. Still seems to be a bit of action going on, moving round a bit. Its tasting bloody beautiful. Tempting just to carb it up and drink right away.

[Peter Smith]

then def warm it up for 5 days,  you watch it will go full on again....    what yeast is it?

I have been using boh pils and a munich yeast, about to bottle 2nd batch of each one...  perhaps do one last version with each then try us05 cold with only pils malts ....   restart up closer to summer to build stocks up...

what was the recipe if you don't mind sharing?

[Paul Cannell]

Used Wyeast 2007 pilsner lager. Nothing happened for the first week then it came to life all of a sudden.

So i'll lift it up to 18 for 5 days then keg it and leave it in the fridge hooked up to 10psi for another month or so.

[Paul Cannell]

Dropped it back down to 13 degrees, few new bubbles clinging together on top. 

[Peter Smith]

I have left it there for about 2 days then i just drop 2C a day until its about 1C then forget about it for a month, they say corny kegs with shortened dip tubes are good as you can then transfer to another corny keg under pressure with co2 or I guess just pressure up if it has a short dip and you aren't going to move it.

I bottled 10L of one of my early pils about mid march and kegged the rest, had one bottle last week, awesome fluffy head just sat there the entire pint, only have three left from that batch and intend to get some feedback from nhb comp      To me the bottles just seems to get better with time.    Bottling 2 carboys of a double batch across 2 yeasts this weekend.    The more I think about this the more I am inclined to redo a previous batch with malt changes, I had a bit of light crys in it, going to remove that, also temped to remove the melanoidin malt completely , so just pils, carapils and a bit of acid malt.  keep the hops same as last time, maybe some whirlpool hops

Cant bring myself to dump good pils yeast cakes....

4.50 kg	Gladfield Pilsner Malt (1.9 SRM)	Grain	1	81.8 %
0.50 kg	Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM)	Grain	2	9.1 %
0.20 kg	Gladfield Light Crystal Malt (27.4 SRM)	Grain	3	3.6 %
0.15 kg	Acid Malt (3.0 SRM)	Grain	4	2.7 %
0.15 kg	Gladfield Aurora Malt (3.0 SRM)	Grain	5	2.7 %
20.00 g	Pacific Jade [13.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min	Hop	6	26.3 IBUs
30.00 g	Riwaka [5.25 %] - Boil 15.0 min	Hop	7	7.9 IBUs
0.30 tsp	Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins)	Fining	8	-
30.00 g	Riwaka [5.25 %] - Boil 5.0 min	Hop	9	3.2 IBUs
1.0 pkg	Bohemian Lager (Wyeast Labs #2124) [124.21 ml]

 

[Paul Cannell]

I'm not sure i've got the patience for this lager yeast business! Looks good though. I wonder how the same recipe would come out with US-05 or 04 yeast???

[Richard Rice]

It can be done with US05.  While technically not a lager, you can brew as low as 15C with US05.  I tried it and it worked nicely - wasn't a lager recipe either but it initially came out crystal clear and beautifully crisp.  Got the inspiration from 666Brewing!

[Peter Smith]

I guess the only way to really tell is to first make a good clean lager the traditional way, then do a split batch so you know you are comparing good clean lager to good clean us05. There a reports online that Emerson once said with a decent late hop most can't tell a us05 brew vs lager. Guess I love pain. Still keen to keep trying. I still don't have my recipe right. Thinking less carapils as well.