[denny]

It has been five months -- enough time to brew and lager my first lager beer.

I choose a  Czech dark lager recipe from BrewBama with a S-189 yeast.  The time involved is longer than I wanted but the reuults are excellent -- much better that I expected.  I understand that I am out of the style guidelines but who cares.  Seven out of six folks drool  after they taste it. 

The recipe will go to my 'top five' list.

Again, thanks to everyone who helped and offered suggestions.

Wow, 5 months is a long time!  Glad you found a beer you love, but you should be able to turn it around sooner. (Unless the time was due to life demands....that happens to all of us!)

[Robert]

It has been five months -- enough time to brew and lager my first lager beer.

I choose a  Czech dark lager recipe from BrewBama with a S-189 yeast.  The time involved is longer than I wanted but the reuults are excellent -- much better that I expected.  I understand that I am out of the style guidelines but who cares.  Seven out of six folks drool  after they taste it. 

The recipe will go to my 'top five' list.

Again, thanks to everyone who helped and offered suggestions.

Wow, 5 months is a long time!  Glad you found a beer you love, but you should be able to turn it around sooner. (Unless the time was due to life demands....that happens to all of us!)

+1

I take up to 2 months from grain to glass with lagers (and ales, the timeline is identical,) but that's not necessary or ideal, just how long it takes, in my rotation,  to get a keg tapped.  Could be a lot faster:  7 days fermentation,  cold crash and lager for at least a week, or until clear (could be several weeks, as we are usually waiting for the beer to clear itself, while commercial brewers filter to shorten the process.)  Normal German lager production processes take 17-20 days total.  Kunze warns that lagering for more than 5 weeks absolutely must be avoided.   So next time, don't waste away in anticipation!   Anyway, glad you're enjoying the beer so much, and I hope your 7 of 6 friends don't drink it all!

[Mr_Beer]

It seems clear that I might not have the correct ‘formula’ for lager brewing and would certainly like some education/help.
Remember, Arkansas with ambient inside temps in the high 70s.
BrewJacket cooling device.  The BrewJacket device, in theory, will cool wort up to 35⁰ but the time required for a 24⁰ drop will be 48 hours.  Not ideal but that is the way it is.

I have established a BeerSmith fermentation profile …

2 days to drop temp to about 54⁰
Pitch
14 days of primary fermentation at 54⁰
4 days for temp raise to 62⁰ for diactyl rest
Rack to secondary
30 day lager at 54⁰
Bottle and wait 30 days for carbonization

This is a 50 day period to bottling and 80 days to first consumption.  Part of the time spent is my inability to lower temperatures quickly but most of the time is what I have gleaned from various forums. 

So the question for this audience is whether my profile is wrong or suggestions on how to change/improve it. 

And thanks again for helping.

[Richard]

I'm not sure that 54 F counts as lagering. You can help the Brewjacket by adding ice. If you have your fermenter in the insulated bag, add as many frozen bottles as you can fit in the bag and exchange them as soon as the ice melts. That will speed the cooling and help you to achieve lower temperatures. Ice cubes have greater surface area to volume ratio than frozen bottles and will cool your beer much faster, but you can't put them in the bag. I am not sure how good the insulation is on the bag, but you can also add more insulation.  Even better would be to put the fermenter in an insulated cooler filled with water up to the level of the beer, and dump ice cubes into it as needed. If you do this right, with good insulation all around and on top, you should be able to achieve temperatures below 40 with your immersion cooler. I have a similar setup with a home-built thermoelectric cooling system and can achieve 34 F with the aid of ice, even with ambient temps in the 70s.

[Robert]

^^^^^
Long ago I had decent success using those blue gel bricks you freeze for picnic coolers, stuffed inside a homemade insulating jacket, for fermenting lagers, much like Richard suggests with water bottles.  I switched out a set morning and evening.

54°F doesn't count as lagering.  But lagering (holding  beer around freezing temperature) is not necessary.   There are two distinct processes to be executed in making the beer:

First is fermentation and flavor maturation,  which are done by yeast.  They will only do this effectively at warmer temperatures, and will do virtually nothing below 40°F.   If you ferment at 54°, and at about halfway to final gravity (around 3 days normally) allow the beer to free rise to room temperature,  this will keep the yeast active.  They will do all the "cleanup" of diacetyl, expulsion of sulfur, and such as they are finishing up fermentation.  When you reach final gravity, the beer is fully matured flavor wise.  The yeast have no more to do.  This entire process should take about 7 days if you have pitched an adequate supply of healthy yeast into wort with adequate nutrients.

The second thing to achieve is physical stabilization, that is, clarification.  Dropping the beer to near its freezing temperature (ideally 29°-30°F) for 7-10 days, or at most 3 weeks, will not only settle yeast, but will also form and precipitate colloidal haze, improving the stability and foam characteristics of the beer as well. (Much more than 3 weeks cold storage at these  temperatures will begin to precipitate body- and foam-active colloids and evolve permanent haze; you have a bit more leeway at temperatures up to 36°F; above this, again, you're not really lagering.)  If you cannot get the beer at least close to freezing temperature, then there is no point whatsoever in storing the beer for any period of time.  You can fine it and package it as soon as it has reached final gravity and the yeast begins to settle.  The only noticable disadvantage will be chill haze when you cool the beer for serving.  The great advantage will be fresher, less oxidized beer than you'll get with a several-months-long process at ANY temperature.  Once beer is fermented out and clarified as much as possible,  it is not really ageing, it's just getting old.

[RC]

The only thing I would add to the above is that although the yeast are done metabolically once fermentation and clean-up are finished, flavor maturation still occurs--not from yeast metabolism, but from yeast settling. Upon cold crashing, my beers definitely have a cleaner flavor. The flavor improvement ranges from subtle to pronounced, but it definitely happens. Cold crashing is not the same as lagering, but the goals of both are similar--flavor improvement by holding the beer at cold temperatures pre-packaging.

[Robert]

^^^^
Right.  But this can be aided and accelerated by fining or filtration if the freezing temperatures needed to precipitate chill haze are not achievable.
(Lager yeasts tend to be quite powdery and reluctant to drop out leaving the beer bright at higher temperatures.)

[69franx]

BrewBama, looks like a great brew, going to have to work this one into the schedule somewhere. Thanx for sharing it

[kgs]

I have been looking for my first lager recipe and Brewbama's looks delicious. I have a small fridge with a Johnson controller I use for fermenting and a larger fridge I use for my kegs. Whatever I brew will be a half-recipe.

Per Palmer (2017) I should pitch twice as much yeast, pitch at fermentation temperature (50-55f), conduct a diacetyl rest toward the end of fermentation (3 to 5 days in) by raising the temp no more than 10 degrees every day "for at least four days if not a week," then get the beer to lagering temperature (35f or a little below) by reducing the temp not more than 10 degrees per day and keep it there ca. 2 weeks before kegging.

It sounds from this thread as if Richard's advice is similar to this, if not quite as dialed-in (free rise versus 10 degrees per day).

So this is the schedule I'm looking at:

Brew Thurs 7/4, pitch at 55f
Sun 7/7 - Tues 7/9 raise temp a few degrees each day
Wed 7/10 - Friday 7/12 ramp down to 33f
Keg on weekend of 7/27
Serve by 8/3 (3-gal kegs are usually ready earlier than a week, but tapping on a Saturday night sounds nice)

[BrewBama]

I have been looking for my first lager recipe and Brewbama's looks delicious.

Cheers to Paulaner!


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