# Production time - 6 1/2 days for Guinness - Min 2 weeks in FV?



## trustyrusty (23/3/17)

Hi I was watching and episode of how its made and they showed The Guinness Brewery. They ferment in 2 1/2 days and mature for 4 days, ready in 6 1/2 days. I always hear 'at least 2 weeks' in fermenter. I can understand if you were going to bottle and you want to FG down to stable but if you are kegging is that as critical - you can always degas. Guinness most likely filter to get beer clearer so that helps. I always keg beers and leave for a least two weeks room temp, and then 2 weeks fridge.I know there are a gazillion variances but found it quite interesting that one of the best beers can be in the taps within a week. They also use nitrogen to carb. They must use a lot of nitrogen as that does not come from natural carbonation...

cheers


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## Adr_0 (23/3/17)

The advice of two weeks in the fermenter covers the - extremely likely - non-ideal fermentation conditions: lower yeast vitality and/or low yeast cell count.

Some strains work faster than others. Higher temperature will speed up the rate of fermentation. 

If you consider the above, an appropriate strain of fresh, healthy yeast in high quantity should get you to FG within a couple of days. In fact some of the American ale strains do this easily. 

A good indicator for how happy/healthy the yeast is, is how quickly it finishes. So again, advice on here is well-placed to consider less than ideal conditions. Ideally, the yeast will get to FG within a couple of days. 

The 4 days to mature will also generally knock the last point or two off. Pretty well every major brewery moves the beer off the trub, hops and krausen from primary into another clean vessel for conditioning. That doesn't seem to be popular on this forum though, as less than ideal transfer conditions are assumed: not sanitary, introducing oxygen, breaking out head proteins. 

Regarding the time, larger volumes tend to mature faster than smaller volumes. I'm not sure why - the only thing I can think is the driving force of concentration differences. So 20-25L should condition faster than 750mL. And 10,000L will mature quite quickly. 

For most beers, I try to do conditioning in another fermenter to hopefully speed up aging. Probably pale ales are the only ones I don't do this for.

For simplicity and risk reduction, that's how two weeks is arrived at - time to settle to FG, and some conditioning time. If your circumstances are closer to ideal, you could push this a little.


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## MHB (23/3/17)

I would regard 2 weeks as the absolute maximum amount of time for beer to be sitting on the primary yeast, that with good temperature control. More than 7 days to hit FG and I think you have underpitched egregiously.
Nearly all commercial brewing is done in CCV's (cylindro conical vessel) which makes dumping trub easy and safe, you could expect at least two to three dumps over 14 days. so suggesting racking once isn't I think excessive.
As for size mattering I understand that Guinness have a 2 million litre fermenter so if size plays a role, they might be at a slight advantage there.
Mark


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## Lord Raja Goomba I (23/3/17)

Not a technical answer, but I pitched my stout on 1/3 yeast cake from a low grav mild, and it was high krausen in 12 hours, and is starting to flocculate now, and it's not 2 days until this evening. 

Accordingly, I could see the 2 1/2 day thing as being quite plausible with the right pitching rates and the right yeast.

I avoid if I can leaving anything more than a week in primary. If I'm uber lazy it goes into a fermenter and down to serving temps until I could be bothered with it.


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## manticle (23/3/17)

Forgetting exact units of time for a minute, allowing fermentation to properly finish is about more than just extra fizzy beer.

There are byproducts of fermentation that taste bad but get cleaned up by contact with healthy yeast, given sufficient time. Time also allows yeast to drop out of suspension, generally resulting in cleaner tasting, clearer beer.

Guinness will have a number of industrial advantages, possibly including pressurised fermentation, filtration, appropriate yeast pitch, perfect temperature control, etc.


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## bradsbrew (23/3/17)

A few years back I brewed an Aussie Old to keg for a Chappo brewday. Brewed on a Sunday, kegged on Friday, consumed Saturday. Was one of the best Old's I have made.


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## manticle (23/3/17)

Wasn't very old.............


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## Adr_0 (23/3/17)

manticle said:


> Wasn't very old.............


*bu-dum chh* h34r:


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## Beil (23/3/17)

I'm testing a speed ferment as we speak.
Put down a 15L 1.048 brew with nottingham yeast on Saturday night, by Monday night it was 2 points off of predicted FG. Kept under 20°c as far as I can judge.
I dry hopped last night, will cold crash on Saturday and bottle Sunday.

I just want to see what the effects of not letting the yeast 'clean' up after themselves are, also to try and have a quicker turn around if I can infact shave a week off.

Or I might have 15L of foul tasting beer....


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## Adr_0 (23/3/17)

The other thing is, Guiness is a dry stout and doesn't have a massive spectrum of flavours. Who knows what the actual recipe is - probably has sugar in it - but it certainly doesn't have multiple roasted and caramel malts, and it's not particularly alcoholic - both of which lean towards less conditioning time.


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## jbaker9 (23/3/17)

I'd be interested in how your speed ferment compares to two weeks. My gut feeling is that Guinness have such refined process that they can pull it off with some minor compromise in finishing off that may not be noticeable in a stout.

Transfer off yeast after ferment if you want but I don't buy that it will affect your beer unless aging for a long time. If anything it's an opportunity for oxidation.

This is a legacy from old brewing practices to prevent yeast autolysis, the general consensus with most experts now is that the negatives of transferring outweigh the benefits for standard gravity ales.

Another thing to consider is what your objectives are. If you need a lot of beer quickly for an event maybe there is a benefit if you brew occasionally I would think you are limiting the opportunity for your yeast to clean up some off flavours from fermentation.


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## Adr_0 (23/3/17)

jbaker9 said:


> I'd be interested in how your speed ferment compares to two weeks. My gut feeling is that Guinness have such refined process that they can pull it off with some minor compromise in finishing off that may not be noticeable in a stout.
> 
> *Transfer off yeast after ferment if you want but I don't buy that it will affect your beer unless aging for a long time. If anything it's an opportunity for oxidation.*
> 
> ...


Just about these two points...

Yes, transfer is an opportunity for oxidation. It's also an opportunity for infection, and breakout of head-retention proteins. You should be able to very easily do this without causing oxidation (e.g. CO2 purging), infection etc. Bottom-transferring is probably the best way to do this, if you don't have CCV with a tap on the bottom. My view is that the lowest common denominator advice works for a while and serves well to increase the chances of making unspoiled beer, but should not be taken as gospel as a brewer gets more experience and improve their practices. Sanitation and careful transfers should be a given, not something special you do every now and then.

I'm not sure about the legacy from old brewing practices either. A couple of fairly solid sources1,2 suggest the beer should move off hops and yeast basically as soon as possible to avoid imparting harsh flavours to the beer. I'm pretty sure I've read this in other places too. This is well before autolysis comes into play.

1 - German Wheat Beer, Eric Warner - (paraphrasing) skimming is done during primary fermentation to remove hop resins and trub particles to ensure a clean fermentation. Pg 72-73
2 - New World Lager Brewing, Greg Noonan - the head can be floated or skimmed off, so that it does not fall back through the beer. Only a clean head should be allowed to fall back through the ferment. Residual scum gives the beer a harshly bitter background flavour. The stability of the beer is invariably less [versus] if the [krausen head] is removed or the beer is quickly separated from its trub after the [krausen head] falls. Pg 184, 185

I'm pretty sure Greg Noonan mentions it in a number of places in his book - the main point being that the krausen drives out a lot of unwanted particles which should be removed. If they settle back into the beer, get the beer off the particles ASAP. The only exception to this would be thin, low alcohol beers which could benefit from extra 'character'.


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## good4whatAlesU (23/3/17)

Possibly why I don't like Guinness that much.

And also why I absolutely love a nicely (6+ months) non-pasteurised and aged Stout.


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## Bribie G (23/3/17)

Regular Irish Guinness made in Dublin is a 4.3% ABV stout that is fermented at around 25 degrees for 40 hours primary. You can do this yourself using Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale which is a close relation to their yeast.

It is pitched at about 20 and is allowed to rise naturally to 25, then "matured" for a few days. They've been doing that since the 1930s I believe as that was also the ferm schedule at the Park Royal brewery they used to have in London.

I have done this with the Wyeast in a number of dry stouts and one of them was the one that got me over the line to win the BABBs competition in 2011 and got me the trip to New Zealand.

1084 is notorious for being done and dusted at "normal" fermenting temperatures with often a surprise beer clearing from the top on day three. Ferment at 25 and it's a rocket, leaving few if any esters.

Edit: Guinness in Australia is brewed as a lager and has been since Tooheys got the Gig in the 1970s then CUB then back to Lion. Ferm schedule probably a bit different here.


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## MHB (23/3/17)

jbaker9 said:


> I'd be interested in how your speed ferment compares to two weeks. My gut feeling is that Guinness have such refined process that they can pull it off with some minor compromise in finishing off that may not be noticeable in a stout.
> 1/
> Transfer off yeast after ferment if you want but I don't buy that it will affect your beer unless aging for a long time. If anything it's an opportunity for oxidation.
> 2/
> ...


I disagree with nearly everything in the above
1/ You're presupposing that 1 week is speed fermenting. Rather 2 weeks is slow fermenting, with a proper pitch and good temperature control there is no compromise involved, apparently Budvar get primary done in 3 days at 8oC, no apparent ferment faults.
2/ Racking or a healthy pitch doesn't cause oxidisation, bad brewing practice does.
3/ "_the general consensus with most experts_" Name one expert, not someone who posts a lot, but a single reference suggesting that getting off the trub is a bad idea.
4/ Good beer takes time, my objective is to brew the best beer I can. Maturation takes time and a bigger pitch has nothing to do with getting the beer into the glass faster. Two parts to the answer, a bigger pitch of healthy yeast will produce less off flavours that need cleaning up (low stress), the other is that there is and should be plenty of yeast in the beer when it's racked, its just that its yeast that is still working not lying on the bottom heading toward autolysis. At the time when beer is cask clearer are still looking at somewhere in the order of 10,000 c/mL - heaps to condition the beer, not enough to cause much if any trouble.
Mark


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## trustyrusty (24/3/17)

I thing I have noticed with brewery videos (How it is made, how did they do that, I have seen Millers, Budweiser, Boston,Guinness and a few others over the last few years as I have been brewing I have taken note of these shows), they ALL, of what I seen, move the wort into maturation tanks after initial ferment normally 3 to 5 days....Just thought that was interesting, they seem to use secondary tanks.

BTW why is moving to a secondary tank as a chance for infection more than any other situation. Surely if you are as careful with your gear as you were in the first process - why is that not the same?? You also move to a keg too or bottle so they are all chances of infection...


cheers


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## manticle (24/3/17)

In my experience, the risk is overstated.

Present certainly but as you suggest - exercise appropriate caution and it's more than likely a risk that's mitigated.

Backlash against the old idea that you absolutely had to transfer ever beer to a secondary vessel otherwise it would end up a vegemite and goat neck hair mess.

I use a second vessel for beers that need much more than 3 weeks before packaging unless I get lazy. I go by taste and gravity first though - fg must be reached and no acetaldehyde detected.


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## jbaker9 (24/3/17)

MHB said:


> I disagree with nearly everything in the above
> 1/ You're presupposing that 1 week is speed fermenting. Rather 2 weeks is slow fermenting, with a proper pitch and good temperature control there is no compromise involved, apparently Budvar get primary done in 3 days at 8oC, no apparent ferment faults.
> 2/ Racking or a healthy pitch doesn't cause oxidisation, bad brewing practice does.
> 3/ "_the general consensus with most experts_" Name one expert, not someone who posts a lot, but a single reference suggesting that getting off the trub is a bad idea.
> ...


Hi Mark,

I agree with most of what you say above. I have no doubt that you get excellent beer with primary/secondary. It sounds like you have good processes to avoid the potential negatives of racking to secondary.

I will go through your points above.
1. I don't make any assumption about the time for ferment. Sure, for a low gravity ale with sufficient healthy yeast they can be done in 3 days. This will vary depending on gravity, brewing temperature, yeast strain etc. I agree 2 weeks would be a long primary ferment. Do Budvar bottle after 6 1/2 days? Fermentation is one thing. Once that is complete the yeast are still conditioning the beer to clean up some off flavours (this will still happen if the beer is racked to secondary and sufficient time). In the book Yeast by Chris White (of White Labs) and Jamil Jainasheff they state that a problem with many commercial beers is that they don't leave beer long enough to condition, resulting in high diacetyl levels. 
2. Again, agreed. As per my original comment, it is an opportunity for oxidisation that has questionable benefit for a standard gravity ale.
3. I have read the books by John Palmer (How to Brew), Randy Mosher (Mastering Homebrew) and regularly listed to podcasts by the authors of Experimental Brewing Denny Conn and Drew Beechum. They all agree that for most ales there is no benefit to racking to a secondary. I would agree that secondary is important for high gravity beers that will be aged a long time, lagers, adding fruit and some other applications. Older texts do recommend this, but plenty of research has been done to come to the conclusion that yeast cake and trub will not negatively effect your beer over the course of a normal ale fermentation.
4. I agree with your comments in point 4 in full except for the point on autolysis (unless you are aging a long time). However, the original post is start ferment to bottle in 6 1/2 days. Maybe with the control of a commercial brewery this can be achieved, at home I have my doubts.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think that there is anything wrong with your process however I think that this belief about effects from autolysis and trub over short time periods are outdated by the latest research and literature. I wouldn't want a new brewer to think that they need to rack to secondary to make good beer - if they do this without getting all of their process down they may end up making it worse rather than better.


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## jbaker9 (24/3/17)

Trustyrusty said:


> I thing I have noticed with brewery videos (How it is made, how did they do that, I have seen Millers, Budweiser, Boston,Guinness and a few others over the last few years as I have been brewing I have taken note of these shows), they ALL, of what I seen, move the wort into maturation tanks after initial ferment normally 3 to 5 days....Just thought that was interesting, they seem to use secondary tanks.
> 
> BTW why is moving to a secondary tank as a chance for infection more than any other situation. Surely if you are as careful with your gear as you were in the first process - why is that not the same?? You also move to a keg too or bottle so they are all chances of infection...
> 
> ...


I expect that in commercial breweries this is for economical reasons.

In the large conical fermenters that they use they can drain trub and yeast cake from the bottom without requiring transfer. However, for primary ferment a larger fermenter is required. Once primary fermentation is finished they can transfer to a smaller fermenter.

Remember that a lot of what applies to a commercial brewery does not apply at home brew levels. Many of the old homebrew practices were transferred from commercial research. At their scale there are very real reasons for some of these practices.

My advise is:
- Keep it simple. Why add extra steps if they don't add value (as the evidence from some of the top homebrew authors suggests)
- Figure out what your objectives are. If you need to brew a lot of beer quickly this should be taken into consideration in your practices. If you will bottle then leave the fermenter empty for the next month maybe you can leave it a little longer. Maybe you have big fermenters for primary and smaller ones that exactly fit a batch and you need to free up the big fermenter. If you are doing it because a 20 year old brewing book says that it is absolutely essential maybe you should get some of the new books.
- If you want to do the research for your own interest, go for it.
- If it makes you feel warm and fuzzy, go for it.

If you have good processes and have the capability to CO2 flush your secondary you will get good beer either way.

As Denny Conn says, "don't worry, it's just beer".


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## trustyrusty (24/3/17)

Thanks

_- In the large conical fermenters that they use they can drain trub and yeast cake from the bottom without requiring transfer._

Yes that is possible and what I thought but everyone has transferred to new tanks, I noted this each time...I think they reason could be that they start brewing another batch, otherwise all tanks would have to be fermentation tanks which might have temp controls / heaters / coolers attached to them etc... Where secondary tanks can be controlled by room temp or aircon... cheers


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## mosto (24/3/17)

Most of my beers would be at FG in 3 or so days. However, I've gotten best results by leaving it in primary for two weeks (ramp temp to top end of yeast tolerance at day 7, then cold crash at day 10). Then keg at day 14 and leave at serving pressure in keg fridge for minimum one week before tapping. One decent exception I came up with when I needed beer ready for some mates that were coming around is my One Week Wheat. An American-style wheat beer which I ferment with US05 at 23c for 6 days, keg and set at 40 psi for 24 hours (I've never had much success with the Ross method). Came out surprisingly good and is now something I regularly brew, particularly if stocks are getting low. Almost everyone who's tried it rates it. Seems to have just enough character to interest craft drinkers but not so much as to 'offend' megaswillers.


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## Bribie G (24/3/17)

I don't imagine that megabreweries transfer their beer to the massive conditioning tanks by chucking a huge silicone hose over the side and sucking on the end to start the syphoning process while standing around staring into the swirling beer in the receiving tank whilst eating their cheese and salad sandwiches for lunch.

Transfers would be smooth, totally enclosed and oxygen free.


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## mstrelan (24/3/17)

Bribie G said:


> I don't imagine that megabreweries transfer their beer to the massive conditioning tanks by chucking a huge silicone hose over the side and sucking on the end to start the syphoning process while standing around staring into the swirling beer in the receiving tank whilst eating their cheese and salad sandwiches for lunch.
> 
> Transfers would be smooth, totally enclosed and oxygen free.


with their pants off


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## Adr_0 (24/3/17)

jbaker9 said:


> I expect that in commercial breweries this is for economical reasons.
> 
> In the large conical fermenters that they use they can drain trub and yeast cake from the bottom without requiring transfer. However, for primary ferment a larger fermenter is required. Once primary fermentation is finished they can transfer to a smaller fermenter.
> 
> ...


I think we're roughly on the same page. 

How To Brew and Mastering Homebrew are both great books, with some good sections for reference for brewers whose have moved past the basics. Both books are aimed at inexperienced brewers, so are quite pragmatic, and have a focus on simplification to get 70-80% there and increase a new brewer's chances of making half decent beer. I think we all know this is the right approach and 10's of thousands of brewers have likely benefited from John Palmer's book in particular. 

One thing I've learned from working with a lot of Americans in the last few years is that they often miss the finer points, are over-confident and take their word as definitive. Look at American beer journalism and forums and it is plain to see. I saw it in some equipment failures where near enough was good enough: in particular, gas leaks where design and installation wasn't quite right; and lunching a $10mil turbine because they thought the oil was clean enough - rather than going through the fine detail and thinking about it a bit. 

I like the pragmatism that John Palmer and Denny Conn show, and what comes through in Randy Mosher's book - it's important to have this when brewing, but a lot of brewers will strive to improve from each beer to the next and I think this is worthwhile too.

There is a spectrum from "who cares" right up to the most pedantic, pain-staking practices. This does not necessarily correlate with the quality or enjoyment of the beer, but there is certainly a good chunk where the correlation is there.

Randy acknowledges transfer to secondary should be done for certain beers. I think we're all in agreement here. Yet a number of German brewers and commercial brewers go to the effort of separating fermentation trub/scum from the beer in primary - through either skimming, dumping or transferring. This is extra effort employed for some reason and unlikely to be to do with turnover in the case of skimming and dumping.

I learned very quickly that just because a confident American says something does not make it definitive. Commercial breweries and detailed reference books practising something should make it worth considering at the very least, not being dismissed as warm and/or fuzzy.


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## Peregrine (10/4/17)

When I was a winemaker I used to do a keg of stout as an addition for events at the winery. Great on hot days for blokes who didn't want to drink white wine. I admit I used extract (Muntons) and SO4 with a fair bit of POR hops. Fastest was brewed on Wednesday, kegged and gassed on Saturday, sold on Sunday. Admittedly I did give it a 20 micron filter and a 12 hour crash and then served it cold. It was a little chunky but I never had a complaint and always sold it all.


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## good4whatAlesU (10/4/17)

Nooo noo no no no no no no no no. yes.

People will drink average beer if it's all that's available. Or if they don't like it but they are told 'its cool'.


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## Bribie G (10/4/17)

Funny this thread popped up again, I've got a pack of Wyeast Irish Ale in the fridge and house guests arriving in a couple of weeks.
Yesterday (brewed an English SB) I was checking out my dark malt section and thought "flippin eck, how much bloody black malt and roast barley does one man need in a lifetime???" and decided to whack out a quick dry stout or porter with ambient in the garage now sitting around the early 20s.

That and a good dose of oxygen, I guarantee there'll be a nice drop on tap within 10 days.

Will report.

(@Peregrine, I had to Google Kongwak, I assumed you were an expat in the Malay Peninsula or somewhere :lol: - welcome to the forum and keep rugged up)


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## Peregrine (11/4/17)

Bribie G said:


> Funny this thread popped up again, I've got a pack of Wyeast Irish Ale in the fridge and house guests arriving in a couple of weeks.
> Yesterday (brewed an English SB) I was checking out my dark malt section and thought "flippin eck, how much bloody black malt and roast barley does one man need in a lifetime???" and decided to whack out a quick dry stout or porter with ambient in the garage now sitting around the early 20s.
> 
> That and a good dose of oxygen, I guarantee there'll be a nice drop on tap within 10 days.
> ...


I'm in much the same situation - not enough beer on hand and not a lot of time before people are here. So I've just brewed your Guinness clone partly because of the time factor but also because everyone likes it (a lot) and I was wondering how soon I could reasonably wait before kegging it. No I won't be trying to set any records - it will make the two sabbath rule. Previous efforts worked very well in keg especially with a push of nitrogen. And thanks for your welcome. I've been lurking for a while and you've been a considerable inspiration - the TTL recipe, the Guinness one, general advice regarding British ales and the piggy back BIAB system amongst much else. 

And @good4whatAlesU You're quite right. On a hot day at a winery a beer tent can become surprisingly popular. My general point is that while this is an extreme example of brewing speed, even slightly faster than Guinness apparently use, it worked well enough in that context. There is no way any other beer style could be treated like this.


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## Bribie G (11/4/17)

Fame at last - thanks for your kind remarks. 

If kegging, after primary fermentation I'd even look at hurrying it along for maybe just three days with some gelatine while the FV is sitting on a bench in the kegging position (so the gelatine doesn't swirl up) and then keg.

Down your way at the moment I'd expect the ambient temperature in your brewhouse would be ideal.

I just milled the grain bill for a 1.058 OG Porter and the Irish Ale 1084 is in the stir-inator right now.


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## good4whatAlesU (11/4/17)

Peregrine said:


> And @good4whatAlesU You're quite right. On a hot day at a winery a beer tent can become surprisingly popular. My general point is that while this is an extreme example of brewing speed, even slightly faster than Guinness apparently use, it worked well enough in that context. There is no way any other beer style could be treated like this.


Sorry Peregrine, a bit tongue in cheek from me. Glad to meet another Stout brewer - all the best. Bribie is a great source of knowledge and well worth taking his advice. My beers on the other hand, even with good ageing can be a 'acquired taste'.. Lol. All the best.


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## Bribie G (14/4/17)

Thank you. Another good input is plenty of oxygen.
For example my latest English Special Bitter, 1.045 - pitched Monday, Fermented bang on 20 degrees (Mangrove Jacks New World Strong Ale) nice and clear on the top today (Friday).
Will keg Monday and put on gas at 8 degrees.
Tap the following Monday if Allah spares me.


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