Cloudy Pilsner - Need Help

[manticle]

Posted this in the original recipe critique thread I made a while back but maybe making a new thread will lead to some good advice.

This is in regards to a SMASH pilsner made with JW pils, Saaz pellets and wyeast czech pilsner with some brew cellar lager yeast (German dry lager yeast) thrown in. It's been brewed for the Vic case swap at the end of November. (26 bottles required)


The brew was fermented at around 10 deg C, given a diacetyl rest for 48 hours, racked and lagered for around a month, fined then bottled a couple of weeks ago. I got 29 bottles so 3 to test between now and end of Nov to make sure they're ok to give to strangers.

FG was something around 1010-1012 from memory.

Well I cracked one just now and it's carbonated nicely - a bit fizzier than I like but in keeping with the style and that was a conscious decision when priming.. The taste is like bread and grass with a nice subtle bitterness but it's incredibly cloudy and there's some other taste I can't describe (doesn't fit in with any off flavours I know about - kind of salty or something). I thought maybe because this was the last one out of the fermenter but holding all the others up to the light, they all seem hazy. Stored in ambient temps in the garage and I don't normally get any problems with clarity.

Any ideas? Is it just a matter of time? Should I leave the bottles out another week to ensure carb is complete in all bottles, then re-lager them all until it's time for the swap? Normally after two weeks I have a good indication of how a brew is going even if ageing it gives it new characteristics and a better roundedness. If this is an indication then I'm ashamed.

I do have a back up brew but either way - if I'm not giving it away I'd like to be able to drink my hard work and further - learn for the next one. Currently the worst AG I've put together (although admittedly a couple have been terrible in the first little bit then become magic with some time).

I am far from being a lager expert so if I've missed something simple then by all means tell me how stupid I am. Just say it in french because that sounds nicer.

 

[Effect]

Sorry to hear that mate...I am also sorry cause I don't know what is wrong with your brew, but I do have some questions.

1) What did you fine with?
2) How did it look and taste after lagering? In thought of that, how did it taste and look at all stages of the fermentation?

Cheers
Phil

 

[Tony]

What was the hopping schedule?

 

[manticle]

Sorry to hear that mate...I am also sorry cause I don't know what is wrong with your brew, but I do have some questions.

1) What did you fine with?
2) How did it look and taste after lagering? In thought of that, how did it taste and look at all stages of the fermentation?

Cheers
Phil

Fined with gelatin.
During ferment and just before bottling it's been pretty much as described without the extra sensation. Bread and grass. Now it's actually a little closer to what I'm aiming for but it's just a little odd. Maybe I'm panicking unnecessarily because it's not just me who's going to be drinking it?

@Tony: hopping schedule was

50g Saaz (3.75% AA, 60 min.)
20g Saaz (3.75% AA, 30 min.)
20g Saaz (aroma

6 kg pils malt (JW), total volume 25 L

 

[Tony]

Mmmm nothing out of the ordinary there.

I made a pils once with a lot of late hops and it was cloudy. But i used way more hops than that.

Perhaps you had some issues with dough balls and didnt get full conversion?

Sounds like starch haze

hard to know. I have had the odd brew do this to me and i never worked out what it was.

cheers

 

[manticle]

Interesting thought. My notes at the time suggest I got a slightly higher OG than expected so it seems odd that it was conversion related. With such a clean beer though maybe anything and everything would show through?

starch could explain what I was tasting. Any chance extra lagering of the bottles will drop it out or am I destined to swap my American Brown instead?

 

[Zwickel]

Sounds like starch haze

yeah, that was my first thought too. As you may know, Im a Pils/Lager brewer and I did already more than 100 brews, all the same way. But once in a while, I get the same issue.
Finally I havent found out yet what was the reason, but Im focussing on one fact: when Im planning to do a brew, the day before Im going to mill the grain. Sometimes I have to postpone the brewing day, so the milled grain stands in my cellar for two weeks or more.

Im guessing that my milled grain absorbs some moisture from the air and some germs start to change something. Im not sure about that, am still searching for it, but have an eye on it.

Cheers :icon_cheers:

 

[matti]

mmm interesting.
Starch haze.
Did you mill your own grain with a those Handle corn mills and did you batch sparge?
The reason I ask is I mill my grain with same device and find Pilsners and Lagers are not greatly suitable for batch sparging unless you have a perfect crush every time.

I'd allow the bottles to sit some where very cold for a few weeks and see if thing have sorted them selves out.

 

[manticle]

I use a corona and I batch sparge.

Somehow I have to find room in my fridge for 26 bottles and still CC my back up brew.

 

[Screwtop]

Is it protien haze? What was your mash regime, did you include a Protien rest or a Limit dextrinase rest. Have you tried waiting until the temp of the beer in the glass rises to 15 or so to see if it clears up.

Cheers,

Screwy

 

[t2000kw]

I got 29 bottles so 3 to test between now and end of Nov to make sure they're ok to give to strangers.

Why waste your good beer on strangers? :icon_cheers:

 

[manticle]

@ Screwy: No rests - just single infusion on advice from a couple of more experienced brewers here. However it was only chilled slightly before cracking and I tried the rest of the bottle an hour or 2 later with no difference. The other bottles, which seem to be hazy when held up to the light, have been stored at room temps (well outside garage temps in Melbourne Spring)

 

[manticle]

Why waste your good beer on strangers? :icon_cheers:

So you recommend giving only crap beer to case swappers?

 

[Fourstar]

Any ideas? Is it just a matter of time?

I'd say time will heal allwounds mate, given enough time to settle, anything will eventually turn bright. Looking forward to the swap!

 

[t2000kw]

So you recommend giving only crap beer to case swappers?

Not at all. I didn't see mention of any case swapping. Maybe I read the thread too quickly. I had a speed-reading accident recently--I hit a bookmark--and I miss some things now and then.

If you're swapping a case with them, I would think they're they're not total strangers.

Then again, maybe the term "stranger" means different things in your part of the world than in mine.

I was thinking along the line that if it was really bad, you wouldn't want to give it to anyone you knew well and if you wanted to get rid of it but not waste it, you might give it to people you didn't know. Or people you don't like very well, perhaps.

It probably will be OK, even if it's cloudy.

 

[manticle]

They're strangers as in I haven't met them. After the swap we will all be chums.

Yes I was brewing this for the vic xmas case swap.

Those bookmarks can be very, very sharp.

 

[Effect]

how intense was your boil and did you use whirlfloc? My first batches of beer were really murky, also due to yeast, but since using kettle finings my beers have changed for the better.

 

[flattop]

I had a Dr Smurto's turn out very muddy, haven't figured out what caused it, i do know i forgot the irish moss and gelatin, otherwise i followed the same recipe as usual. I'm not a crash chiller and i suppose protein haze is a possibility.

It was a BIAB no chill...yes i know ... the antichrist....

It i leave them in the fridge for a few weeks they clear a little and i can get a reasonable first glass, but i did notice that when i crack the bottle the carbonation starts to stir the bottle up immediately. The 2nd glass is thick and looks really muddy.
Flavor is fine although it does feel "thick" in the mouth (like a milkshake).

Anyhow it doesn't worry me as i'm the only one drinking it and it tastes good but would like to avoid it in the future.

 

[manticle]

how intense was your boil and did you use whirlfloc? My first batches of beer were really murky, also due to yeast, but since using kettle finings my beers have changed for the better.

My boils are pretty intense when I use my woodfired burner. Inside they're a bit less. I think this one was woodfired.

Usually I use whirlfloc - I did run out for a couple of brews recently but from memory it was included with this. So far I think starch haze has cme the closest to describing what I have.

Can that be cleared by lagering in the bottle?

 

[manticle]

It was a BIAB no chill...yes i know ... the antichrist....

I know you're taking the piss but anyone who thinks that needs a sharp knock on the head. You take grains and brew beer and use lateral thinking to make it happen according to your own time schedule. I'm pretty new to grain brewing but I never understood slamming other people's methods unless there's a genuine basis for why it won't work.

Obviously I'm referring to the naysayers rather than yourself.