Clearing the Beer

Clearing the Beer By Pete Ricks Reinheitsgebot. The mere mention of the word tends to stir up controversy in the brewing community as the debate rages on about how beer should be brewed and what ingredients are allowable. Personally, I lean towards the purist side as I only use barley, hops, water, and yeast to brew beer. For meads, I prefer single source honey straight from a beekeeper. OK, so maybe I occasionally use some non-barley malt like rye and adjuncts like maple syrup and coffee in a specialty beer, but whatever is included in my brews must be pure. But enough about what is used to brew beer, what about some of the items used to clarify it? If people knew that some beer was clarified with DME, fish parts, and gelatin, would they think twice about drinking it? For homebrewers, there is a better way! Before we get into what that better way might be, let's review some of the more popular clarifiers that are recommended for brewing use and what they are. Irish Moss - I don't have much of a problem with Irish Moss as I guess seaweed can be considered vegetable matter and after all, we do put hops in beer. That, and the fact that you introduce it to the wort before the end of the boil. That being said, I've never used Irish Moss once in my brewing and most of my beers end up crystal clear. DME - Hey, isn't this the same stuff that I use for my swimming pool filter? Well, not exactly as the DME used in beer filtering is food grade. Still, the basic concept is the same. While DME is widely used in craft brewing to filter beer, and is considered completely safe, it probably isn't necessary to filter homebrew. But let's face it, most homebrewers don't have access to a plate filter like the big boys use so they probably won't be using DME anyway. Isinglass - OK, this is the stuff that makes me want to hurl. Why would anyone want to combine the beauty of water, barley sugars, hops, and yeast with fish bladders? Isinglass is supposedly "allowed" under the Reinheitsgebot law. Why, I don't know as this sounds like the most evil clarifier of them all. I've had many microbrewed beers that were clarified with Isinglass and I couldn't taste any fishiness, but still, it's the thought that counts. Polyclar - Basically, this is a polymer plastic. The only plastic that I want to be touching my beer is a plastic cup at a good beer party. Gelatin - Probably the least innocuous of the clarifiers. After all, most of us have consumed a fair amount of jello. Still, would you slurp down a bowl of jello with a beer? OK, maybe after many beers. Why there is haze in beer is another article, if not a complete book. Haze in beer typically is the result of proteins that were not removed between the process of brewing and packaging. There are also many other reasons why there can be haze in beer and some of them can be unpleasant. If you have one of the unpleasant reasons that result in haze, you will most likely be able to taste it. Maybe the haze is supposed to be there. If your beer is a German Wheat style or if you used a fair amount of wheat malt in your recipe, you are going to have haze and there isn't a whole lot you can do about it. For professional brewers, beer is typically filtered using DME filters or other methods. For homebrewers though, how do you get that cloudy, yeasty looking beer to look like it was professionally brewed? Two words. Time and temperature. So what is a homebrewer to do when it comes to clearing up the brew? Chill out, that's what! Most homebrewers have a converted freezer, at least they should. Having a temperature controlled freezer is nice because not only can you better control the temperature of your fermenting beer, but you can also chill it down to close to freezing when it is time for kegging. Even the most non-flocculent yeast will drop out at close to freezing. At least that has been my experience. I recommend a chill session of about a week in the 30-32 degree range. A couple of days won't cut it. Don't worry, your beer shouldn't freeze and this works for meads too. After a week you will see a nice, compact layer of yeast on the bottom of your fermentation vessel. If you are bottle conditioning your beer, you should have enough yeast left over for some priming but you will of course have to let the beer warm back up to fermentation temperature for that. So put down the fish bladder, give the big chill a try, and see how it works for you. You just might be surprised with what can be accomplished with a little patience and temperature. Keep it pure. Until next time, Prost!