Sanitization & Infections

Yeast is the smallest ingredient in beer brewing; in fact it's microscopic.  But yeast is the crucial ingredient that gives us all of our wonderful brews.  Without yeast, there would be no beer.  So raise your glass and thank God for yeast!

Yeast is a living thing.  It's a micro-organism whose function in brewing is to consume sugar and oxygen, and produce carbon dioxide and alcohol.  What a wonderful little organism, isn't it?  As a living micro-organism, however, it will eat and interact with whatever you provide it.  This is why sanitization is so important in brewing.  Introduce a yeast to a wort or some brewing equipment that is unsanitary, and you risk introducing any number of undesirable micro-organisms into your beer.

Don't worry.  It's not possible to produce any pathogens from brewing.  There's nothing that will kill you or make you horribly ill or anything like that.  If an unwanted organism does make it into your beer, however, it can infect the beer and definitely impart some off flavors, smells, aftertastes, etc.  An infected beer is never a good thing. 

Sanitization & The Boil:
When brewing, you always want to use clean equipment.  I always clean and sanitize nearly everything my beer or any of its ingredients will touch.  Before reaching the boil kettle, however, full sanitization is less crucial.  Sure, you want everything to be clean and sanitary, but it's less important before the boil than after it.  That is, of course, because boiling your wort for approximately and hour would definitely kill any micro-organisms that might have found their way into your beer before it reached the boil kettle. 

After the boil is when proper sanitization becomes crucial.  Once your finished wort drops below boiling temperature, it becomes susceptible to infection.  If you allow the wort to come into contact with anything dirty or unsanitary, it has a chance of picking up something unwanted.  That is why it's important to keep the boil kettle closed while cooling the wort after the boil, and why you want to get the wort cooled and into an airlocked fermeter as soon as possible after the boil is complete. 

I Use 'Star San' Sanitizer To Sanitize My Brewing Equipment

Later, when you move your beer to a secondary fermenter, to a keg or if you bottle it, you must continue to make sure that anything that touches your beer is clean and sanitized.  Even though your beer may be finished fermenting, the yeast is still alive.  It's merely gone dormant after consuming all the available sugar and oxygen, but it can 'wake up' again if it finds a new micro-organism to interact with. 

One Piece of Faulty Equipment:
In my previous post, I was discussing the importance of patience in brewing.  I was becoming unhappy with the first batch of IPA I'd brewed this year, because it seemed to be a very mediocre beer, and I had been blaming my impatience in rushing the beer into the keg and into the glass.  I still maintain that patience in brewing is important and that I absolutely did rush that batch of IPA, but I discovered last night that was not the reason the beer was not as good as it could have been - and actually seemed to be getting worse over time. 

I was adjusting a few things in my fridge last night when I made a shocking discovery.  The bottom of my fridge was a bit wet and rather sticky.  Closer inspection revealed a slow leak around the liquid-out fitting on the keg I had been serving from.  The ball-lock fitting for the liquid out connection wasn't sealing securely and I had, apparently, had a leak from the keg. 

Ball-Lock Fittings (Grey = Gas | Black = Liquid)

Thankfully the leak was very slow and not serious enough to flood the fridge with beer or drain my newly-exchanged CO2 tank.  However, it seems that the leak in the connection was just enough to allow the beer in that keg to pick up an infection.  The ball lock fitting had a thin layer of yeast crusted around the edges, and I found the same sticky, yeasty liquid leaked liquid all around the fitting and even down the side of and under the keg.  Clearly, whatever had infected the crusty yeast on the keg had also gotten inside and spoiled the beer. 

I decided to dump the keg.  Why keep a beer around that doesn't taste good? Drinking homebrewed beer is supposed to be an enjoyable experience, not something that becomes work or a chore to be checked off.  That's no fun.  And since this beer seemed to be getting even worse, not better, I saw no reason to save it.  Who wants to drink an infected beer? 

A Wonderful Discovery:
If you'll recall from back when I brewed this batch of IPA, I wound up a bit under the 10 gallon mark.  In fact, I wound up with just slightly under 9 gallons due to equipment and evaporation losses.  That means I wound up having one keg with just under 5 gallons in it and one keg with just about 4 gallons in it.  Unfortunately, the keg with the leaky ball-lock fitting was the keg with 5 gallons in it.  Up to that point, I had been serving beer only from that 5 gallon keg and allowing the other keg to just sit near the back of the fridge. 

Well, last night after pulling the bad keg from the fridge and dumping it, I went to try a beer from the 4 gallon keg.  I was fully expecting the possibility that this keg either had an infection as well, or still suffered other detrimental flavor effects due to my impatience.  I crossed my fingers and grabbed a glass. 

Immediately after tapping off the beer I brought it to my nose and was very pleasantly surprised by an instantly citrusy, hoppy nose, with some subdued caramel malt aromas in the background.  I took a sip.  Amazing!  Despite my impatience early on in the fermentation and kegging process, allowing this keg to sit for a couple of weeks before tapping it really made a difference.  Sure, it still had a bit of haze to it, but even that was not as bad as the beer from the first keg.  This was a beer I wanted to drink; a beer that I would be proud serving to my friends and family.  Thankfully, the problem with the one leaky keg had not been transferred to this keg.  But it was a great learning experience about how easily beer can become infected and how important it is to always check your equipment for leaks or other faults. 

Drink responsibly and stay safe out there!

Patience & Planning Ahead

Brewing is an art that requires patience - not only on the day of brewing, but also in the days, weeks, months and sometimes years that follow.  A lack of patience can lead to undesirable results.  You don't want to interrupt an active fermentation to move your beer to another fermenter.  You don't want to be impatient about letting your beer condition a while before kegging it.  You don't want to tap a newly filled keg without allowing it time to settle a bit.  Etc. etc.  All of these things can lead to problems with your beer. 

Brewing also requires planning.  If you want to have a beer ready by a certain date, you have to plan well in advance to make sure you hit that date.  Take, for example, an Oktoberfest beer.  Since Oktoberfest is a Lager, it will take longer to ferment and condition as an Ale would.  Preferably, you want to age an Oktoberfest for several months and, ideally, they should be ready by mid September.  That means, if you want to make an authentic Oktoberfest beer and have it ready on time, you should be thinking about brewing it around May or early June at the latest to allow it sufficient time to ferment and condition. 

The Price of Impatience:
Sometimes, as homebrewers, we can forget about patience.  The result is a noticeable difference in the quality of the finished beer.  Take, for example, the batch of IPA I brewed back on March 20th of this year.  It was my first batch of homebrew in nearly seven years and, as a result, I was impatient.  I hadn't had any of my own homebrew in several years, and I was eager to take my first sip and enjoy the fruits of my labor.  So, I left this beer in the primary fermenter for only a week - and in the secondary fermenters for only one more week before kegging it.  To make matters worse, I started drinking that kegged beer almost immediately. 

I could taste a few 'off' flavors in my beer.  But I attributed this to it being so 'young', so I forgave it's problems and kept on drinking it.  Don't get me wrong.  It is by no means a horrible beer.  It has a good color, a good, medium body, holds a head quite well and has an overall decent flavor.  However, it does have it's share of problems, mostly associated with my own impatience.  It's hazy, it's a bit husky/grainy and it's slightly astringent.  Definitely not my best beer and nothing I'd be particularly proud serving.  As a result, I have resolved to work harder at exercising my patience going forward. 

Slow it Down:
The Chamomile Ale I brewed on April 9th, for example, has now been in the primary fermenters for 9 days, and I plan to leave it in those fermenters for nearly another three weeks before moving it to kegs and allowing it to continue to condition for another 3-5 weeks.  Admittedly, I may tap some of it just a bit 'young', so I can bring some to my next Impaling Alers homebrew club meeting on May 20th, but I'm taking my time with this one. 

I also recently learned something new about today's yeasts and how the strains have improved over the years.  For example, when homebrewing was young (back in the late 70's and early 80's), it was common to recommend racking your beer off the yeast in the primary fermenter as soon as primary fermentation was complete.  The idea was to get your beer off the yeast cake at the bottom of the fermenter so that your beer wouldn't pick up any 'off' flavors from the spent yeast. 

Now, that concern is mostly gone.  Most experts agree that, with today's yeast strains, you should only have to rack your beer off the yeast in the primary fermenter if you plan to do a true secondary fermentation (adding more ingredients to the second fermenter for the yeast to do it's job on) or unless you plan to dry hop your beer or add any fruit or other adjuncts.  Less racking of your beer means less chance of oxidation or introducing any contaminants that could infect your beer.  With today's yeasts, you should be safe leaving your beer in the primary fermenter, on the spent yeast, for up to four weeks before having any issues with the yeast imparting any off flavors to your beer. 

Adjusting My Schedule & Batch Size:
All of these considerations along with some equipment restrictions have made me rethink my brewing schedule and realize that I have to slow down a bit.  Originally, I had planned to brew an Imperial IPA this past weekend, but I had to reconsider due to the time my 10 gallons of Chamomile Ale still needs in the primary fermenters.  I only have one water bath with an aquarium heater to regulate the fermentation temperature, and that bath holds only two six and a half gallon carboys.  So, I have to wait until the Chamomile Ale is ready to be moved to the kegs and start conditioning in the fridge before I can brew another batch. 

Another issue is keg and refrigerator space.  I have a fairly large brewing fridge.  It's big enough to hold up to four full Cornelius kegs and my CO2 tank and regulator.  However, when I brew 10 gallon batches, that means two kegs per batch (unless I bottle half).  That would mean I could only have two different beers on tap in my fridge at any one time. 

That seems insufficient, so I have decided to drop down to brewing only 5 gallon batches for a while.  I'm sure I'll still brew the occasional 10 gallon batch, but if I stick to 5 gallon batches it will afford me many advantages.  First, I'll have room for two different batches at a time in the heated water bath I use to keep my fermenters at proper fermentation temperature.  Second, it virtually doubles my capacity to ferment and keg beers - since each batch will only be half the size of what I've been doing.  Finally, with only one keg per batch, I should be able to keep up to four different beers on tap at any one time in my fridge. 

What's Next?:
I still want to brew an Imperial IPA once my Chamomile Ale is done, but I would also like to make an Oktoberfest this year to be ready by mid-September.  Since each of these will only be 5 gallon batches, however, I think that should definitely be doable. 

My Chamomile Ale should be out of the primary fermenters and into kegs for conditioning on or about May 7th.  That means, I can brew my Imperial IPA on the weekend of May 7th or 14th and my Oktoberfest on May 14th or 21st.  I should have enough fridge space for the two kegs of Chamomile Ale and the fermenter for the Oktoberfest, while the Imperial IPA will ferment in my heated water bath. 

I also have a 5 gallon batch of strawberry cider in the works, but that should be ready to rack off the strawberries and into the keg by next weekend (April 23rd).  I plan to keg it and then fill some bottles from the keg a week later.  I will definitely have some of this cider to bring to my next homebrew club meeting. 

Drink responsibly and stay safe out there.