Questions for the lager brewers

[Kyle]

Ok, I will soon have the space to do lagers!

The brewing room will have at least one fermentation keezer, possibly two.

I want to start making lagers, especially Vienna Lagers and Pilsners.

What have you found to be the best approach to consistently turning out lagers, with regard to temperature and is there is a need to do a secondary in a different vessel?

I'll start out fermenting in corny kegs, and move to sanke's eventually. I have a spunding valve, not sure how that applies for lagers.

[Shawn]

I've done four lagers since getting a fermentation chamber - a Schwarzbier, Traditional Bock, Bohemian Pilsner, and Oktoberfest... so, I'm hardly an expert. But I'll tell you my approach, which is based on a lot of what I've read.

You CAN do the approach where you pitch the yeast warm, wait for fermentation to be visible, and then drop the temp to 50 F. This way, however, produces more diacetyl. So, I follow the Narziss method (I think that's how it's spelled). I pitch at about 45-48 F, set the temp of the fermentation chamber to 50 F, and let it go. Fermentation is obviously slower to start, and not as vigorous as at ale temps, but it'll get you there IF you pitch enough yeast (important).

Once it starts to slow (ideally when the gravity reads about 4-5 points away from your target FG... not a bad idea to check if you want to be sure), I'll take the carboy out of the chamber and leave it at room temp till it rises to about 65 F or so; leave it there for a couple of days for the diacetyl rest. Then, I put it back in the chamber, and decrease the temp by about 4 F every day until it's back down to 50 F. I'll leave it there till it's been in primary for about 3 weeks.

After that, you DO have to rack to secondary; this is where the lagering takes place. Since you keg, I'd just rack to the keg if I were you, and do the lagering in there. I then lower the temp of the chamber by about 1-2 F every day. If you dropped it from 50 F to 34 F (or whatever you want to lager at) right away, the yeast would just floc out; do it slowly so they have time to adjust. I've read some opinions that the yeast won't be active anyway below 40 F, so whether you choose to lager at 32-34 F or 40 F is up to you. Once you get to your lagering temp, leave it there for however long you choose to lager. I'd go at least a month; it really depends on the beer. If it was a strong Doppelbock, for instance, I'd probably lager at least 4 months.

When I bottle (obviously won't be an issue if you're kegging), I add about 1/4 pack of rehydrated dry yeast to the beer in the bottling bucket, to make sure it carbonates after all that time at near-freezing lagering temps.

Have I forgotten anything?

[Kyle]

Thanks Shawn,

So it sounds like someone can only really do 1 brew at a time for the first part of the fermentation, where you are changing the temperature regularly.

I'll try doing the secondary lagering in the serving keg, I suppose.

[Shawn]

It really depends on how you plan it. With a bit of prep, you can work it out so that you don't spend 3-4 months using up your fermentation chamber for just one beer.

The 4 lagers I did, I did it basically in two "batches". For example, I did the Schwarzbier first with the Wyeast 2124 Bohemian Lager yeast. When it was "done" 2-3 weeks later, I racked to secondary and kept the 2124 slurry to brew my Traditional Bock. The Bock fermented at 50 F in the chamber; the Schwarzbier was there with it, in secondary... it could have been lagering at this point, but keeping it at 50 F for awhile longer, off the yeast cake, wasn't doing it any harm. SO, when I started lagering the Bock, finally, a couple weeks later, THAT'S when I started lagering the Schwarzbier as well. So, my freezer had two secondary carboys at the same time, eventually, both lagering at near freezing. After a month or so of this, I bottled the Schwarzbier, and left the Bock for another 4 weeks or so before bottling as well.

If you do a bit of planning beforehand, you can work it to your advantage to make the most of your space/time.

[Richard]

The man with the plan... nice one Shawn; will soon be using your strategy