Roiling Flocculation

The funny thing about what you read in brewing guidebooks and advice from other home brewers is that everybody has a different take on what the "right" way to brew is. Before I could even begin to understand how important some of the best tips are to my brewing process, I'm quickly realizing I need to have made a few batches of beer and tasted the end product.

As an example, my first batch of Light Ale had so little trub after racking to the primary fermenter I didn't notice it much as the yeast started doing their thing. But the organic Double IPA settled with an inch thick layer of tan blobs an hour after pitching the yeast. Then, after 24 hours of quiet buildup, bubbles are now popping out of the airlock at two per second. The trub layer has gotten churned up by the active yeast till there's almost none left on the bottom of the primary fermenter. Aside from the color and the fantastic smell, the churn reminds me of how cream erupts in tea with a little lemon. (How I know what this looks like is another story having to do with an interstate road trip and sleep deprivation.) The contents of the fermenter could not be mistaken for anything but living and very vigorous organisms.

John Palmer's advice in "How To Brew" is that I should have let the wort settle for a couple of hours in a five gallon carboy or bucket then racked to the six and a half gallon carboy before pitching the yeast. Hopefully I won't see too much of an off flavor once the primary fermentation has finished and all the particles have resettled into a fresh trub layer.

Another tip from Palmer that is worth trying is to add some of the kit's liquid malt extract at the last ten minutes of the main boil, heating it only long enough to pasteurize.

The third thing I've been doing wrong, according to Palmer, is using too much water to steep the specialty grains. Instead of steeping in a full-boil five gallons of water, he suggests the best ratio is one gallon of water per one pound of grain, adding water to the mash to top up for the main boil. While this advice is contrary to the two kit recipes I've brewed so far, it seems worth trying on my next batch.