At long last, the lagering stage is almost over. This weekend, if I get enough prep work done, I plan to prime and bottle up the Maibock that was brewed back in January. It seems way too long ago. When you are used to the turn around time of an ale, 10 or so weeks feels like a lifetime.
When it comes to priming, I am used to boiling 3/4 of a cup of corn sugar in a pint of water and adding that to my bottling bucket. I have been looking at charts and seeing that if my beer is at a colder temperature than room temperature, then the theory is that the beer should have more CO2 in it and will not need as much priming sugar as a beer at room temperature.
Talking to Mike, I think I am still going to prime as usual. Maybe as a safeguard, I can take the carboy out of the fridge and let it warm up slowly to cellar temps and then prime it.
After bottling is done, I am going to store the bottles in my front hall closet to let them carb up. No need to keep them at lager temps when they’ll carb up faster in the 60° range.
Next weekend, I’ll brew up the Irish Red Ale as long as all the ingredients get to my house on time.
Paul Kenjerski
Lagers require patience, but it’s so worth it. Is it just me or does corn sugar give the homebrew a weird flavor? I have made several varieties and they all have a particular taste. I think it’s coming from the corn sugar. I keg most of the beer I make, but bottle a few to experiment.
JW
John,
Are you going to add back any fresh yeast? I always worry that too much yeast has dropped out of solution during lagering and therefore, because of the limited yeast left, the bottle conditioning period has to take a much longer time (as compaired to an ale).
Let me know your thoughts – I need to bottle my Munich Helles in the next week or two, so I’ll be in the same position.
-JW
John
Hey JW,
I think I am just going to go for it without adding any fresh yeast. I think I am just going prime as I would an ale.
I think I can siphon into my bottling bucket some settled out yeast from the bottom of the carboy. I am hoping that does the trick.
Aaron
I worried about leftover yeast when I bottled my pilsener, but didn’t add any fresh and had no problems.
It had a primary ferment at 50 for 4 weeks, then lagered for 4 weeks at 33. It carbed up in the same amount of time any ale has.
John
Maibock went into bottles last Sunday. Everything appears to be going well.