I'm cold-crashing in a corny keg, in a fridge. I want to take some away in bottles in about 48 hours. Can I carbonate it at the same time?

[Toastkid]

So, i've done a few brews before (brew in a bag) but this is my first since getting a fridge and a corny keg. My beer has finished fermenting, and I've transferred it (minus the bottom gallon or so with all the crap) into a corny keg and put the keg in the fridge (at about 2.2C/36F) to cold crash it. (the main reason I did this is because the corny keg is the only thing that will fit in the fridge).

I'm going camping in about 48 hours and want to take some of the beer away with me in bottles, so ideally I would carbonate it first, in between now and then. What i'm wondering though, is if the carbonation will interfere with the cold-crashing. Would it be best to give it 24 hours without the CO2 and then turn it up to high (eg 35 psi) for the second 24 hours? Or can I just start carbonating now? (I already put a bit of CO2 in to flush the air out, then closed the CO2 regulator again, so no more will come in).

I do have a carbonation cap, so if I would get better results by not adding any CO2 at allin the next 48 hours, and then try to carbonate it in the bottles before leaving, then that's an option, but it's more hassle and will probably not be as carbonated as I'd like.

Grateful for any advice, thanks.

EDIT - regarding speeding up the clearing, I do have some gelatine (which has worked well before but i'd prefer to avoid, since I think it affects the flavour, and i'm trying to go as minimal as possible with this brew) and also some Bentonite (which I've not tried before).

 

[peebee]

What choice do you have? You want it force carbonated and in bottles in 48 hours. Presumably bottling under pressure with whatever system you use for that? And you want it cleared. I've no idea whether force carbonating interferes with "cold crashing". But best get on with that all the same. I do not personally believe "cold-crashing" will clear a beer much faster than it would anyway. Certainly not in 48 hours. But cooling will help carbonation and will help clearing a bit. I've never used gelatine (only isinglass) but I'd have some of that in quick.

Never heard of anyone using Bentonite in beer; only wine. Does it clear beer? Is it (blindingly) fast acting?

And the best (and least useful) advice: Plan things a bit better next time!

 

[phildo79]

Don't know if it will affect clearing but I've read recipes that say to carb as soon as you keg and then leave for a couple of weeks before drinking. Although perhaps whomever created the beer didn't care if it was clear or not.

 

[Scrattajack]

Never heard of anyone using Bentonite in beer; only wine. Does it clear beer? Is it (blindingly) fast acting?

I'm currently trying this out, with one brew in bottle and drinking underway and one about to be bottled. The former is certainly the clearest I've produced yet though it was also fermented with Kveik, which may be connected. The other was also done with Kveik so I'll be none the wiser with that though I'll report back if anyone's interested.

I wouldn't know if it's a fast-acting process, the guide I read said to leave it a week, so I did.

 

[Toastkid]

What choice do you have? You want it force carbonated and in bottles in 48 hours. Presumably bottling under pressure with whatever system you use for that? And you want it cleared. I've no idea whether force carbonating interferes with "cold crashing". But best get on with that all the same. I do not personally believe "cold-crashing" will clear a beer much faster than it would anyway. Certainly not in 48 hours. But cooling will help carbonation and will help clearing a bit. I've never used gelatine (only isinglass) but I'd have some of that in quick.

Never heard of anyone using Bentonite in beer; only wine. Does it clear beer? Is it (blindingly) fast acting?

And the best (and least useful) advice: Plan things a bit better next time!

You sound like my wife, with that last bit at least. She also has magical powers of hindsight and obviousness, no offence intended.

Cold-crashing is pretty well accepted as a quick way to clear beer, isn't it? I didn't think there was any controversy around whether it actually works.

I haven't tried the bentonite yet, with beer or wine. I've used gelatine before with beer, and chitosan with wine, which works very well. Like I said with this batch I really want to try to go as minimal as possible - it's one grain, one hop, no extra additives.

What I ended up doing, after advice from a friend, was to do the following, at the start of the cold-crashing:
- put pressure up to 40 psi then close the regulator so no more gas comes through.
- after 24 hours, check the pressure, turn it up to 20 (it had gone down to about 10) and then leave it turned on for the remaining time.
- then at bottling time:
- turn the gas off
- vent the gas using the pressure release till the pressure goes down to 5 or 6 (which is pretty much the minimum on my gauge)
- turn the gas back on and slowly increase it till you see the needle move a tiny bit (meaning it's around 5 or 6 too) and then leave it on that.

I'll put a post up later to say how it went...

 

[Toastkid]

Don't know if it will affect clearing but I've read recipes that say to carb as soon as you keg and then leave for a couple of weeks before drinking. Although perhaps whomever created the beer didn't care if it was clear or not.

It might be one of those cases where it's 90% clear after two days and then 100% clear after two weeks. 90% is good enough for me to take camping. I've never had the patience to wait two weeks for beer to mature and I don't think I ever will :)

 

[phildo79]

It might be one of those cases where it's 90% clear after two days and then 100% clear after two weeks. 90% is good enough for me to take camping. I've never had the patience to wait two weeks for beer to mature and I don't think I ever will :)

Why the need for clear beer? I was never that bothered what it looked like, so long as it tasted nice.

 

[Toastkid]

Why the need for clear beer? I was never that bothered what it looked like, so long as it tasted nice.

Doesn't clearer beer normally taste nicer though? (unless it's *meant* to be hazy of course). I'm actually not too bothered what it looks like but I would like it to taste as nice as possible (given the time constraints).

 

[phildo79]

Not sure about that. There is an argument that using finings actually remove flavour.

 

[PhilBrew]

Cold-crashing is pretty well accepted as a quick way to clear beer, isn't it?

... no, cold-crashing is accepted as a quick way to get yeast to stop fermenting and to drop to the bottom of the fermenter ... which can have the effect of making beer look clearer (by removing the turbidity due to yeast cells in suspension) when performed at the end of fermentation but if fermentation hasn't well and truly finished, it's a poor way of clearing beer because the yeast will resist (trying to cling on to eat the last of the food) and will restart fermentation as soon as the beer is warmed up any ... and it's not really the recognised way to clear beer at the packaging stage because if the turbidity is due to hop-oils, proteins and/or polyphenols then (short term) crash-chilling can increase the haziness (see "chill-haze") ... the "crash" bit of the term "crash-chilling" is there implying it's done quickly and for short duration, yes "chilling" can be a method for clearing fermented out beer, but only really when done longer-term (see "lagering")

Cheers, PhilB

 

[Toastkid]

... no, cold-crashing is accepted as a quick way to get yeast to stop fermenting and to drop to the bottom of the fermenter ... which can have the effect of making beer look clearer (by removing the turbidity due to yeast cells in suspension) when performed at the end of fermentation but if fermentation hasn't well and truly finished, it's a poor way of clearing beer because the yeast will resist (trying to cling on to eat the last of the food) and will restart fermentation as soon as the beer is warmed up any ... and it's not really the recognised way to clear beer at the packaging stage because if the turbidity is due to hop-oils, proteins and/or polyphenols then (short term) crash-chilling can increase the haziness (see "chill-haze") ... the "crash" bit of the term "crash-chilling" is there implying it's done quickly and for short duration, yes "chilling" can be a method for clearing fermented out beer, but only really when done longer-term (see "lagering")

Cheers, PhilB

I see, thanks. Well, I'll post later to describe how it all went.