Why chill your wort?

[Ken L]

I've been doing a bit of pondering about AG and you all chill your wort post boil using various contraptions.
Now I haven't gone and tried my first AG brew just yet but I have just grated 1.5kg's of ginger and boiled it up with a bunch of lemons for a ginger beer and I shall be leaving that to cool overnight before pitching yeast in the morning.
So, why chill, when you could just wait?

 

[MyQul]

This is known as no-chill and plenty of forumites (including myself) use this method of cooling the wort.
The 'problem' with it is that you get chill-haze, which means that if you put your beer in the fridge to cool it goes hazy. This is caused by protiens in the beer that precipitate out when you chill quickly using a chiller but dont if you no-chill. It has no effect on the taste of the beer though.

 

[Ken L]

This is known as no-chill and plenty of forumites (including myself) use this method of cooling the wort.
The 'problem' with it is that you get chill-haze, which means that if you put your beer in the fridge to cool it goes hazy. This is caused by protiens in the beer that precipitate out when you chill quickly using a chiller but dont if you no-chill. It has no effect on the taste of the beer though.

That makes sense. A chiller should be easy enough to construct from a couple of meters of copper pipe running inside a cold water jacket made from a hose.

 

[Gerryjo]

That makes sense. A chiller should be easy enough to construct from a couple of meters of copper pipe running inside a cold water jacket made from a hose.

A couple meaning a minimum of 10 meters coiled 🍺👍

Sent from my ALE-L21 using Tapatalk

 

[MyQul]

That makes sense. A chiller should be easy enough to construct from a couple of meters of copper pipe running inside a cold water jacket made from a hose.

Absolutely. This is called a counter-flow chiller (iirc)

 

[DoctorMick]

Another reason for chilling, and this is the reason given in most of the homebrewing books I have, is that the sooner you pitch the yeast the less chance you have of getting an infection in your beer. Given how many people practise no-chill without infections I don't know how relevant that reasoning is.

 

[Cwrw666]

Not relevant at all. After the boil I let the wort stand in the boiler for half an hour to let the break materials and hop debris settle, then transfer to the FV while still hot so it effectively sanitises the FV so there's no risk of infections in my opinion. The FV then takes about 8 or 9 hours to cool to pitching temperature, but I have been known to forget to pitch the yeast until the next day. Still no infection. It might be different if you let it cool in the boiler and transfered to the FV when cool...
By the way, I've never noticed any chill haze effect either, though generally I don't refrigerate beer as it kills the flavour.

By the way, for bigger volumes I can see the sense in chilling as it would take forever to let say 100L cool to pitching temperature.

 

[Gunge]

That makes sense. A chiller should be easy enough to construct from a couple of meters of copper pipe running inside a cold water jacket made from a hose.

There's a simpler way: mine! My boiler sits on the kitchen sink draining board, with the copper tubing coil submerged in cold water in the sink. The wort enters at 85C and a few seconds later emerges from the other end and falls directly into the waiting FV at around 20C. Takes maybe 15 mins to chill the entire contents of the boiler.

 

[MyQul]

By the way, I've never noticed any chill haze effect either, though generally I don't refrigerate beer as it kills the flavour.

I dont chill my beer and just drink it at room temp so dont get chill haze either. You'll only get this type of haze if you put your beer in the fridge prior to drinking. I usually leave my wort for 24 hours and often leave it for 48 hours before pitching and dont get an infection

 

[foxbat]

I don't think I'd use no-chill for anything containing pilsner or other 'lager' malts. The SMM to DMS conversion continues below boiling point and if the DMS isn't boiling off then it's staying in your wort. It's good to get those worts down cool quick.

 

[yeastinfection]

I dont chill my beer and just drink it at room temp so dont get chill haze either. You'll only get this type of haze if you put your beer in the fridge prior to drinking. I usually leave my wort for 24 hours and often leave it for 48 hours before pitching and dont get an infection

do you stir it to add oxygen?
i no chill. but poor it from one the no chill fv to the one i use to ferment in. i only do this to aeriate it.

 

[MyQul]

do you stir it to add oxygen?
i no chill. but poor it from one the no chill fv to the one i use to ferment in. i only do this to aeriate it.

I do exactly this. I often rack the wort off the trub from the first FV and pour the 'clean' wort only in the second FV. This way get clean yeast and no 'bits of protien matter' floating in the beer just below the surface of the beer that often find their way into the bottles

 

[Simonh82]

One argument against no chill is the affect on hop flavour/aroma. Leaving your wort at high temperatures for a long time will kill any hop aroma from late hop additions. This can of course be overcome by dry hopping or making a hop tea but it is worth mentioning.

 

[MyQul]

One argument against no chill is the affect on hop flavour/aroma. Leaving your wort at high temperatures for a long time will kill any hop aroma from late hop additions. This can of course be overcome by dry hopping or making a hop tea but it is worth mentioning.

You'd think so wouldnt you? I used to do a micro boil to counteract this negative (take a small 3L portion of wort after it had chilled then reboil and do the late hops in that. Then chill the 3L quickly in the sink then add this back to the main body of the wort to then pitch the yeast.) But I stopped doing it because I couldnt tell any difference between the beers I did a micro boil with and the ones I didnt. Could be my palette of course though

 

[MyQul]

One argument against no chill is the affect on hop flavour/aroma. Leaving your wort at high temperatures for a long time will kill any hop aroma from late hop additions. This can of course be overcome by dry hopping or making a hop tea but it is worth mentioning.

Also, there's loads of evidince to suggest that the volitile hop aroma/flavour oils 'boil off' with high temps, even as low as 65C. Perhaps it's because I only really make lower hopped beers such as bitters and the the effect would be much more pronounced for something like an IPA?
I find it a bit of a strange one because all the evidence suggest I need to be doing 'something' to counteract the effects of no chill on flavour/aroma but I'm not finding I'm getting these effects