Going to try "No Chill"

[Barley Bottom]

Hi
I use the no chill method at the brewery, we have done this for over a year. I transfer from the boiler straight into the fermented, pop the lid on and leave to cool over night. One interesting point was sealing the barrel, I just have a loose fitting lid. I wonder how much aroma and flavour we lose, The other interesting point was the late hops in the boil verses dry hopping. We might have to try this with the next brew just to see what results we get.

Regards paul


Barley Bottom Brewery

 

[EskiBrew]

The other interesting point was the late hops in the boil verses dry hopping. We might have to try this with the next brew just to see what results we get.

Would be very interested to hear what you find if you do try it Paul :thumb:

 

[Barley Bottom]

We are just in the middle of moving units, we will be back brewing next Wednesday, I'll let you know how's it goes the week after.

Paul

 

[lambert]

I've been no-chilling for quite some time and can add the following from observations:

1. My beers does suffer from chill haze. I'll be trying CLARITY FERM ENZYME in my next brew (to be pitched today) to see if it solves the "problem" (the chill haze doesn't bother me but I want to see if I can get a crystal clear, ice cold beer). I don't rack to a secondary and I haven't used gelatine/polyclar/isinglass so don't know how effective that would be.

2. At a stage I think that some of my no-chilled beers suffered from HSA - they tasted fine but when I burped I got this funny "after taste". I've eliminated this by being very careful when transferring the wort from the kettle to the cube - as little splashing as possible and a slow syphon. I've also tried to minimise oxygen contact when bottling the beers (flushing the bottling bucket with CO2 and a slow syphon) at the same time so I can't say with certainty that HSA was the problem. Regardless, haven't had it since so I'm not changing the procedure.

 

[rich27500]

Lambertthats what surprises me when I see people transferring to cube with a funnel in the screw top. I use a length of tube right to the bottom of he cube to reduce oxidising.

 

[RobWalker]

it wouldn't "oxidize" as such rich - oxygen is good for yeast in the pre ferment stage - but i think you are right regardless, it certainly seems like unnessecary exposure to the elements and the **** in the air, whereas in the FV you can control the oxygen yourself - or oxygenate by splashing the syphon tube around in a sterile environment.

 

[artyb]

from lots of the articles ive read ,
an awful lot of aussie and american brewers believe HSA is a myth....

 

[EskiBrew]

from lots of the articles ive read ,
an awful lot of aussie and american brewers believe HSA is a myth....

I've heard that too :hmm:
It could be an interesting experiment - I'll email Basic Brewing to suggest it.

 

[rich27500]

Robwalker what about hot wort aeration?

 

[EskiBrew]

Robwalker what about hot wort aeration?

I think Rob was talking about after cooling rather than transferring from kettle to cube when hot.

It's a moot point as far as I am concerned - I have heard no proof that it either exists or is a myth and as far as I am aware there has been no convincing experiment to test it out :hmm: - It could be another urban myth for all we know

 

[rich27500]

Is there any point cooling and transferring to the cube? Isn't supposed to go in there hot, pretty much as soon as flame out? I leave mine five mins tops. If you cool first is it still a no chill cube or is it just a cube!

 

[EskiBrew]

Is there any point cooling and transferring to the cube? Isn't supposed to go in there hot, pretty much as soon as flame out? I leave mine five mins tops. If you cool first is it still a no chill cube or is it just a cube!

No, I think you have misunderstood me - I meant that I think Rob was talking about transferring from the cube to the fermenter, not transferring from the kettle to the cube.

You are right, it is supposed to go into the cube very hot and then the air squashed out and once sealed, the cube is inverted so that hot wort touches the whole of the insides for some time to try and kill off anything still lurking.

 

[rich27500]

Yeah re-reading I do think we are talking about different stufff

 

[EskiBrew]

My cubes have arrived :party:

 

[Raptor]

How did you get on with the No-Chill now you've had your cubes for a while?

 

[NickW]

I've a quick question as I will be doing my first AG brew soon and I have one of these cubes! I will be doing no chill (well, I may out in in a nice cold bath but that's about it).

1. What is a cold break?
2. Is there anything left behind at the bottom of the cube once its got to pitching temp? If so, do I need to avoid syphoning this into the FV?
3. EDIT: Also, is there anything in the boiler that needs to be left behind when transferring to the cube?

 

[Aleman]

from lots of the articles ive read ,
an awful lot of aussie and american brewers believe HSA is a myth....

Not a myth . . . just not something that we are likely to encounter (HSA Discussion)

 

[Duxuk]

Hi
I use the no chill method at the brewery, we have done this for over a year. I transfer from the boiler straight into the fermented, pop the lid on and leave to cool over night. One interesting point was sealing the barrel, I just have a loose fitting lid. I wonder how much aroma and flavour we lose, The other interesting point was the late hops in the boil verses dry hopping. We might have to try this with the next brew just to see what results we get.

Regards paul


Barley Bottom Brewery

This is what I do, but I strain the hops through a piece of voile, which removes some of the crud. I make ales which don't get chilled like lagers so show no chill haze. Using a cube means that you don't transfer hot wort to the FV. I sterilize the FV with Chemipro Oxy but it gets a little extra help from the hot wort, which has cooled to about 80C by the time I tranfer it. The only downside to no chill this way may be the loss of aroma from the longer term heat and the continued AA isomerisation, which reduces once the temperature drops.
I've never had a problem with infection. Beer taastes great :thumb:

 

[calumscott]

Speed of chilling makes no difference to the clarity of beer.

The temperature to which wort is chilled makes the difference.

Well... that's maybe not *quite* correct.

I have found quoted studies into the floc formation and they are only concerned with the size of floc created and the size of particle aggregating to form the floc by absolute temperature. They conclude that the size of particle aggregated to flocs decreases significantly below 20 degrees celcius.

I have found no studies into how the rate of change of temperature affects floc formation.

I believe that two fundamental concerns of the brewer have been confused.

1) To get clear beer, you need to cool your wort to floculate non-microbial particles (NMPs). Chill your wort.
2) To best reduce the risk of infection you need to pitch your yeast as soon as possible. Chill your wort as quickly as possible.

The "no-chill" method could be the perfect solution for anyone with a brew fridge. Set brew fridge to max coldness. Drop hot wort to FV. Add FV to fridge, chill overnight bringing wort down close to zero and creating big flocs, bring temp up to fermentation temp. Pitch.

:hmm:

 

[Aleman]

The "no-chill" method could be the perfect solution for anyone with a brew fridge. Set brew fridge to max coldness. Drop hot wort to FV. Add FV to fridge, chill overnight bringing wort down close to zero and creating big flocs, bring temp up to fermentation temp. Pitch.

Only if you want to break your brew fridge . . . they really are not designed to deal with getting rid of that much heat.

No Chill is an ideal way of producing 'running beer' i.e beer that is going to be drunk in a fairly short space of time. It is not the optimal way to produce beer that is going to be store for any length of time as you will have an excess of low molecular weight proteins/polypeptides left in the beer that would have been removed via chilling . . . This will produce a haze in the beer, it also provides a source of 'energy' for non desirable redox reactions to take place further reducing the quality of the beer.