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Pilsner Ale instead of lager?

Johnh3nry

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Location
Markham, Ontario
Just tasted my latest batch that I call a Pilsner Ale. It's an all grain recipe and consists of 10lbs Pilsner malt, 1 lb 10L Crystal and 1 lb flaked corn plus 3 oz Saaz hops fermented with an American Ale Yeast (Wyeast 1072 plus starter).  I am very pleased with the results. That being said, I feel like there is something missing. I normally brew ales and I struggle with the overhead associated with lagers. I want a clean tasting Pilsner Style beer brewed with an ale yeast. I live in Canada so cold temperatures are not fundamentally a problem. Any good ideas on improving a Pilsner brewed with Ale yeast or do I really need to switch over to a lager yeast?
 
You can try kolsch yeast and cold crash it a while longer.
 
I brew a pilsner exactly like you're describing. One thing that might help a little bit is to get rid of the crystal malt in the recipe. You're adding unfermentables which may detract from the "clean" taste you're looking for. 

Mine is essentially a SMaSH with all pilsner malt and then whatever German hops I might have around. I've used Tettnang, Hallertau, Perle to good success.

I use exclusively US-05 at home and as long as the temps are reasonable (I'm usually 65-70 in the basement) then you should be fine.
 
I'm drinking one I made recently using Weyermanns pilsner malt, carapils, saaz and kolsch yeast. It's great and I doubt if many people could tell it's not a lager. I certainly can't.
 
Kolsch yeast does add something special.

Here is one I enjoyed this year.
8.5# best malz pils, 1# carapils, 40z Saaz 60,45,15, 0. Safale s05 @ 65*f




Sometimes just letting it sit cold for a month or two can really clean the flavors. So perhaps you've been just drinking them too fast..
 
I've made ale with pilsner malt and I wasn't impressed. It was almost tinny. Like you said, there was something missing. I fixed it by using pale malt instead of pilsner malt.

There's a reason why some grain is for pilsner and some is for ale.  Ale yeast makes beer that tastes like ale. Lager yeast make beer that tastes like lager. Changing up the grain won't change what the yeast makes.

So I settled on making session ales using ale ingredients (pale malt, a little crystal, and an ale hop like English Kent Golding or Fuggle) and ale yeast, and pilsners using pilsner ingredients (pilsner malt, noble hops, maybe some dark malts for color and/or carapils for body) and lager yeast.

Both are light bodied beers that are tasty and easy to drink, but totally different at the same time.
 
I also live in Canada. I Insulated the garage, put a princess auto heater on a thermostat set at 5-10 celsius. keeps the garage from freezing, maintains perfect lager temps from end of september to may. I even cut styrofoam pink into individual panels for the garage door and glued them on. Instant cheap insulated overhead door.
I also agree with the other reply regarding yeast.  for me, nothing but saflager s/23 for pilseners. Then its a true pilsener, I also just use a good fresh pale 2 row malt . Then there is the process involved. Reading up on traditional bavarian beer styles, you will see step mashes,  infusion mashes, and decoction mashes. Pilsener benefits from a 4 step temperature mash that includes an acid rest, protein rest, saccarification rest and mash out. Just put your mash on the burner to gently raise he tempurature. Other beers like wheat beers are crafted by using double decoction mashes, then adding special wheat beer yeast that fully attenuates in 3 days, then adding reserved unfermented wort(spiese) and lager yeast before bottling. After 3 weeks, you have perfect wheat beer champagne. The method is a major key in great beer.
 
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