Cooling Wort

[Enchanted Brew]

We just finished cooking a batch of Kolsch, our first 5 gallon boil on the Hurricane burner.  To cool the wort, we place the brew pot into an old fashioned galvanized tub filled with a little water and a lot of ice.  We spin the brew pot in the ice filled tub, just like making ice cream, gently stirring to move the wort against the cool sides of the brew pot.  It takes us 12 minutes to cool the 5 gallons down to 73 degrees.

Could this gentle stirring at this stage in the game result in cloudy beer?

Thanks.

[Wildrover]

how gentle is the stirring?  I would think that so long as there is no splashing it shouldn't be a big deal.  HSA really hasn't been proven to be much of an issue at the homebrew level anyway.

[Enchanted Brew]

Gentle enough to move the warmer wort in the center of the brew pot to the outside edges, closer to the ice cooled brew pot side.  So gentle that no bubbles were seen in the wort.

This is our fourth batch of beer, but we haven't tasted our first batch, yet.  Our first taste test will be April 4th, four weeks in the bottle.  That should tell us if what we're doing is on the right track.

Thank you for your comments.

[MaltLicker]

Do you pour the entire pot into a fermenter thru a funnel?  Since you are cooling it pretty well and quickly, you could try a different transfer method to leave more hot and cold break behind in the pot.

Just cool as you are doing, maybe even to mid-60's, and then put pot on the counter.  With a sanitized large s/s spoon, gently whirlpool the wort and then cover and let sit for >30 minutes.  The trub and gunk will gather in the middle bottom of the pot.  You can then siphon from the edge and take only clean wort into the fermenter.  It will cost you some wort, but the gunk you leave behind is sizable. 

I just did this on a couple batches and the amount of trub in the fermenter is less than half the amount I would get if I dumped the whole pot. 

[Enchanted Brew]

We'll try that on our next batch, a Belgian ale.  Please define "more hot and cold break behind in the pot".  We're at work now and don't have access to our Palmer book for definitions.

Here's what we've been doing.  After cooling down to about 70-72 degrees in the brew pot, we pour the wort, through a sanitized stainless strainer, into a plastic "ale pail" (with snap on lid, airlock, and drain valve thing at the bottom.  We then pitch the yeast into the wort with a lot of aeration.  This becomes our primary fermenter.  We've been letting the wort sit in this primary for 2 to 3 weeks or until we need the container for another batch, or bottling, etc.

With your method, do you pitch your yeast after you get the clean wort into the fermenter?

Should we be concerned with using a plastic primary for 2 to 3 weeks.  The boss likes this method.  I think we should go directly from the brew pot into a glass carboy.  The boss is really into brewing every Saturday morning.  I don't want to mess with the boss.

[deerelk4x4]

We'll try that on our next batch, a Belgian ale.  Please define "more hot and cold break behind in the pot".  We're at work now and don't have access to our Palmer book for definitions.

Hot break is the proteins that group together in the boil, usually starting as the foam on the top of the brew pot.

Cold break is again more proteins that clump together and settle out when rapidly cooling the wort.

Should we be concerned with using a plastic primary for 2 to 3 weeks.  The boss likes this method.  I think we should go directly from the brew pot into a glass carboy.  The boss is really into brewing every Saturday morning.  I don't want to mess with the boss.

Plastic is fine for a primary, as many brewers will do primary fermentation in a bucket.  Just don't leave the beer in the plastic for too long.  Two weeks might be about as long as you want to leave it here. 

I do both my primary and secondary in glass carboys.  And to ensure that i don't have any light issues, I place my carboy in the box it came in, or you can use an old dark colored t-shirt with the neck over the top for the air lock to poke out the top.

Hope this info helps out.

Steve

[MaltLicker]

With your method, do you pitch your yeast after you get the clean wort into the fermenter?

Should we be concerned with using a plastic primary for 2 to 3 weeks. 

It is just my preference, but I do like to fill the primary (carboy) first, grab my clean final OG sample, then aerate and pitch yeast.  I like to taste these gravity samples, and this way the majority of the hops and gunk are out of it.

Buckets are fine for primary while the fermentation is producing CO2 and the bucket is out-gassing.  After active ferm ends, you run a slight risk of air-permeable plastic allowing something bad in when the out-gassing stops.  But by then, you have beer not wort, so it's acidic and alcoholic, and less vulnerable to bugs.  Your call there.