Hot beer

[guypettigrew]

Hot, isn't it?

My beer's in far less than ideal conditions. Pending the building of a proper brew room and beer storage area the fermentation vessel and kegs are in the garage. Which is currently at about 27C. The fermentation is completely temperature controlled to within +/- 0.5C, so the beer going into the kegs is good. Sadly, the beer coming out of them is about 23C!

Amazingly, it still tastes OK!!! Nowhere near as good as it should be, but still drinkable.

There's something about English style ales which makes them able to tolerate high temperatures.

It's unlikely the new brewery and storage room will be built before the end of summer (boo hoo!), but next year the beers should be served at the perfect temperature.

How's everyone else coping with this sudden heatwave?

Guy

[Jim]

I was in the same position as you for many years, but thankfully I now have an 'extended fridge' storage area for my barrels. It makes a huge difference, including in the winter, where my beer used to get too cold to taste properly.

[McMullan]

The key stage for temperature control is active fermentation. Once that's done, you should be fine. Higher temperatures after that will reduce shelf-life a little. I wouldn't worry, unless you want to store beer for ages.

[aamcle]

Get some "plastic ice cubes" and put them in your glass, BnM, Home Bargains and so no have them. That's what I have to do in summer and it works OK.

aamcle

[guypettigrew]

The key stage for temperature control is active fermentation. Once that's done, you should be fine. Higher temperatures after that will reduce shelf-life a little. I wouldn't worry, unless you want to store beer for ages.

Ah, storing beer for ages. Never quite cracked that!

Get some "plastic ice cubes" and put them in your glass, BnM, Home Bargains and so no have them. That's what I have to do in summer and it works OK.aamcle

Genius! Never heard of these before, but I've now ordered 18 clear ones off ebay for £3.59 including postage.

Thanks for the advice.

Guy

[alexlark]

Struggled for a while but now have a serving fridge, with 2 sankeys, and a fermenting fridge, which currently has a PB of pale ale in it.

[Hanglow]

I still can't brew due to some ongoing building work, but I usually store my beer in the pit in my garage, it keeps it around 12c in summer and down to 6c in winter. Now that the garage is insulated it'll be a bit more stable I think. ALthough now I think about it it could well be warmer in the summer. I tend to transfer a few beers to the fridge for the weeks drinking, then bring them out a bit before i drink them if I want them warmer than fridge temp which is most of the time.

Ideally I'd store most of my beers near freezing but I'm not so bothered as to get more fridges for that


I only bottle, If i had kegs I'd definitely have more fridges

[Capped]

i think it's perfect brewing weather. Maybe does get hot in the day, but it drops cool at night; the ale ends up somewhere in the middle, not suddenly assume its surrounding temperature! Without even bothering to check I know that the FV in the corner of my living room will be 20C, give or take a couple of degrees. What's wrong with that, exactly?