I posted last year about my fest beer and how it took 8 weeks to finally be ready. That sounds about right for traditional lager brewing methods. Well, here we are again in late July and I started thinking that I really need to get moving on brewing a fest beer for this year in order for it to be ready by mid-Sept. Unless there was another way...
I've been hearing alot about the new Novalager yeast from Lallamand and how it can ferment a very traditional tasting lager in a matter of days - for example, see recent video by the Apartment Brewer
I thought I'd give this a try and see if I could turn around a decent fest lager in just a couple of weeks. This would give me plenty of time to make another larger batch after this small batch test run and in time for the real Oktoberfest season starting in mid-Sept. I used a simple recipe of 87% pilsner, 7% Munich Light, and 6% Vienna malt and Hallertauer Mittelfrueh hops : see recipe on Brewfather
I also used my usual Brulosophy-style "short & shoddy" method of a 45 min mash followed by just 30 min boil. I pitched the yeast at around 58F and let it free rise to my set temp of 62F and then let it ferment for a week, at which point I had already reached final gravity of 1.009. I then raised the temp to 64 (as high as my wine fridge goes) for a diacetyl rest for 3 days, then cold crashed, carbonated, and sampled a couple of days later.
I am amazed by the result! This beer is super clean with no off-flavors, and all of the desired characteristics of a classic fest-style lager. I am really impressed with this yeast - the picture above was taken just 12 days after brewing! This tastes at least as good as the fest beer that took a full 8 weeks to clean up last year. Don't get me wrong, I still have absolute reverence for the traditional German lager brewing "low and slow" methods, but for a small-batch home brewer in a hurry and with minimal refrigeration space for traditional lagering, I am really happy with this result!
Prost and looking forward to the upcoming Oktoberfest Season!
ps...I also used the low dissolved oxygen mash method for this one which may or may not have contributed to the great end result. Hard to tell without a direct side-by-side comparison, but it certainly didn't harm things in any way