Last week we took a look at kettle finings, those potions and powders you zealously chuck into the boil in hopes that they’ll precipitate out the malt proteins that can create chill haze. Irish moss and Whirlfloc tablets do a great job of pulling proteins out of solution in wort, but what about the suspended yeast cells that remain in your beer after fermentation? Those can cause haze, too, after all.
Well, that’s where post-fermentation finings, or cask finings, enter the picture. As the names suggest, these are substances that brewers add to finished beer to encourage suspended particles, mainly yeast cells, to drop, producing brighter beer.
Professional brewers have access to a whole army of clarifying means and methods, including
- Centrifuging
- Filtering through diatomaceous earth or perlite
- Filtering through plates or other mechanical means