Franconian Beer Message Board

Kräusen
Posted by Barry on 2014-09-23 03:35:44
I was musing on the topic of Kräusen when it occurred to me that it might relate to my often (and doubtless boring) preoccupation with the addition of extraneous CO2 to various beers in Bayern (you might recall the repeated discussions about the kellerbier in the Wizgall keller).

In the summary of the 'Kräusen' process, kindly provided by Nick, the following appears:

'Because of the German beer purity law (the Reinheitsgebot), use of sugars not derived from malt was not allowed, so alternative means were needed to supply a small dose of sugar for the yeast to convert and ultimately carbonate beer. The solution was to add high-krausen wort of the same recipe to an already fermented batch to provide the sugar needed for bottle carbonation. The same technique can also be implemented when naturally carbonating in casks and firkins. Some brewers will add non-fermented wort called spiese as the priming sugar, but the addition of active yeast from krausening was essential in carbonating lagers.'

Surely, then, this was the precursor to the lamentable and lazy process of beefing up beer with CO2 and shouldn't we be encouraging moden day brewers to adopt the technique?
 
Followups:
                 Kräusen by Mosquit on  2014-09-23 04:03:36
                   Kräusen by Nick B. on  2014-09-23 04:52:17
                     Kräusen by Mosquit on  2014-09-23 05:48:59
                       Kräusen by gary on  2014-09-28 20:18:44
                         Kräusen by Barry on  2014-09-29 03:36:07