How to WHITEN my beer?

[jessup]

I brewed a White Chocolate beer with Ghirardelli Sweet Ground White Chocolate and want nothing more than for it to glow with a vibrant white color. Currently it's only a tan color similar to cream soda. In my head I imagine it being solid white the way a stout is solid black. Is there any feasible way to make the beer white without adding bleach or something toxic? Imagine Dunkin Donuts white hot chocolate for a comparison of desired color; or milk for those who haven't had the pleasure of having the white hot chocolate. If it can be successfully done maybe Southern Tiers next beers will be the whitewater series

Any ideas?

 

[IrregularPulse]

DO they make white food coloring?? I don't think you're gonna have much luck.

 

[jmo88]

Simple color theory here. White is the absence of color. You can't adjust your beer to be white. It'll just be a washed out version of your base beer color. If most of your beer is 4 SRM and you add 5% of white chocolate, that is like using 95% yellow paint and adding 5% white and expecting the result to be white.

 

[wrench001]

They do make white food coloring but it'll probably never get any whiter than a caramel cream color and you would probably have to add a ton just to get it to that. I think it would be worth it to try on a couple test glasses of beer.

 

[passedpawn]

Simple color theory here. White is the absence of color.

Then what color is water?

 

[eanmcnulty]

Isn't water clear?

 

[Walker]

Simple color theory here. White is the absence of color.

Black is the absence of all color. (Black objects reflect no light - nothing bounces to your eye - you see black)

White is the presence of all color. (white objects reflect all light - everything bounces to your eyes - you see white)

Water does not reflect or absorb light at all. Light passes through it and you see what is on the other side - usually with some refraction (not reflection) of the light.

 

[jmo88]

Black is the absence of all color. (Black objects reflect no light - nothing bounces to your eye - you see black)

White is the presence of all color. (white objects reflect all light - everything bounces to your eyes - you see white)

Water does not reflect or absorb light at all. Light passes through it and you see what is on the other side - usually with some refraction (not reflection) of the light.

That's additive color. Like computer screens projecting light. Subtractive color is when a material absorbs color, like in paints and inks, and even beer. The water comment is correct though.

 

[ChshreCat]

That's additive color. Like computer screens projecting light. Subtractive color is when a material absorbs color, like in paints and inks, and even beer. The water comment is correct though.

+1 this is why you can't mix red, green and blue paint to make white paint. It just doesn't work that way... though I tried so hard with the tempra paints in grade school to make it happen.

 

[wyzazz]

I add a tsp of flour to all my Wheat's/Wit's/Hefe's to keep the "cloud" in the beer, it actually gives it a pretty white appearance and keeps it cloudy for a long time. I'd try boiling up a bit of flour and adding it to your bottling bucket with the priming sugar.

 

[Edcculus]

stuff dealing with light (computer screens, projectors etc) are additive color like someone said above. There is really no "theory" into making a liquid white. What really needs to happen is that it needs to be opaque first. In most printing inks, we use a "pigment" called titanium dioxide. Its highly reflective and has almost no color. When used as the only pigment in an ink it makes it very white and opaque.

I think they use titanium dioxide in food like pills to make them white. Even if you use that, or a ton of flour (something to make it opaque), you still have the color of the beer itself. Even if you use only pils malt, the resulting opaque beer will be kind of yellow. There isn't any way to get rid of that color aside from extreme filtration.

 

[JOHN51277]

Use white pint glasses to serve it in and move on to the next brew.

That's what I'd do.

 

[JKoravos]

The short answer is, no, you can't make it look like milk.

Maybe next time use a lot of rice and pils so your beer is almost clear, then adding flour could get you close.

Titanium Dioxide is an interesting idea and would do a much better job than flour, but you'd have to do some toxicology research before putting large quantities in your beer. Oh yeah, taste testing, too.

 

[ctufano]

Then what color is water?

blue!

 

[jessup]

Well it sounds like i'm not going to have much luck getting the beer whiter than it is. There's no way i'm putting titanium dioxide in my beer and consuming that Flour sounds alright, but funk it, I'll just deal with the cream soda color it is.

For the recipe I used all pilsner with some oats and wheat for head retention and body. For hops i wanna say i used goldings, but can't quite recall and since i'm at work & no recipe available. WL002 english ale used for fermentation. The OG was 1.083 if i recall correctly, and that was before i added an addional 2 lbs of ghirardelli sweet ground white chocolate; 3+ lbs altogether. oh, and 2 vanilla beans. I'm gonna prime it with creme de cocoa to assure it's full on white chocolate flavor and that might even subtract some color to make it a bit lighter. Checked SG the other day and it was @ 1.016 which is about the best i'm gonna get in terms of attenuation. It tastes great and is the lightest in color i've ever gotten, but i wish there was a way to go full on white. Oh well.

Thanks for all the advice and replies!

 

[SumnerH]

Well it sounds like i'm not going to have much luck getting the beer whiter than it is. There's no way i'm putting titanium dioxide in my beer and consuming that Flour sounds alright, but funk it, I'll just deal with the cream soda color it is.

FWIW, titanium dioxide is an FDA approved food coloring (not to exceed 1% of the food product, by weight) and is present in many pills, most toothpastes, some skim milk, and a bunch of other ingestibles.

http://www.fda.gov/forindustry/coloradditives/coloradditiveinventories/ucm115641.htm

I'm not saying I'd recommend it, but it's not a totally insane idea.

 

[wendelgee2]

I'd start with a wheat beer next time. It ain't called a Wit for nothing.