"Speed Brewing" an Irish Red

[JCasey1992]

Until recently, I have been unable to brew leaving me with an empty keezer. In an attempt to catch up on my pipeline and to have some libations ready for the holidays, I am brewing some "fast" beers. Currently, I have a 1.043 red ale that has been in the fermenter for around 6 days and has been at FG for close to 3 of those days.

How quickly can I turn a low OG Irish Red such as this around? I was thinking I could start cold crashing and fining tonight and keg and carbonate around 48 hours later. With my method of carbonating, I'll probably be drinking the beer about 2 days after I start force carbing. Will this schedule work or will I destroy the beer this way? I understand that the beer will be better after aging a bit but will it at least be drinkable if I pull it off the yeast this quickly? I don't really drink it that fast so I'm sure I'll be able to enjoy it when it has a little age under its belt as well.

Cheers!
Casey

 

[RM-MN]

I've bottled beers after 7 days in the fermenter without cold crashing. There was a lot of sediment suspended yet but the beer was drinkable. You do know that it will improve if you wait but in your circumstance I'd go for it this time. Your next beer might be a wheat beer as they are ready to drink sooner as there is little maturation time needed for them.

 

[Miraculix]

I brewed an Irish red a few months ago and compared to all the other beers I brewed, it did not change much with time. It tasted like it does now directly after carbonation finished, but I carbonate naturally in the bottle. Took about three weeks from grain to glass, and since then, not much change in taste.
It was a fairly easy recipe. 5% 60l Crystal, I think about 2% dehusked roast barley and the rest mo pale.

 

[kh54s10]

If you are going to force carbonate, why not wait at least a few days longer?

Unless you don't have enough fermenting equipment and want to get more in the pipeline, or you start the holidays way early, you have some time.

 

[@RoyalGallon]

Just our of interest it sounds like what you’re planning to do is more or less the ale fermentation profile by Brülosophy here.

http://brulosophy.com/methods/fermentation-schedules/

 

[Gnomebrewer]

Go for it. Worse case is you start drinking it and it still has some off flavours (such as acetaldehyde). In that case, you can warm the keg up, shake it a bit, and leave it for another week or two - there's still enough yeast in there to clean things up (from personal experience multiple times).

 

[JCasey1992]

Thanks guys! The beer turned out great! I can't wait to give one to my die hard Smithwicks drinking dad. I think he'll love it!

 

[Miraculix]

Thanks guys! The beer turned out great! I can't wait to give one to my die hard Smithwicks drinking dad. I think he'll love it!View attachment 600918

Nice color mate! Care to share the final version of the recipe?

 

[Beer666]

The fastest beer i have made was a no boil wheat. Fermented for 6 days then kegged and force carbed. There was a bit of yeast at the bottom of the glass but the beer was fantastic.

 

[JCasey1992]

Nice color mate! Care to share the final version of the recipe?

Sure thing! I don't own the micro pipework for my Grainfather so I ended up increasing the batch size to 7 gallons to use enough grain. With that in mind, you may want to scale the recipe back a touch.

Update: Forgot the link. My bad

https://share.brewfather.app/BTr65jGNSWDp0x

 

[Hanglow]

This was a brown ale I made 8 days before this picture was taken. Only copper finings, lots of calcium and a very fast and flocculant yeast. That includes 3 days bottle conditioning too. Was bit too green at that point understandably