Beer Forum

I would like to come up with a fast brew. Something that can go from brewday to bottle in two weeks or so. I was thinking a mild.

Any suggestions?

Good call. Anything of moderate gravity fermented with a highly flocculant yeast (WLP002 is my favorite) could easily be drinkable in 2 weeks. I've actually done a brown ale and had it kegged and force-carbed and was drinking it in a week. It was better in two weeks, of course, but very drinkable at a week.

Spurtrax wrote:I would like to come up with a fast brew. Something that can go from brewday to bottle in two weeks or so. I was thinking a mild.

Any suggestions?

Hefeweizen is usually my go to quick brew beer

Brandon wrote:

Spurtrax wrote:I would like to come up with a fast brew. Something that can go from brewday to bottle in two weeks or so. I was thinking a mild.

Any suggestions?

Hefeweizen is usually my go to quick brew beer

+1 on the Hefeweizen.

Dunkelweizen. I'm doing one this week...plan on having it bottled in 2 weeks.

Any low-standard gravity ale (<1.050) should be finished with fermentation in under 7 days if you pitch appropriately and oxygenate correctly. IME a lot of the conditioning is waiting for yeast to floc. I find that WLP002/Wy1968 and WLP007 produce excellent beers and flocculate very quickly.

Heffe doesn't need to floc, so it's ready quickly

IME I think mild actually takes a bit more time than something like an ordinary bitter. I've always found that malty styles need more conditioning that hoppy styles. Hoppy styles are often better fresher.

I make an 1.065 IPA with Cal Ale that I can turn around (with 10 day dry hop) in 14 days. I dry hop when fermentation starts to subside, and on day 9 of dry hopping, I chill the beer in the carboy and the yeast flocs out overnight. It's kegged the next day and if I shake it, ready to drink. That said, I find the beer benefits from a couple extra weeks of conditioning, but it's not necessary to be drinkable. If you don't have a fridge to help you floc the yeast, stick with WLP002/007. That said, it's in 40s-50s here these days. If your weather's similar you could probably floc the yeast without freezing it in this weather by putting it outdoors.