Oakham "Krausening" casks

Should these be added as new beers?
The process starts with great beer being brewed in the usual Oakham way, but at the end of the initial fermentation, yeast cells are removed from the beer.

This is because yeast gets tired and a bit bad tempered after working hard in the fermentation process and this can cause undesirable aromas and flavours.

So fresh yeast is introduced to complete the fermentation – a process known as “Krausening” and the method which ensures that Oakham’s Cask Aged beers taste so smooth and drinkable.

The beer is then racked in casks and cellared like a fine wine to allow development of the remarkable flavours and conditioning that characterize the Oakham Cask Aged range.

All of the Oakham Cask Aged beers are aged for at least 6 weeks – usually for much longer

I have a feeling these are ‘old stock’ and they’ve just re-oompahed them!

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There are some famous beers that have claimed Krausening, like this one -
https://www.ratebeer.com/beer/aecht-schlenkerla-kraeusen/146702/
But, are Oakham listing and marking up as a different product with these or is it going out in the same packaging / pump clips? If so, we may never know. I’m happy if it is marked up as a different product, we can then compare the differences.

This is the picture that a local pub has posted on facebook advertising a tap take over. It’s also where I found out they were ‘cask aging’.

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Here’s another Krausen: https://www.ratebeer.com/beer/haake-beck-kraeusen/9606/

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I happen to be in Peterborough at Charters in a couple of weeks. If they are new they should be in there I can check if anything different is mentioned on the pump clip. The image is the standard ones.

Thought I’d check the website. Seem to have different pump clips - and ABVs (didn’t cross refrence)?

https://www.oakhamales.com/cask-aged-beers/

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This is a common process (or at least I thought it was) I’ve never heard of it being called krausening ; not for cask anyway. The method I am familiar with is the beer finishes fermenting it is then centrifuged so there is no yeast and the beer is brite. Then sugar and yeast are added to the beer to enable conditioning in cask then cask is kept on-site for a number of weeks to condition.

Some breweries like to rack to cask before fermentation has finished ; this is risky.

Some like to add nothing to the cask ; this is amateurish.

Proper krausening is adding fermenting beer to fermented beer to condition not a million miles from a lambic producer adding 1 year lambic to create bottle conditioning

What Oakham are doing is not krausening as they don’t mention fermenting beer they mention adding yeast.

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Excellent point there. I had forgotten about the fermenting beer part rather than just adding a second dose of yeast. However I am wondering what Aecht Schlenkerla and Haake are really doing to claim Krausening.

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Taken from the Schlenkerla website

Kräusen

Helles Märzen refermented blend


In the world of German brewing, Kräusen refers to the intense proliferation of bubbles and foam formed during fermentation of a young or “green” beer. And Aufkräusen (literally to kräusen it up), refers to a historic brewing technique in which some green beer is added to a fully-matured lager. This is a very old and very typically German tradition, and today even English-speaking brewers refer to this technique as krausening. Krausening brings the vibrant freshness of young beer to the more refined, austere flavors of a fully-matured lager.

Aecht Schlenkerla Kräusen starts out as normal Helles Schlenkerla Lager and matures for months in the old rock cellars underneath the brewery. Just before filling it is blended using the before mentioned “Kräusen” technique with classic Märzen Rauchbier. The result is an unfiltered, bottom fermented and amber color Märzen Lager hybrid with a vibrant and slightly smoky flavor.

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Krausening is the addition of unfermented or part-fermented beer - green beer, as Heller-Trum puts it above. What Oakham is doing is, as you say, is common for cask conditioning - and it’s not Krausening! The likes of Fuller’s have done it for years - filter out the leftover yeast and add fresh for conditioning. According to John Keeling, a major reason for doing it is you get much better control of the yeast ppm density in your casks, and therefore get a more even and reliable secondary fermentation.

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How did you get on? The Tap Takeover in a local pub starts on Friday 2nd July. Do we need to add the ‘Cask Aged’ beers as new beers or not?

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Think I have answered my own question:

https://www.ratebeer.com/beer/oakham-blue-skies-ipa/438176/

https://www.ratebeer.com/beer/oakham-blue-skies-ipa-cask-aged/660008/

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The first review still casts doubt: " I added this as a new beer as the original pump clip didn’t say cask aged, but could be the same beer."

In fact I see that latter beer was added in 2018 anyway.

It was all order on an app with table service, so never got to see a pump clip the app only had the standard beer names. So nothing conclusive.

I did visit the Bumble Inn and Peterborough’s new craft bar. Blind Tiger 20+ taps decent selection and crowler fill. I will add the place soon, but current I’ve lost my place adding privileges.

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I think you just have to log off and then back in and they should magically return.

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Yea that’s exactly what you have to do. However I wish the message would be displayed at the top of the page rather than the bottom. The amount of times that I have filled in almost all of the details only then to realise that at the bottom is a message telling me that I must be logged on, grrrr.

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