No one gives much thought to sediment in beer. That sludgy light brown layer at the bottom of some bottles of beer, that can rush into your glass as you finish pouring. That goo is actually dormant yeast (and some assorted proteins and other matter) that settled out after doing its job. Recently I found myself contemplating the etiquette of sediment, and decided to write a column about it (seriously). That turned out to be my latest Beer 101 column (EDIT:which you CAN find here, thanks to Joel for pointing out how to do it hopefully you can find here – Sherbrooke recently redesigned its webpage and I can’t figure out how to get a permanent URL link. So if the piece is no longer the first item, scroll down until you find it).
Most readers here will be well aware that most commercial beer is filtered before bottling, meaning sediment is a rarity. However, certain styles have evolved to require processing the beer in a fashion that results in sediment. Belgian-style ales and German weizens are the most common, although good old-British real ale will also have sediment. Bottle sediment is usually a result of bottle conditioning (sometimes called bottle fermentation and other synonyms), where the carbonation takes place post-packaging.
That is all well and good, but my main purpose for writing the piece was to discuss what to do with sediment. Do you let it pour out, or leave it behind? Do you drink the yeasty dregs or dump it down the sink? The latter is mostly personal preference. The former depends on the beer. Belgians are sticklers for leaving sediment behind, lest it mar the beer’s appearance. German weizens, in contrast, are improved by swirling and letting it flow.
I won’t re-write the column here – you get the gist. But I find myself still wondering about sediment. Many of you out there are seasoned and experience beer aficionados, and have likely tackled the sediment question many times. So let me ask: What do YOU do with your leftover sediment? Do you drink it (and how) or do you dump it?
Feel free to post a comment and tell us.
January 23, 2013 at 10:31 AM
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January 23, 2013 at 10:48 AM
Joel, thanks a million! If we are ever in the same pub, I owe you a beer!
Jason
January 23, 2013 at 6:38 PM
If the sediment is relatively homogenous, I usually pour it, hefeweizen style. If the sediment is ‘dirty’, with residual hops and stuff like that, like in my homebrew, I throw it out.
January 23, 2013 at 8:55 PM
B vitamins are good for the day-after-effects of drinking too much beer. Most of the time, I’ll pour it and drink it.
May 4, 2015 at 5:51 PM
In my short-term experience of only a few batches and a lot of reading on the subject, I usually do everything to force the beer to coagulate in the fermenter pre-bottling to get the best clarity by adding clearing agents or cold-crashing for a week. (Doing so might require an additional week or two of bottle-conditioning to achieve the right carbonation levels.) One of the reasons for clearing beer is that a lot of people find clarity aesthetically-pleasing. My second reason is that clear beer stores better and has longer shelf life. If you ever get into beer aging, you’ll want to have your beer as free of any particles as possible. As far as health benefits, if consumed, I presume that sediment is rich in certain vitamins and has probiotic properties. A more advanced option of things to do with sediment would be harvesting the used up yeast for later re-use. This is particularly convenient with conical fermenters.