Why is Secondary Fermentation Important in Beer Brewing?
This article discusses the process of secondary fermentation and why it is a good thing for your beer. By employing secondary fermentation into your brewing process, you don’t need to worry about unfinished primary fermentation including the dreaded exploding bottles. The purpose of secondary fermentation is to condition the beer. One of the key reasons to get the beer into the secondary fermenting vessel is to get it off the yeast bed. Once the initial fermentation is over, the yeast that sediments on the bottom of the primary fermenter will start to decompose. This is known as yeast autolysis and if you leave your new beer sitting on the yeast bed, it will start to adversely affect the flavor of your beer. So by racking the beer into the secondary fermenter will stop this from happening. You could of course just bottle the beer at this point but if you leave it for a secondary fermentation you give the flavors more time to mature and mellow and the improvement in the flavor of the fi
