Holy Lager Batman!

OK guys, I just witnessed the most epic lager fermentation schedule in history. This is done in a commercial brewery. Check it out.
Day 1 - 66-68
Day 2-3 - 62-66
Day 4 - 58-62
Day 5 - 56-58
Day 6-7 - 52
After day 7 keep at 32-34.
I don’t even wanna know what their beer tastes like…
What do you think?
Oh, they use S-189.

Hmm, I do it almost backward.

Days 1-7 48-50°
Days 8-14 ~ 60°
Days 15-30 ~70°
After 30 days, lager for at least a month.

Breweries can get away with different temp regimens because they ferment under pressure. Especially with lagers, this will produce a lower ester profile than you’d get with an open fermentation. I’ve been playing with pressurized fermentations and they work well, haven’t done a room temp lager yet but its on my list.

They use open fermentation…

Well, I never…

Now I wanna do an open ferm lager at 66!!!

Still, the head pressure on a large fermentor can generate the equivalent of 10psi on the yeast in the bottom. So even if the fermentors aren’t under pressure, they are proabably getting fewer esters than we would in a bucket/carboy.

Or is this beer just really lousy?

I have no idea. I really want to taste it now!

So…Is this a beer we would have heard of?

Well, Dmitri, brew with Wyeast bohemian lager and you’ll be able to get away with it. That’s what 1554 is fermented with.

I doubt it. I’ve never heard of that brewery, and it’s actually in Russia.

Interesting as Denny mentioned years ago that S-23 was a fruity mess at 45-50 but was better at 55-60??? If I recall correctly.
And if you look to the chart below S-189 has even higher Vdk values than S-23. I would also think the higher temp would accentuate esters. I had heard about the under pressure large narrow cylindrical vessel promotes fast fermenting and aging of beer and it then sees less ageing/ lagering than conventional wisdom would dictate and maybe they keep at 32 for a week etc… then carbonate in the bright tank for serving. But I consider it all hearsay as I have not attended Siebel or other and learned commercial brewing to this level of knowledge. There are a few members here that have, so chime in. I would say yuk. But maybe its the right way to approach this yeast? Or methods used as seen below? I would say a little more prying is in order Dimik, Do some counter brew-espionage and let us know where this science was learned!

Or are you dealing with a misinformed or self taught “tour guide, bartender” that just has the fact of the operations methods backward?

Also here is the Noonan quote on temp which does give some insight to their possible method reasoning. “The temperatures quoted here apply to dextrin-rich lager worts of 10P(SG 1.040) or greater, producing full bodied beer.” IE:he states later then that 47-52f during primary and no higher than 60f during primary and/or raise towards 60f then for diacetyl and a drop to 28-32f as is widely held as proper.
Now this is where I had to stop and reread a few times. He states within the same paragraph.
"If a high maltose wort relatively free of haze forming protein fractions is being fermented, or if a top fermenting strain is used, temperatures should be higher by 6-20f. Fermentation times will be correspondingly foreshortened.

Then goes back into why you want to keep the temps low with dextrinous wort in order to give the lager yeast time to break down and covert the dextrinous sugars. Then it is noted that he states “Moreover, higher temperatures invariably cause an increase in esters, fusel alcohols and solvent like flavors that are inappropriate in lagers.”

So the esters for one are a function of yeast temp, where it can be noted that fusel can be formed from many things other than just high temps. So if one could expect fruity esters from a high temp ferment of a high Vdk yeast like S-189 why would the presence or lack or dextrins change the yeast from not forming high Vdk at 60-70f as would be thought? They just clean up faster due to the lack of dextrins to break down???

Intriguing to say the least. My lagers will typically always have dextrin fractions so I subscribe to old school here for sure, but these cats are in the business of fast turn around meaning cash flow.
But then you have a beer with 100% maltose and a thin body maybe? How would you retain full body with out a dextrin rest or dextrin malt possibly some cara and adjunct to balance the palate-style your going for? Dimik are they making a miller lite clone? I jest(but you never know)
The learning just never ends huh, part of the fun.