[CannisterFlux]

Is this something unique to British-brewed beers? According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isinglass "Isinglass finings are widely used as a processing aid in the British brewing industry to accelerate the fining, or clarification, of beer". I cannot recall ever seeing anything like this on the ingredients lists of cans from other countries (e.g. French or Spanish beers), but maybe it doesn't count as an ingredients for some reason or maybe other countries use something worse to clear the beer.

[Nursie]

It's used in champagne and all sorts of other products, but as it's used in processing and not considered an ingredient, it can probably be left off in a lot of places.

[Nursie]

And when I lived in Australia I noticed a bottle of pink champagne (I think it was veuve cliquot rose?) had a notice about fish parts on the side, which I've never seen in the UK. Labelling laws may be different in different places.

[creshal]

Apparently in Germany it fell out of use – mechanical filtration systems are better and cheaper nowadays –, and is only used for some traditional wines (and possibly beers).

However, it is not considered an ingredient, and so does not need to be listed on the bottles.

[franze]

In germany there is something called "Reinheitsgebot" - the oldest (1516) food law in existence (if you don't count religious "laws"). It states that you can only use water, barley and hops for beer production. So no fish in german beer.

[dagw]

Are you sure? I'm pretty sure the law has been updated to allow natural clearing agents as long as they're completely filtered out before bottling.

[adrianratnapala]

The Reinheitsgebot sounds like a good reason for brewers to be lawyerly about what counts as an "ingredient". So traditionally they used it but claimed it wasn't an ingredient, and then when mechanical filtration improved, they decided that was a safer course.

[Udo_Schmitz]

The Reinheitsgebot is more of a myth though:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=th-f1ztar_U

[creshal]

Since it's not an ingredient, the reinheitsgebot doesn't apply – none of the filter ends up in the final product. Hausenblase was used heavily for centuries, but nowadays it's simply too expensive to bother with.

[Nursie]

Is that still the law?

Also, it may not be considered an ingredient so much as a tool or technique...

[tobltobs]

It isn't a law anymore. But I do not know one beer brewery which doesn't still brew according to it. However, the food industry is usually quite creative in bending the rules...

[Nursie]

From a quick googling - it looks like finings were allowed, as they aren't strictly an ingredient.

[talldan]

It'd be strange for it not to be an ingredient. As far as I understand it's added directly to the wort prior to fermentation.

[creshal]

Yeah, but it's completely removed before bottling. Is a spoon an ingredient?

[talldan]

How is it removed? Here's some details on brewing with Isinglass: http://byo.com/malt/item/645-fining-your-beer-techniques

I've only done homebrew - but I can't see how a powder, moss or tablet can be removed again once it has mostly dissolved.

[Nursie]

I've only done homebrew and never used isinglass....

But when I used gelatin it set the yeast sediment into a jelly-like layer at the bottom of the fermentation vessel, so when I bottled I'm not sure there was really any in the finished product. The same may apply here.

I think the point of all of them is to encourage sedimentation, and thus they shouldn't be significantly present in the finished product

[talldan]

That's a good point. It's called the 'trub' that's left at the bottom of the fermenter. So trace amounts are still present, I'd imagine.

[dublinclontarf]

Large scale commercial beer producers user filtering, and in the case of lagers it doesn't matter because the beer is left to settle for quite some time.

In the UK with Real Ale, especially cask ale it's used because it's unfiltered and has lots of live yeast and sediment which needs to settle at the bottom of the cask.