Okay, I'm just getting in to this wonderful hobby. Got my first batch of brew done (porter w/ wy london ale) a few weeks ago. I had heard a guy say that people will put a few flaked oats in their bottles when they cap them. So i tried it on two of them. they turned out a lot better tasting than the bottles without oats. It took some of the dry aftertaste and coffee flavor out and just overall made them more mellow. What is the oats doing to my beer and why doesn't it taste as well without them? thanks
Interesting. The addition of oats adds relatively long-chain carbohydrates, a bit of protein, a few lipids, and perhaps a tiny tiny amount of flavor. This would be perceived by the taster as fuller in the mouthfeel and could have the effect of "taking the edge off" a harsh beer. One could achieve a similar effect by using a higher mash temperature or a less-attenuative yeast.
First of all i didn't mash with the oats...simply added 5 dried oats like quaker, to two of my bottles when i capped them because i didn't know what the outcome would be. and i didn't sanitize anything..not only are they dried, but the 6.0%+/- alc took care of any contamination. so the oats arn't adding any carbs or protein to speak of.
The effect may be psychosomatic. Do a blind tasting with some friends who have a solid grasp of beer styles.
Adding oats at bottling time really sounds like a poor practice. If you want to add the slick mouthfeel and slight flavor of oats to a brew, you need to add the oats during the mash, not during conditioning.
I agree that it is poor practice, but i do not agree that the taste is due to the placebo effect. It obviously took away the dry after taste of the beer. Is dryness due to the type of yeast? or otherwise
I still don't know how you can be sure that the oats did anything. Can you taste the bottled version with oats side by side the same beer un-oated? I'll bet it has more to do with the beer just conditioning.
I'll pop a few in some bottles in one of my next brews and do the blind taste test thing.
BoB
PS I don't worry about infection as much as everyone else. Before I knew about infection I used to stick my finger into the head of every single bottle to "pop"the foam and aid in filling. Never had a bottle infection and that was back in college, when my fingers were definitely not clean.
Why is my beer better when bottled with oats?
I have brewed with oats before but never put them directly in the bottles.
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