Every one of the beers I've made, from good to bad, have had one constant, and that is a slightly yeasty flavor. After about 8 beers now, I've decided to chalk it up to my lack of high-end filtration and it being just excess yeast in the beer.
Is there an unavoidable "homebrew" taste?
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I have never had any feedback from people that the beer is "yeasty" and I do not taste it myself. I tasted it in a cider I made, that was terrible. Describe your timeline for your process from pitching the yeast to bottling (including chilling and pouring into a glass).
hunter_le five
Sheriff Underscore
I had a "yeasty" brew (and a couple yeasty ciders) back when I first started years ago. In general it seemed to stem from me rushing the process too much (not giving everything enough time in primary to settle) and poor racking practices.
However normally when I think of "homebrew taste" I think of fermenting too warm and the off-flavors that produces. Very common with new brewers.
Whatever the "homebrew taste" that you are referring to is, yes, it is absolutely avoidable. Good practices produce good beer.
As Hello mentioned, knowing your processes in great detail would better help for a diagnosis.
However normally when I think of "homebrew taste" I think of fermenting too warm and the off-flavors that produces. Very common with new brewers.
Whatever the "homebrew taste" that you are referring to is, yes, it is absolutely avoidable. Good practices produce good beer.
As Hello mentioned, knowing your processes in great detail would better help for a diagnosis.
Indian_villager
Well-Known Member
Deliciousness, my beers result in deliciousness. A rundown of your process will help the folks here give you tailored advice.
brrman
Well-Known Member
The homebrew taste to me is apparent when I first keg and force carb a beer after like 3 weeks in the fermenter. It has a green taste for like a week, but after that it tastes clean and refreshing.
Possibilities:
1) Too young (but unless you drink your beer very quickly you should notice a change over the weeks)
2) Underpitch
3) Common extract problems (not known to cause "yeasty" flavor, but not everyone's diagnosis is spot on)
Some small beers are best 7 days after pitching, but you really have to get the oxygenation and nutrient levels right to make that happen. Others will take some time to come around.
Hi all, thanks for all the feedback! I'll try to go over our process as closely as I can:
We order our kit so it arrives a few days before we're going to brew (normally from Jasper's Hombrew or ritebrew.com). We order all our grains pre-milled.
We brew in our garage on a Bayou Classic propane burner and a Bayou Classic 10 gallon pot /w a false bottom and a built in thermometer (highly recommend this pot).
1. Sanitize everything. We used to use One Step, but we recently got Starsan. We fill an old 5 gallon feta bucket with sanitizer water and keep all our equipment in there while we brew.
2. 15-20 minute protein rest @ ~125F, Sach rest @ ~155 for 60 minutes.
3. Batch sparge with 170F water into a 10 gallon igloo cooler (FWH if needed)
4. Clean the brew pot with the garden hose. We don't bother sanitizing because the next step is to boil.
5. 60 minute boil. Hop schedule accordingly. During the boil we begin rehydrating our dry yeast (usually US-05/04).
6. Wort chiller, while stirring. Drops the temperature to ~67F in ~10 minutes.
7. Decant boil into fermenter through 400 micro strainer to catch some trub. Thinking about getting a 300 micro strainer.
8. Pitch rehydrated yeast halfway through transferring the boil.
9. First 24-36 hour of fermentation is done in a chest freezer @ 58F. Increase the temeperature to 65F for the next week or so. Bring it up to 68F for the last couple days.
10. Add Gelatin and cold crash for 2-4 days.
11. Dry hop for 7-10 days for certain beers. Cold crash for another 24 hours.
12. Bottling day. Transfer to bottling bucket, careful to avoid disturbing the bottom of the fermenter. We clean our bottles with bleach and then rinse each bottle 3 times.
13. Store bottles for at least 3 weeks in 68F (generally with our next fermenting beer.
14. We chill about 6 beers at once, so the others are sitting out at basement temperatures. We've never done a big beer that requires aging.
We've never had an infection and our beer quality has risen a ton since we started doing all-grain, but we still get "yeasty" flavors. Our best beer yet is our currently bottled one, a kolsch. Maybe it's because kolsch have such a delicate flavor profile, but there is a definite "yeasty" flavor even in this one.
We order our kit so it arrives a few days before we're going to brew (normally from Jasper's Hombrew or ritebrew.com). We order all our grains pre-milled.
We brew in our garage on a Bayou Classic propane burner and a Bayou Classic 10 gallon pot /w a false bottom and a built in thermometer (highly recommend this pot).
1. Sanitize everything. We used to use One Step, but we recently got Starsan. We fill an old 5 gallon feta bucket with sanitizer water and keep all our equipment in there while we brew.
2. 15-20 minute protein rest @ ~125F, Sach rest @ ~155 for 60 minutes.
3. Batch sparge with 170F water into a 10 gallon igloo cooler (FWH if needed)
4. Clean the brew pot with the garden hose. We don't bother sanitizing because the next step is to boil.
5. 60 minute boil. Hop schedule accordingly. During the boil we begin rehydrating our dry yeast (usually US-05/04).
6. Wort chiller, while stirring. Drops the temperature to ~67F in ~10 minutes.
7. Decant boil into fermenter through 400 micro strainer to catch some trub. Thinking about getting a 300 micro strainer.
8. Pitch rehydrated yeast halfway through transferring the boil.
9. First 24-36 hour of fermentation is done in a chest freezer @ 58F. Increase the temeperature to 65F for the next week or so. Bring it up to 68F for the last couple days.
10. Add Gelatin and cold crash for 2-4 days.
11. Dry hop for 7-10 days for certain beers. Cold crash for another 24 hours.
12. Bottling day. Transfer to bottling bucket, careful to avoid disturbing the bottom of the fermenter. We clean our bottles with bleach and then rinse each bottle 3 times.
13. Store bottles for at least 3 weeks in 68F (generally with our next fermenting beer.
14. We chill about 6 beers at once, so the others are sitting out at basement temperatures. We've never done a big beer that requires aging.
We've never had an infection and our beer quality has risen a ton since we started doing all-grain, but we still get "yeasty" flavors. Our best beer yet is our currently bottled one, a kolsch. Maybe it's because kolsch have such a delicate flavor profile, but there is a definite "yeasty" flavor even in this one.
sputnam
Well-Known Member
hahaha, i call my beer deliciousness all the time - awesome.
btw, i was literally thinking just a few days ago that i thought there was something unique about my beer. I couldn't put my finger on it but i definitely felt there was a certain something. I chalked it up to the fact that it's MINE and I created it and I am proud of it. After reading this article I might be leaning towards my water. My water is good right out of the tap and maybe that's it, I don't know. But i do know that I used to spend $100/mth at the craft beer store but i haven't been there in 2 months and don't miss it a bit.
mascervesa
Well-Known Member
No mention of aeration after transferring the cooled wort to the fermenter. Yeast need oxygen to reproduce and without it you could get underpitching "off flavors" like diacetyl and others.
My beers got a lot "cleaner" when I started using nutrient, for what it's worth. I have very soft water, and calcium and a little magnesium seems to have made a difference too (those both affect yeast health, but don't go overboard, read up or get a water test, especially for magnesium).
One other area to look at. How are you storing your bottles while conditioning and chilling. They need to be upright so the yeast settles on the bottom of the bottle and make sure not to disturb the layer when pouring. Leave the last 1/4 inch in the bottle.
I have never had "homebrew flavors". Even my worst was pretty good, most are as good as commercial beers.
I have never had "homebrew flavors". Even my worst was pretty good, most are as good as commercial beers.
CastleHollow
Well-Known Member
For years I made very good beer using straight tap water. Turns out that water is very soft and like fearwig & ktblunden mention, my beers went to a whole 'nother level when I started paying attention to water chemistry. Your process and yeast management look good. I would check water.
Despite the fact that I'm not providing any helpful suggestions, I can say unequivocally that there is no "unavoidable homebrew taste".
Beerbeque
Well-Known Member
OP, It might just be you. Have a blind tasting with 2 or more friends, sampling a few of yours and a few comml beers. See if they can taste the homebrew taste. My friends can't tell the diff with my beers.
I'll share my experience.
I brewed using the basic Brewers Friend water calc for a number of years. I always had that weird "Homebrew" taste. I used tap water and RO water, nothing helped.
Once I started using Bru'n water, my beer quality shot up like crazy. I now make better beer (by my judgements) than at least 50% of commercial beers I try.
Along with the water issue, I started aerating better and using liquid yeast with a stir plate. My beer seriously has never been better, and is continuing to improve with polishing my system.
I brewed using the basic Brewers Friend water calc for a number of years. I always had that weird "Homebrew" taste. I used tap water and RO water, nothing helped.
Once I started using Bru'n water, my beer quality shot up like crazy. I now make better beer (by my judgements) than at least 50% of commercial beers I try.
Along with the water issue, I started aerating better and using liquid yeast with a stir plate. My beer seriously has never been better, and is continuing to improve with polishing my system.
No it is avoidable.... part of it is technique, part of it is equipment...
I have tasted a lot of "commercial nano" beer that tastes like crap compared to my homebrew... I do have a pretty over the top setup but I am still by law a "homebrewer" and honestly I'll bet I could do better even with less advanced equipment then what I use compared to some of these "pro" breweries.
I have tasted a lot of "commercial nano" beer that tastes like crap compared to my homebrew... I do have a pretty over the top setup but I am still by law a "homebrewer" and honestly I'll bet I could do better even with less advanced equipment then what I use compared to some of these "pro" breweries.
1. Save the bleach for the laundry. Sanitize your cleaned bottles with StarSan just before bottling time.
2. Increase your cold crash time to a week. Give the yeast a better chance to fully drop out. Do not let the beer warm up before priming and bottling. Be careful when moving the fermenter getting ready to rack to the bottling bucket. Sloshing up a bunch of trub is to be avoided. Don't stick the siphon down into the trub layer.
3. After bottle conditioning, give the beer at least a few days in the fridge before serving.
There is no unavoidable homebrew taste.
2. Increase your cold crash time to a week. Give the yeast a better chance to fully drop out. Do not let the beer warm up before priming and bottling. Be careful when moving the fermenter getting ready to rack to the bottling bucket. Sloshing up a bunch of trub is to be avoided. Don't stick the siphon down into the trub layer.
3. After bottle conditioning, give the beer at least a few days in the fridge before serving.
There is no unavoidable homebrew taste.
Also water chemistry and kegging are not mentioned. Water chemistry meaning predicting and getting mash ph correct plus kegging will greatly improve your beer.... nothing beats kegging... nothing. I don't care what anyone tells you... it will improve your final product, period.
fuelish
Well-Known Member
No....
I read the first page and then I jumped into the reply.
To answer your question, "is there an unavoidable home-brew taste?". Answer: NO
I used to ask myself this same question. I found the solution by experimenting on changing some parameters.
1) Your water. You want a certain level of minerals in your water, but you don't want chorine or choramines. Find a way to treat your water to remove these. I know what I found that worked for me, but I'll leave you to discover your own method. It isn't that I'm trying to by mysterious, it's simply that my method is a bit "unorthadox". I'll give you a hint: My 125 gallon Amazon biotope aquarium is awesome.
2) Temps. If the yeast says it works from 65F-75F then you should be sure the room temp is 65F min. Fermentations are warmer than the outside room temp. By at LEAST 5 degrees F. Usually the cooler the better. If you cannot control temps, find a yeast that works well at higher temps. I suggest Danstar dry Siason yeast. At moderate temps it tends to ferment very clean.
3) Age. Don't believe the instructions that tell you your beer is at its peek after 2 weeks of bottle conditioning. This isn't the case most of the time. You will find the best bottle of beer from any batch is the last one you drink. This is because it took that long to condition to its best. I never drink a beer that hasn't been in the bottle for at least 4 weeks min. More often 4 months. Good beer takes time. Don't rush things. Sure, you can drink it after 2 weeks. It has bubbles. But it isn't matured fully. Give it that extra time and you will be rewarded with a remarkably better beer.
4) Sanitation. I shouldn't need to elaborate on this. For the love of God, keep everything clean. If your beer is armwrestling you, you've done something wrong. If your beer is sitting on the couch holding the remote and asking you to move out, you really need to buy some Starsan and not worry about the foam.
To answer your question, "is there an unavoidable home-brew taste?". Answer: NO
I used to ask myself this same question. I found the solution by experimenting on changing some parameters.
1) Your water. You want a certain level of minerals in your water, but you don't want chorine or choramines. Find a way to treat your water to remove these. I know what I found that worked for me, but I'll leave you to discover your own method. It isn't that I'm trying to by mysterious, it's simply that my method is a bit "unorthadox". I'll give you a hint: My 125 gallon Amazon biotope aquarium is awesome.
2) Temps. If the yeast says it works from 65F-75F then you should be sure the room temp is 65F min. Fermentations are warmer than the outside room temp. By at LEAST 5 degrees F. Usually the cooler the better. If you cannot control temps, find a yeast that works well at higher temps. I suggest Danstar dry Siason yeast. At moderate temps it tends to ferment very clean.
3) Age. Don't believe the instructions that tell you your beer is at its peek after 2 weeks of bottle conditioning. This isn't the case most of the time. You will find the best bottle of beer from any batch is the last one you drink. This is because it took that long to condition to its best. I never drink a beer that hasn't been in the bottle for at least 4 weeks min. More often 4 months. Good beer takes time. Don't rush things. Sure, you can drink it after 2 weeks. It has bubbles. But it isn't matured fully. Give it that extra time and you will be rewarded with a remarkably better beer.
4) Sanitation. I shouldn't need to elaborate on this. For the love of God, keep everything clean. If your beer is armwrestling you, you've done something wrong. If your beer is sitting on the couch holding the remote and asking you to move out, you really need to buy some Starsan and not worry about the foam.
I used to make good beer with bleach, the common rinse phobia is unfounded, that's not generally how you get infections (and if you do get infections from your tap water, you need to stop drinking it). But you need to rinse the crap out of it. If you don't get every trace out, your beer will certainly "have that homebrew taste", whatever that is.
delarob
Well-Known Member
How big are your batches? Could be underpitching.
How old is the yeast?
How old is the yeast?
ArcaneXor
Well-Known Member
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Your yeast handling is suboptimal. Pitching at 76 degrees and then chilling the wort to 58 stresses the yeast tremendously. Drop the temperature to 62 degrees first, then pitch the yeast. Going any lower for these strains is not a good idea. You could with 001 or 1056, but US-05 gets estery when fermented very cold.
US-05 doesn't flocculate as well as its liquid equivalents. Add another week or so to the primary at 68+ degrees to help it along.
Isinglass is a little more potent than gelatin.
Try "crashing" more gently. Try lowering the temperature gradually over a few days. That way, you still get a good settling-out of the yeast, but it remains minimally metabolically active for longer, meaning it'll continue to clean up after itself for a while.
Get rid of the bleach.
US-05 doesn't flocculate as well as its liquid equivalents. Add another week or so to the primary at 68+ degrees to help it along.
Isinglass is a little more potent than gelatin.
Try "crashing" more gently. Try lowering the temperature gradually over a few days. That way, you still get a good settling-out of the yeast, but it remains minimally metabolically active for longer, meaning it'll continue to clean up after itself for a while.
Get rid of the bleach.
I don't personally have a phobia but before I began brewing I read about off flavors and one of them was the result of bleach. There are so many variables that could result in my beer having off flavors, in the beginning I felt if I could control just one then I would. Ergo, I never used bleach.
While PBW isn't "cheap" and there are DIY recipes out there, I will spend the money on PBW and Star San as I feel having clean equipment that is also sanitized is mission critical. Again, so many things can go wrong with brewing, I am just trying to take away some of the ways those things can go wrong.
With the OP, I feel he has outlined a good process and now I think it's time to experiment with water. Perhaps a gallon brew using his water he uses now and one using something else. Hard to say what something else is without knowing what he uses, but I assume we'll find out soon enough. I love this hobby and to think someone is always feeling their brew is bad sucks.
Except for my mash lauter tun, brew pot, fermentation buckets/carboys, and bottling bucket (the big stuff) - I just put it all into my dish washer on a sanitize cycle. When I bottle, I bottle in the kitchen next to the dish washer and pull the bottles directly from the washer as I go.
I use tap water, but the tap water where I live is very decent. I've never tested it but I have several friends that live near me using the same tap water. No one has had any issues. Maybe we're just lucky.
I feel that I'm pretty lax on sanitizing. As mentioned, I put as much as I can into the dish washer on a sanitize cycle. Otherwise I just use a sponge and water to wipe everything down, then follow up with StarSan when I'm done. I use StarSan again right before I use the equipment.
The cleaning up part of brewing has always been my least favorite part. So I've tried to simplify it as much as possible. Cleaning carboys have always been the worst for me, so I've mostly switched to buckets.
I use tap water, but the tap water where I live is very decent. I've never tested it but I have several friends that live near me using the same tap water. No one has had any issues. Maybe we're just lucky.
I feel that I'm pretty lax on sanitizing. As mentioned, I put as much as I can into the dish washer on a sanitize cycle. Otherwise I just use a sponge and water to wipe everything down, then follow up with StarSan when I'm done. I use StarSan again right before I use the equipment.
The cleaning up part of brewing has always been my least favorite part. So I've tried to simplify it as much as possible. Cleaning carboys have always been the worst for me, so I've mostly switched to buckets.
thegreatmaibockaddict
Well-Known Member
I would like to suggest switching from dry yeast to liquid, and doing a starter. or even try doing a starter with the dry yeast a couple days prior (thus turning it into liquid yeast).
Stop with the nonsense about bleach. Been using it for 20 years. It is the best way to sanitize bottles, and remove residual gunk from both bottles and carboys. A bottle washer rinses all the chlorine out of the bottle, and hot water is assumed to be sanitary because it is.
Stop with the nonsense about bleach. Been using it for 20 years. It is the best way to sanitize bottles, and remove residual gunk from both bottles and carboys. A bottle washer rinses all the chlorine out of the bottle, and hot water is assumed to be sanitary because it is.
thegreatmaibockaddict
Well-Known Member
And to get rid of homebrew taste, practice practice practice...
Clonefan94
Senior Member
I have to agree with those here who say that "Homebrew Taste" is bad practices somewhere in the brewing process. I had it early on with my first couple of beers, then improved my fermentation and water situation. I can tell you I don't consider myself a "great" or precise brewer. I don't meddle with water chemistry all that much, all though I'm lucky in the fact that if I get the chlorine out, it's good water to work with. The only time I mess with it much is if I'm doing a really dark beer. Then I just make sure the ph is good. I don't have any fancy fermentation chamber, basically a soft sided cooler, a bottle of ice and a towel to wrap it all up in.
All that being said, I have done side by side tests with commercial beers. Not to determine if mine were better, but we each had flights of 6 beers, 3 commercial versions of the style and 3 that I brewed. I will actually exclude my findings, because even with my friends pouring while I was out of the room. I still knew which beers were mine because I had previously sampled them. My friends though could not tell which were homebrew and which were commercial versions.
I recently brewed a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and Zombie Dust clones. Over memorial weekend I will be doing another blind test to see if we can tell any difference via "homebrew taste" with their direct commercial counterparts.
I'm not saying any of this to brag. I don't have any medals, I've never entered a contest and don't plan to. My beers may be mediocre at best as far as the styles go, but they definitely don't have a taste to them that triggers in people, "Oh this is a homebrew." Especially if you are brewing all grain, the process is literally no different than it would be on a commercial scale. You just have to take the care to figure out what is causing the off flavors and take steps to remove them. I still believe most of what people perceive as "homebrew taste" is from fermentation. It's easy to stress yeast. Without jacketed, temperature controlled fermentors like the commercial breweries have, it takes a lot of care to get your beer to ferment just right. I'm sure there are other causes as well, but I still thing for most people, getting a handle on fermentation is the key to getting a "clean" beer.
All that being said, I have done side by side tests with commercial beers. Not to determine if mine were better, but we each had flights of 6 beers, 3 commercial versions of the style and 3 that I brewed. I will actually exclude my findings, because even with my friends pouring while I was out of the room. I still knew which beers were mine because I had previously sampled them. My friends though could not tell which were homebrew and which were commercial versions.
I recently brewed a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and Zombie Dust clones. Over memorial weekend I will be doing another blind test to see if we can tell any difference via "homebrew taste" with their direct commercial counterparts.
I'm not saying any of this to brag. I don't have any medals, I've never entered a contest and don't plan to. My beers may be mediocre at best as far as the styles go, but they definitely don't have a taste to them that triggers in people, "Oh this is a homebrew." Especially if you are brewing all grain, the process is literally no different than it would be on a commercial scale. You just have to take the care to figure out what is causing the off flavors and take steps to remove them. I still believe most of what people perceive as "homebrew taste" is from fermentation. It's easy to stress yeast. Without jacketed, temperature controlled fermentors like the commercial breweries have, it takes a lot of care to get your beer to ferment just right. I'm sure there are other causes as well, but I still thing for most people, getting a handle on fermentation is the key to getting a "clean" beer.
V1king
Well-Known Member
I most often taste that yeasty "homebrew" taste from bottle conditioned beers. Especially beer styles that would not normally be bottle conditioned by commercial outfits. Try kegging. You will notice a difference.
Hi all! Thanks for the replies, I'll try to answer everything I've gathered from the questions.
1. What water do we use / chemistry.
Probably our issue, honestly. We just use our tap water, because 10 gallons of distilled water was getting expensive and obnoxious. The same taste has persisted across the distilled vs tap water, so maybe it's not the issue. When we switched to tap water, strangely our beer improved. How does one go about getting a water profile done?
2. Bottling vs kegging.
Not a day after I posted this one of my brew buddies surprised me in sayinghe bought a keg setup, so we'll be kegging our American Wheat this week, hopefully! We've always filtered well when we bottle and have been very careful when bottling. We can usually drain the entire bottle without seeing and sediment. Something I'm very proud of.
3. Bleach vs Starsan
we did just get 32 oz of starsan, so it should last us a while, but I'm not phased by the bleach phobia that some people have. Triple rinsing is even probably overkill. No bleach smell, no problem. We use starsan / one step when we have it, but I'm not about a good pour of bleach.
1. What water do we use / chemistry.
Probably our issue, honestly. We just use our tap water, because 10 gallons of distilled water was getting expensive and obnoxious. The same taste has persisted across the distilled vs tap water, so maybe it's not the issue. When we switched to tap water, strangely our beer improved. How does one go about getting a water profile done?
2. Bottling vs kegging.
Not a day after I posted this one of my brew buddies surprised me in sayinghe bought a keg setup, so we'll be kegging our American Wheat this week, hopefully! We've always filtered well when we bottle and have been very careful when bottling. We can usually drain the entire bottle without seeing and sediment. Something I'm very proud of.
3. Bleach vs Starsan
we did just get 32 oz of starsan, so it should last us a while, but I'm not phased by the bleach phobia that some people have. Triple rinsing is even probably overkill. No bleach smell, no problem. We use starsan / one step when we have it, but I'm not about a good pour of bleach.
Your answers bring more questions to mind, along with a few answers!
1. Ward Lab will do a water profile called "household minerals test" for $26 that has everything brewer's need. If you have chlorine or chloramines, they don't test for that so ask your water provider.
2. How did you "filter well" before bottling? This is actually what made me think twice, as perhaps you are oxidizing at that point and that is where the off flavor is coming from.
3. I'd suggest not being so laconic about bleach- it really does ruin a beer with something called "chlorophenols" in as little as parts per billion (not parts per million!) so it's not that easy to get rid of it. I have occasionally bleached some buckets, but rinsed so well that there is no hint of bleach smell left although it's not recommended. Oxyclean is great for cleaning, and star-san for sanitizing, and keeping bleach far away is a better idea.
1. Ward Lab will do a water profile called "household minerals test" for $26 that has everything brewer's need. If you have chlorine or chloramines, they don't test for that so ask your water provider.
2. How did you "filter well" before bottling? This is actually what made me think twice, as perhaps you are oxidizing at that point and that is where the off flavor is coming from.
3. I'd suggest not being so laconic about bleach- it really does ruin a beer with something called "chlorophenols" in as little as parts per billion (not parts per million!) so it's not that easy to get rid of it. I have occasionally bleached some buckets, but rinsed so well that there is no hint of bleach smell left although it's not recommended. Oxyclean is great for cleaning, and star-san for sanitizing, and keeping bleach far away is a better idea.
+5 on the yeast handling suggestion.
This is the only thing in your process that sticks out to me. I can't think of a single yeast strain I'd start at 58F. My idea of pitching cold would be pitching at 65 and then "ramping" up to 67, then letting it rise to 70 toward the end, but even then I generally save myself the annoyance and just pitch at 67 for something like 001/US05. You're not doing a single thing to help your yeast out by starting them that cold. Try pitching at 67 or whatever your target fermentation temp is, and see if that doesn't help anything.
Aside from that, you could always move to liquid yeast and begin ideally making starters. Yes, you can make good beer with rehydrated dry yeast. But you won't make "better" beer than you will with healthy, virile yeast chugging away in a yeast starter. Perhaps you don't have access to liquid yeast? In which case I would again recommend NOT pitching at 58F and holding it there for as long as 36 hours.
jrgtr42
Well-Known Member
THere's only a few things I see.
As others have mentioned, you may want to rethink the bleach part. Use the Starsan for your bottles too. I used to use bleach also, but when I started with starsan, the beer got better. Admittedly I changed a lot of things at about that time, so I can't say how much was what.
The other things are mostly yeast handling. First, I personally recommend a starter, even with dry yeast. A simple one of a cup of DME into a quart of water, boil about 15 minutes with a dash of nutrient in there, cool to about 70 degrees pitch, I use an old growler (clean and sanitized, of course) with no problem. I shake it when I walk past. A couple days ahead of time. let grow for a day or 2, cold crash, decant and pitch.
Also, pitch temps. Get your wort down to about mid 60s, before pitching. Start the fermentation a bit higher than you do, low to mid 60s, and hold it there.
You also don't say how long your fermentations are. I don't bother with secondary, cold crash or any of that, and still end up with nice, clear beer.
I leave the beer in primary for about 2 and a half weeks before thinking about popping the top to check gravity. It's normally 3 weeks and I can bottle, though I don't worry if it's another week.
Hi all, again thanks for all the replies. Another round of answers:
@Yooper: Thanks for the water info, I'll do that soon! As for "filtering well" we use steralized cheese-cloth at the end of the racking cane to keep the large particulate out, as well as bottle cold after the cold creash (technically not filtering I guess). As for the bleach, we only bleach glass and I the amount we rinse has never caused an issue. We have star-san and oxiclean, which we use when we're not in a pinch, so it's almost a null issue.
@Everyone mentioning the 76, I apologize, that's a typo. I mean't to type ~67. That should clear some stuff up!
@The beerist: Yeah, it's a rough estimation to account for the possibility of ~10 degree differences inside the fermenter due to active fermentation. I taped the thermometer to the side as some suggested and it jumped up ~4C, so I'm regulating it that way with only a 5 degree "safe zone" now
@Yooper: Thanks for the water info, I'll do that soon! As for "filtering well" we use steralized cheese-cloth at the end of the racking cane to keep the large particulate out, as well as bottle cold after the cold creash (technically not filtering I guess). As for the bleach, we only bleach glass and I the amount we rinse has never caused an issue. We have star-san and oxiclean, which we use when we're not in a pinch, so it's almost a null issue.
@Everyone mentioning the 76, I apologize, that's a typo. I mean't to type ~67. That should clear some stuff up!
@The beerist: Yeah, it's a rough estimation to account for the possibility of ~10 degree differences inside the fermenter due to active fermentation. I taped the thermometer to the side as some suggested and it jumped up ~4C, so I'm regulating it that way with only a 5 degree "safe zone" now
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