themack22

Recipes 

My bad! I live in NC, far away from K-ZOO and we have this beer on tap at every bar. I assumed it was like that everywhere.

I wish I was experimenting. Been doing it for a year and only had a few that were some what drinkable.

I hear ya. The one on the left is a classic pale ale color, the right seems like an Octoberfest. IMO

themack22

Recipes 

Sorry for the freakout. I am just at my wits end with homebrewing. I feel like I know everything about the basics of the extract process. My fianceé and friends will vouch for how much I have read about homebrewing over the past year. I know I am not supposed to be a pro by now, and maybe I am just a snob, but how hard is it to make a decent beer?

My fianceé clearly saw I was depressed, asked me about it, kissed my cheek and left me here on the computer.

Dudes...why is this happening?!?

neosapien

Recipes 

because you have high expectations. this is not a bad thing

i felt that way after my first infection (after previous 2 were "meh" beers at best). take it down a notch, do a nice simple single infusion SMaSH brew?

that's what i did. the beer that came out of that one was decent enough to raise my spirits about things.

Effingbeer

Recipes 

My guess is the dry hop. Most kits give generic instructions. Seems you have a classic case of hop aroma an flavor dropping out with the remaining yeast. Hop oils stick to yeasties and other bugs, thats what gives them their preservative qualities. I personally will rack it, wait for it to clear. Then the last 5-ish days just prior to bottling do the dry hop. I taste on day 5, if the profile is where I want it, bottle. After 5-7 days, in the carboy, hops start to fall off. Keep in mind that Bells sells a ton of this beer. Even in NC what you get is probably a month old at most. If you could keep a bottle for a few months, it will probly lack the pizzazz we all love.

themack22

Recipes 

I hope so. I'd for an accomplised homebrewer come in and say "that's not too bad for a year of practice" or tell me "Oh, that tastes like you did x, y and z wrong."

themack22

Recipes 

Word.

So what's the deal with the color? Clearly the darker one is way off.

jonmohno

Recipes 

So what temp? What yeast? Do you note everything? You really need more to tell, thats what may be lacking to help you. I mean your drinking them before they are even carbed? conditioned too? Serious lack of information here. Do you hydrate,aerate,refrigerate,contemplate?Maybe just your water.

themack22

Recipes 

Let's talk about the first one.

OG: 1.068
FG: 1.018

10/14 - brew day
10/20 - rack to secondary, dry hop
10/21 - 1.018
10/30 - beer tastes good
10/31 - beer has taken a less hop flavor and is more sweet

It's been at a good temp. High 60's, but closer to 70. There have been a few nights where it may have gotten down to the low 60's, but that was after the first few days of violent fermentation.

Definitely tasting them before they are carbed. They were flat, but damn delicious. Something has gone awry in the past 2 days.

Effingbeer

Recipes 

Color is heavily tied to the boil and evaporation. Your boil does not need to be ridiculous. Just good movement from the bottom to the top. A lot of folks, including myself will try to move some of the extract toward the end of boil, if possible. With kits, I usually add LME at the beginning and DME at the end. All you gotta do is get the DME dissolved at those temps for a few minutes to sanitize it. This should help lower the "carmelization" effect and give you lighter color.
Like one post said, your pics may be the same color, when the light colored yeast falls out, it looks darker.

bd2xu

Recipes 

Hard to say on the color, was there any scorching in your pot? I've started brewing fairly recently (July) but the hobby has already become a sickness. I've got 9 batches under my belt and the last two all grain. A few things to consider to really improve your beer.

1. Full wort boil

2. Ferm temp. This is critical. Measure the temp of the wort by the tape strip thermo. I use a deep freeze with a controller and tape the thermostat to the bucket and type a towel over it to insulate. This works great, I can keep the temp of the bucket in the mid 60s while the air in the freezer could be 8 degrees lower. Really shows the exothermic process of fermentation. If no freezer or fridge use a swamp cooler, plenty of info on this site on them. My first two batches were IPA and rye pale ale, and I fermented in the basement at 72. But now I realize the temp in the primary was prob closer to 80 during the main fermentation... Too hot!!

3. Excellent sanitation. I switched to star San and I think it is so much better because you don't have to rinse or dry and only takes 39 secs. I keep a spray bottle of it handy.

4. Wort chiller to chill down quickly after the boil.
5. Good aeration. I just shake the bucket but will prob upgrade to o2 soon.
6. Yeast starter if using liquid. Follow calcs on yeastcalc.com.

These have all made HUGE diff from my first two batches where I just bought the kit and followed the instructions.

Last one is patience. Follow you procedures and have faith. I rarely even taste my beer until bottle time and usually don't test gravity until about three weeks in the fermenter. I also have started skipping the secondary stage for most beers and even dry hopping in the primary. My next big step is kegging and from what I've read dry hopping in the keg is an awesome way to get that aroma and taste for us hopheads!

__________________
On Deck: A Saison, maybe the Ginger one in BYO last month
Primary: Centennial Blonde
Secondary:
Carbing/Conditioning: Bellvada Pale Ale
On Tap: Boulevard Tank 7 Clone, Extra Pale Ale, Coffee Oatmeal Stout
Bottled: Pumpkin Spice Porter, La Fin Du Monde Clone, Black IPA, Extra Pale Ale


“Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”
― Benjamin Franklin