NordeastBrewer77

Recipes 

is it the 'twang'? are you boiling LME for too long? happens a lot with all extract beers. try adding the bulk of the LME late, better yet at flameout and steep for ten mins before cooling.

__________________
The Polk Street Brewery
Brew Blog
Primary: Honey Weizen (a ,Midwest kit), Columbus IPA
Secondary: No. 3 Burton, RIS
Bottled: Simcoe IPA, Northern English Brown
Kegged: German Alt, Octane IPA

Give a man beer and his thirst is quenched. Teach a man to brew and it will never be again.

TriggerFingers

Recipes 

+1 on bottled water (Drinking or Spring). Its usually like $.69 - $1.00 per gallon (cheaper if you have your sanitized 5 gallon jug and one of those water stations at the grocery store (like $.30 per gallon). Good water gives you the opportunity to make good beer.

unionrdr

Recipes 

__________________
Everything works if ya let it-Roady(meatloaf)

barkscruff

Recipes 

Okay - So I brewed my Sweet Stout from NB last week and made a bunch of changes. After tasting some of my older beers I think the "off taste" is astringency...I read some good descriptions and it seems that my beer tastes either astringent or twangy.

I am curious if I am steeping too long or hot...I always follow the instructions and steep for 20 minutes of 170 degrees. Does anyone have any suggestions on a better method? Should I steep for a shorter time at a lower temp? Also, I have read alot on adding all or 1/2 of the extract late. The SS recipe called for 1/2 of the extract to go in at boil and the 2nd 1/2 with 15 minutes left. I wonder what the result would be if I steeped the grains, and removed bag, and boiled for 60 minutes with the hop additions, and then added the full bottle of extract w/ 15 minutes left?

barkscruff

Recipes 

Sorry - I didn't see the 2nd page of responses before I wrote mine...NordeastBrewer77, you nailed my previous post. I think the issue really is the length and or temp of my boils. I am going to test my thermometer and perhaps get a new one...I am also going to test adding 75% or even more of my syrup at flameout.

Question - Why do all the recipes call for the syrup to go in for the full 60 if it's not really needed?

Bsquared

Recipes 

Astringency is not really a flavor, it is more of a mouth feel component, If you want to see what astringency is, drink some ice tea. There is a sensation of drying the coats your entire mouth, that is what astringency from tanins tastes like. Tanins are mainly extracted because the pH of the water you are sparging has become too high, the temperature of the water will not enhance your tanin extraction by much.

I did not realize you where parcial mashing. are you squeezing your bag to drain it?

NordeastBrewer77

Recipes 

the length of time you boil LME can really affect the flavor (and fermentability) of the beer. the late or flameout LME addition will really help with this, it made a vast improvement in my extract and PM brews when i started doing it.
i also noticed in your first post today that you're doing your steep at 170, that could be a touch warm, i always do my steep at 150-155, almost like it's a mini mash. 168-170 is the temp i shoot for to sparge an AG or PM batch because it's warm enough to stop conversion, but not quite warm enough to extract tannins (astringency), over 170 and some tannins may be extracted from the steep.

to answer your question, even if a recipe calls for all the LME at the beginning, i'd go half at the beginning, half at flameout. i personally don't like using LME in the boil at all, and use DME for the early addition and LME at flameout. you can adjust any recipe to suit your process. if it calls for some or all the LME early, replace that early add with DME, and use LME at flameout. generally speaking, 1 lb of base malt=.75 lb LME=.65 lb DME, that simple 'equation' can really help when deciding to brew someone else's recipe on your system. it's also great for converting AG recipes to extract, or like i've done with my last two beers, converting an extract recipe to AG.

__________________
The Polk Street Brewery
Brew Blog
Primary: Honey Weizen (a ,Midwest kit), Columbus IPA
Secondary: No. 3 Burton, RIS
Bottled: Simcoe IPA, Northern English Brown
Kegged: German Alt, Octane IPA

Give a man beer and his thirst is quenched. Teach a man to brew and it will never be again.