Amber Lager Tastes very Hoppy

Hello all.

I just brewed my first homebrew and its a spring lager, which was described as an amber lager. I had to improvise the boiling of my sub5 gallon wort in several different pots and it was difficult to figure out how to distribute the hops, which I am going to to ahead and say did not go well. I also did not strain the hops before putting the wort into the carboy. I later strained them, but still some hops remained (im guessing its impossible to get all ofthe hops out). I just went to test my first beer and in addition to it possibly being overcarbonated it tastes way too hoppy. The good news I guess is that this was the only bottle I saw that had a substantial amount of hop residue still in it. Could I have done anything else wrong? Also, why would the beer have overcarbonated?

hmm, sounds like a few things went sideways here. reminds me of my first batch!

- what was the recipe? it might just be too hoppy for your tastes. alot of homebrew recipes are real high in hops simply because most homebrewers love a hoppy beer.

- what kind of "too hoppy" do you mean? excessively bitter/harsh with cooked vegetal flavor? a bright grassy lawn-clippings flavor?

- how did you cool the beer? i used to cool my kettle down in an "ice bath" that didn't have any ice in it, just slowly running water... which gave me more bitterness and less aroma.

- if it's over-carbed there's 2 main causes: either too much priming sugar was used for the amount of beer, or the beer wasn't done fermenting on bottling day. Due to the hop residue in the bottle (and the fact that it's a lager, those take 2-3 times longer to ferment than ales), i'm going to guess the latter... so keep an eye out for bottle-bombs in the next week or 2 here.


FWIW, lagers are much much much more difficult than ales... doing one for your first batch is pretty balsy. I hope it's still drinkable!

I bought the ingredients from this place called the brooklyn brew shop and I bought there spring lager. Which uses lager yeast that is supposed to ferment at ale temperatures. Here is recipe: http://brooklynbrewshop.com/directions/Brooklyn Brew Shop - Spring Lager Instructions 5 Gal.pdf
I cooled it in an ice bath that did have ice in it. The best way to describe the hoppiness is that it tastes exactly like the pellets themselves. So it has a little grassy-lawn clippings flavor. I generally like hoppy, but the hops aren't just adding bitterness here its kind of taking over. Thanks for the help!

Don't worry about transferring hop material to the carboy, it won't hurt anything and will settle out over time. How long did it ferment and at what temperature? Did you take gravity readings before fermentation and at bottling?

I brewed an amber ale that I thought was too hoppy.

How long has it been in bottle?

Give it at least 4 weeks, then try it. At four weeks, mine started to get GOOD.

It's been in the bottle for two weeks now. And I neglected gravity readings in the beginning so I didn't take them in the end either. I'm sure those readings would have helped with actually controlling this process more. I sort of just went by the timeline given to me in the instructions. Thanks again!

Also, I opened the second bottle and it tasted better and did not all turn into foam and taste too bitter until after the first swig. Then once i transferred the beer from a bottle to a glass it stopped turning into foam.

I think it is possible that I added too much honey. I added a full cup, which was the amount needed for 5gallons, but I think I actually had less. I'm guessing around 4 gallons. If this is the case, is there anything i can do about this?