No more Maltodextrine for me

I brewed up a Dunkelweizen kit from BB that had a pound of the stuff in it.

This is the first beer I ever made that I nearly poured out. After aging and carbonating in the keg, I took this on vacation for everyone to enjoy. It's sickeningly sweet and tastes flat even after carbing. We tried our best all week to kick the keg, but just couldn't do it. When I came home, I filled 4 growlers with the remaining beer and gave it away for cooking purposes.

I will never use Maltodextrine again. Do not like the stuff. I'm still trying to figure out wtf Brewers Best was thinking putting a pound of it in the kit.

Come to think of it, the few BB kits I have made were all mehhh at best.

Why would you think maltodextrin makes flat beer?

My first and only kit was a BB APA and it turned out fairly well considering it was my first batch.

If all the kids you're brewing are "meh," maybe it's time to design your own recipes. How bout attempting to make a similar beer to the one you just made, but with what you would deem a more appropriate amount of malto dextrine?

It doesn't make it flat. This just tasted that way. There are better ways to aid in mouth feel than using Malto. A pound of 95% unfermentable sugar is not the way to go about it IMO.

Not all kits, just the BB kits are "meh". But I don't brew kits very often....at least not since I started years ago. I picked this one up on a whim.

Maltodextrine is simply to add some nonfermentables to a beer to increase it's body, it has nothing to do with carbonation, nor should it render your beer "sickenly sweet."

It's quite common in brewing. It's even mixed with priming sugar and sold as heading powder.

I think your issues are coming from somewhere else other than the maltodextrine.

Like? A pound of this seems like an awful lot for a Dunkel.

I've brewed only 2 beers ever with Malto. both this year, this Dunkel and a Pumpkin Ale. The pumpkin is still in the bottle after 10+ weeks, little carbonation and has the same sweetness. The only thing saving that batch is it's a more malty recipe and the pie spices are helping balance it out. Both beers finished rather high and would not go to the appropriate FG. The only common denominator I see is the use of a full lb. of Malto. The pumpkin was a recipe from this database.

My first batch was the BB Porter kit. It came with a pound of MD, but the recipe only called for half that.

Are you sure you were supposed to put the whole bag in? My guess - BB is "lazy", just throws the 1lb bag in whether you need all of it or not.

Good question, I don't have the instructions anymore to confirm.

EDIT: Just looked it up http://www.brewersbestkits.com/pdf/1029 Dunkelweizen.pdf yep, step 4 says add all the included LME and Malto....the full pound.

All brewer's Best instructions and recipes are available on the LD carlson website.

Here's the sheet for the Dunkle

Yes it does say a pound.

I have had good results with the BB kits.... However I have not used any of the kits that had the md with them so I can't vouch for those.

I agree with Revvy that MD is mostly not the reason for your problems. First, it doesn't cause flat beer or a flat beer feel that I can think of. Also, dextrin is not sweet at all. Try an experiment, dump 1lb of dextrin in 5gals of water (or 1/2 TBS into 1 cup of water), mix well and taste it. I think you will have a hard time picking up any sweetness at all.
From what you are saying, a very sweet beer and also flat, looks to me that you have a yeast issue. Perhaps your yeast died before fermentation was completed leaving lots of sugars behind and not been able to promote carbonation later.

It doesn't cause flat beer. I popped a top of my first batch which called for malto in the boil -- had a thunderous, three-finger head only a week after bottling. Surely can't be the malto....

Nilo....that might be worth looking into for the cause. But....in the case of the Dunkel, I washed that yeast and used it in a successful batch of Heffe that I just kegged this weekend. Hit FG perfectly, so the yeast could not be dead correct?

smalliewader said:

Nilo....that might be worth looking into for the cause. But....in the case of the Dunkel, I washed that yeast and used it in a successful batch of Heffe that I just kegged this weekend. Hit FG perfectly, so the yeast could not be dead correct?

Click to expand...

Hum, interesting. That is another piece of info you need to add to your investigation on what happened, just move your focus away from the MD.

Maybe it's something with your carbing process? How much yeast is left in the beer when u bottle it?

In the case of the Pumpkin, there is a normal layer of yeast at the bottom of the bottles. As for the Dunkel, it was my first keg and there was a good looking amount of yeast left in the keg when I cleaned it after emptying. In fact, the final growler I filled pulled lots of yeast from around the pick up tube. Neither looks to have any less yeast than any other batch I have ever done. The Dunkel was kegged after 4 weeks in primary, so there still should have been plenty of yeast in suspension, just like usual.

The Pumpkin (US-05) froze at 1.030 and even after pitching more US-05 never dropped.
The Dunkel (Danstar Munich) stuck at 1.020, didn't re-pitch though. I chocked both up to unfermentables (MD). These are the only two batches in all my years that have not hit the proper FG and both had the only MD I have used.

Maybe you dont like Dunkel and/or its just not fully carbed? Weizens do require a good meausure of carbonation to balance out the sweet/maltiness.
As stated malto isn't sweet like other sugars, and it certainly wont prevent a beer from carbonating provided the simpler sugars are there for the yeast to consume.

Malto will increase the final gravity as they are unfermentable sugars, so more malto = higher OG/FG.

Actually, I love Dunkel...all variations of wheats are my faves and what I brew the most of.

Still think something else is responsible... 1lb of malto-dextrine in 5gal is only responsible for <9 gravity points, and as stated before, it doesn't actually *taste* sweet.

Maybe it's just a fluke?

Did you boil the dextrin with the wort, added to primary or just before kegging?
Assuming you boilled it and as stated above (9 point in 5 gals), your "real" FG would have been 1.011 without the dextrin, not that high.

Boiled in the wort, 60 minutes, both times.

From he kits I've done, the malto is added the last 15 minutes. Maybe start doing that instead? But I'm thinking that isn't the real issue...

Maltodextrin's sweetness can vary a great deal, about a factor of 4. That doesn't take into consideration different people's perception either.

The nice thing about MD, you can add it any time during the boil or fermentation. You can even add it after the fermentation has completed. If you ever get another kit with MD in it, hold off on adding it until the fermentation is done and then add it in stages tasting in between.

My BB Dunkel is still bottle carbing, but I popped one last week after a week of being in the bottle and had a 3 finger head. It def wasn't sickeningly sweet either - at least for my taste

As many people have said, maltodextrin shouldn't cause the issues you are experiencing, but if you are looking for alternatives, wheat malts, pale crystal malts and carafoam will each either increase head retention, body (i.e. non-fermentable dextrins) or both.

Maybe LD Carlson sent you a lb of Lactose that was labeled Maltodextrin? I wouldn't expect that from such a large company but I have used Maltodextrin quite often and usually in 1 lb increments and it has never really added any bit of sweetness. Lactose on the other hand...