Beer tastes stale even when fresh. Why?

Unless I brew something darkish or a very hoppy ipa, almost every one of my beers end up having the same exact stale taste from the moment it finishes fermenting until it is gone. The beers generally taste good, but instead of that nice full bodied backbone, they seem to have this one taste that reminds me of a BMC type taste. The most recent batch that exhibits this flavor is a pale ale that ended up at 1.010 (was aiming for 1.015, but got 82% attenuation from wlp005).

I've done all grain for about 3 years, use a charcoal filter for water, then phosphoric acid in mash to hit 5.5 room temp pH in gatorade cooler, batch sparge, full boil (although not very rolling due to weak apartment stove), use whirfloc and yeast nutrient, counterflow into a carboy, oxygenate, add stir-plated yeast starter, temperature controlled fermentation for 10 days, then another 10 days dry hop, no secondary.

I would think oxygenation, but the taste is there immediately, and there is only one transfer from the carboy to co2 filled keg, through the dip tube, no bubbles in the line.

I can not figure it out. Any ideas where this taste could be coming from?

charcoal filters don't remove chloramine from your tap water...and most cities use chloramine instead of chlorine. Bind the chloramines with campden tabs for 5 minutes before you start brew day.

Oxygenation...do you decant the starter? since you have a stir plate your yeast starter is essentially very oxidized beer, thus most recommend crash cooling and decanting the funky wort and only pitching the yeast cake.

Thanks for taking a stab...

I used to use campden tablets on all my previous batches for chlorine, (no chloramines in my water). Then I got the charcoal filter which I used this last time with the same stale result.

I also decant my starters.

What do you sanitize with?

Can you describe the taste a little bit more? You say stale at one point and BMC at another. I've not had a BMC that tastes stale...bad yes...but not stale. What do you mean when you say it tastes like BMC?

I clean with oxiclean and sanitize with starsan.

I guess the taste reminds me of how a cup of BMC that has been sitting out for a day smells. I guess the best analogy is that it tastes like beer that came out of unclean taps.

I usually go straight from one beer being on tap, to running some starsan through the taps, to putting the next beer on tap. I also switched tap lines like 6 months ago, and the taste is the same as before I changed the tap lines.

It is just a faint taste, and it is more of the aftertaste, but it is always there.

How fresh/old is your grain?

I get my gain from brewmaster's warehouse, crushed, and usually use within a week of it arriving.

Ok, so that's probably out. Ever tried bottling a batch to see if its somewhere in the kegging system?

The only batch I've bottled recently is a quad, but that was so dark and full of flavor, no way you'd taste anything.

I did bottle a Belgian IPA about a year ago, and now that I think about it, I don't think it has much of a stale taste. But it was also 8.5%, hoppy with a good amount of belgian yeast character, might have hid it.

Also, the taste is so immediate after kegging (i've pulled a sample almost everyday since I hooked it up to co2), seems like it would be hard to pick up the flavor so quickly, but possible.

I did not notice the flavor in hydro sample I tasted before kegging though, so maybe it could be the lines... I'll definitely try replacing those as a cheap option.

Good idea, thanks.

If I had to make an educated guess, I'd say you are likely getting a bit of DMS due the lack of a good, strong boil, which is resulting in the stale off-flavor.

Yea, that sounds reasonable to me too. I think I'll try splitting my next batch into 2 pots for the boil and see if that helps.

LLBeanJ said:

If I had to make an educated guess, I'd say you are likely getting a bit of DMS due the lack of a good, strong boil, which is resulting in the stale off-flavor.

Click to expand...

That was my guess. Everything else seems to pass inspection. That would explain the similarity to BMC as well - not saying they have DMS in their beer, but I think there are flavors that one could compare to DMS.

Does your fermenter sit in a well lit location?

Cheers!

Are you using softened water?

I ferment in a better bottle, in a temperature controlled mini-fridge.

My water is not soft. It starts out at: Calcium 35, Magnesium 12, Sodium 9, Chloride 15, Sulfate 27, Alkalinity 101, pH 7.7.

For the current pale ale I described, I added a little gypsum, calcium chloride, and phosphoric acid to get to: Calcium 83, Magnesium 12, Sodium 9, Chloride 47, Sulfate 101, Alkalinity ~0 (I think), pH 5.5 (room temp mash pH).

Are you tasting 'cidery' flavors maybe? Acetyaldehyde from stressed yeast/underpitching?

I don't think that is the taste. I also use a stir plate and follow the pitching rates from mrmalty.com.

I'm so glad I found this thread. I have an american wheat that has been bottled a little over 2 months and it has a pronounced coors original taste, figured it was something that would mellow over time but on seeing this thread it has to be what you're experiencing. I had missed my sparge volume and tried to control my boil off by partially covering the BK.

Lesson learned, just ones more reason I love this forum.

LLBeanJ said:

If I had to make an educated guess, I'd say you are likely getting a bit of DMS due the lack of a good, strong boil, which is resulting in the stale off-flavor.

Click to expand...

Bingo