"Homebrew" taste

I have two friends that homebrew and I homebrew too. Each of the beers we've brewed taste sweet - what I've come to know as homebrew taste. I don't know how to describe it otherwise.

Someone suggested we're using too much priming sugar, but I've jsut been using kits from the store which come with 4oz of sugar for 5 gallons. The beer I just finished fermented for 3.5 weeks and I let it sit for 5 weeks before I tried it.

Any suggestions?

What have your starting and finishing gravity readings been? What yeast have you been using?

Sounds like your yeast is not attenuating very well.

It's not likely anything to do with the priming sugar. If you use too much priming sugar, the yeast will just produce more carbon dioxide and the beer will be overcarbonated (and the bottles may even explode), but you shouldn't get any residual sweetness from the priming sugar; the yeast will use it all.

Too much priming sugar would overcarb your beer, not leave it sweet.

Could be any number of things. Is this an all-grain, partial mash or all extract brew? What kinds of specialty grains are you using and in what amounts?

Do a search for "attenuation". Start here. It can be lots of things (Mash temp, aeration, yeast pitch rate)

The one I brewed was a Hefeweizen with DME only & one hop addition (the simplest kit). I used Wyeast liquid yeast.

Unfortunately I didn't do FG and OG, I was worried about contaminating/wasting beer. I'm going to start with the next batch I brew.

I left it in the fermenter for 3.5 weeks - how would the yeast fail to attenuate?

brewer1222 said:

Unfortunately I didn't do FG and OG, I was worried about contaminating/wasting beer. I'm going to start with the next batch I brew.

I left it in the fermenter for 3.5 weeks - how would the yeast fail to attenuate?

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With proper sanitation, taking your SG is not a contamination risk. And it's far from wasting beer. Not taking an SG and overcarbing a batch and having bottle bombs is a waste of beer!

The yeast could fail to attentuate due to temperature or due to underpitching, just to name a few. Taking your FG would tell you if you reached the finish line or if you need to help it along.

Some extracts will leave a lot of unfermentables that can give you a sweeter taste as well.

Does that mean if I leave the beer in the bottle longer it'll attenuate more & taste better? It's been in 5 weeks already

The fermentation temperature was high, which is why I was brewing Hefeweizen. It's possible it was underpitched. I tried to do a starter but only for about 5 hours or so - not enough to make a difference.

Gravity readings will help you to know for sure, but with plenty of time in the primary and assuming the yeast was healthy you should have gotten pretty reasonable attenuation.

A lot of people who brew with extract talk about tasting an "extract twang".

As a side note, while priming sugar is not the culprit of the sweet flavor, 4oz is almost always too much IMO. Hefeweizens should have a healthy dose of carbonation so I'm sure it is fine in your beer, but consider dialing in your carbonation a little more carefully when you start brewing other styles. http://www.franklinbrew.org/tools/carb.html

brewer1222 said:

Does that mean if I leave the beer in the bottle longer it'll attenuate more & taste better? It's been in 5 weeks already

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Nope. The yeast are almost certainly done working by now. Try making a starter next time. You're yeast might be pooping out early if you're just pitching the vial while not aerating the wort enough.

Otherwise, try switching up the extracts. The yeast can't eat some of the longer sugars, and some extracts tend to have more of those, leading to sweet beer.

The only solution to the extract sweetness problem is AG brewing? Is there a list of extracts anywhere which have this problem

Next time I will
1) take gravity readings
2) make a starter

Appreciate the help!

I wouldn't attribute it to extract just yet. You have a good plan there...see where that takes you.

I agree with Rick500, but if you find that a different extract brand doesn't help, you might also consider substituting table sugar or corn sugar for about 10% of your fermentables. Those are both extremely fermentable, and it will help boost your overall attenuation.

I was using corn sugar - do you mean pitch the corn sugar in with the yeast?

You primed with corn sugar. I'm saying use corn sugar in place of some of your malt extract.

In the boil

brewer1222 said:

The only solution to the extract sweetness problem is AG brewing? Is there a list of extracts anywhere which have this problem

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No, brewing with extract does not necessarily create extract sweetness - it is perfectly feasible to make quality, award-winning beer with extract.

The "twang" a lot of people refer to I believe is often due to some of the extract burning at the bottom of the pot - this happens with LME a lot, and a good way to avoid it is to heat up the extract before adding to the boil, and adding it slowly, removing the pot from the burner, and stirring while it is being added.

DME in my opinion should also be added slowly.

Hope this helps!

To get the maxium attenuation make sure you properly aerate your wort before you pitch the yeast. I could be that the yeast are running out of oxygen before they convert all of the sugar.

Extract definitely isn't the evil that many AG brewers make it out to be. I just finished second place overall in the HBT BJCP competition with a partial mash with extract brew.

Beernip said:

To get the maxium attenuation make sure you properly aerate your wort before you pitch the yeast. I could be that the yeast are running out of oxygen before they convert all of the sugar.

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Just for your brewing knowledge, the yeast don't use oxygen to convert sugar (in any substantial amount) but they use it to reproduce. Proper oxygenation/aeration will help with proper attenuation by allowing the yeast to grow in numbers properly. The yeast use up all of the oxygen before they really put much of a dent in the sugars.

Coastarine said:

Just for your brewing knowledge, the yeast don't use oxygen to convert sugar (in any substantial amount) but they use it to reproduce. Proper oxygenation/aeration will help with proper attenuation by allowing the yeast to grow in numbers properly. The yeast use up all of the oxygen before they really put much of a dent in the sugars.

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+1 on what he said. Aeration has more of a connection to pitching rate than anything else.