1st bottle taste - something wrong

Ok, so,

My first brew ever which was Caribou Slobber, 2 weeks in the bottle. I tasted the first one Yesterday. More to know what 2 weeks in the bottle tasted like rather than expectations that it was done and ready to drink.

It had been carbing at 62 to 64 degrees, since I can't find a warmer place in the house. That said it was medium carbed I think, moderate hiss at opening, no head really, but slight tingle on the tongue. I tasted the 2 Hydrometer samples prior to bottling and while they tasted watery, there was no aftertaste or bad flavors

I drank 1/2 the bottle from a glass and I kept getting this odd, strange bitter taste in the back of my throat. Its not a hops bitter, but more of a metallicish, sickening taste. its very hard to describe. I can only think of describing it as the stuff you'de put on little kids fingernails to stop them from biting their nails. A bad bitter flavor.

about 1/2 hour later I felt ill, nauseous and stomach cramps. Moved from my stomache to lower and is lasting until today. I can still (10 hours later) sort of taste that bitter taste in my throat.

Here is my bottling process: Washed each bottle with PBW and bottle brush, rinsed each and drain in a dish rack. Filled a large tub (like a party beer tub) 1/4 way with starsan and sub merged each bottle and left them for 5 min or more. Drained each bottle and placed it in the lower dishwasher rack, which I had sprayed the lower and upper racks with a fair amount of starsan from a spray bottle. From there they drained and I would bottle what was in the dishwasher before refilling it with bottles from the tub.

I was very conscientious with sanitation, but I would not say I was fanatical about it. But I did sanitize everything that I used, bottling bucket, wand, priming water, etc...

One thing that occured, which I hate to admit, but "may" be the issue. My wife has long dark hair and it gets ALL over the house, everywhere.

After bottling maybe 1/2 the batch, I saw a stringy thing hanging off the bottling wand (im bottling over the dishwasher rack as Revy suggests). It was one of my wife's hairs stuck to the wand. How it got there I don't know, but I was careful enough with the stuff not to like drop it on the floor or counter etc...

I've read xyz, you need to have your body adjust to home brew yeasts, etc.... while I'm willing to accept that might be part of it, I think the flavor is related.

I'm resigned to try and up the carb temperature and leave it alone for maybe another month in the bottle.


So, What do you think, is this flavor and resulting sickness an infection, is the hair involved, would I see an infection in the beer? I have 2 clear PET bottles bottled, so I can see the beer and it looks fine.

Whats going on here? Any Ideas?

But, RDWHAHB isn't going to work, since I'm loathing trying another one of these from this batch.

Several things...

A little bit more time conditioning perhaps.

Extract brews have a notorious "twang" taste, although it is not usually described as nauseating.

When you pour into a glass, make sure to pour slowly to not get any (or very little) yeast in your glass. It takes some practice and if u get good at it, you only lose about 1 oz.
Also, i have found that it is best to refrigerate for about a week before drinking. This forces the remaining yeast to flocculate to the bottom and depending on the yeast used, I have had a well formed clump of yeast at the bottom of bottles that is rather hard to stir up.

How does it smell?

It smells fine. The yeast is well settled at the bottom and I left a fair amount of beer in the bottle.

The taste itself was not nauseating (but yes a twangish taste in the bottle, not in the hydrometer sample) , but the after effects surely were.

I did put the bottle in the freezer to cool it for about 1/2 and 1/2 hour in fridge. The next one I'll leave for a week.

Sickness yeast related? If so how to cure that? I don't want anyone to experience that.

brewkinger said:

Several things...

A little bit more time conditioning perhaps.

Extract brews have a notorious "twang" taste, although it is not usually described as nauseating.

When you pour into a glass, make sure to pour slowly to not get any (or very little) yeast in your glass. It takes some practice and if u get good at it, you only lose about 1 oz.
Also, i have found that it is best to refrigerate for about a week before drinking. This forces the remaining yeast to flocculate to the bottom and depending on the yeast used, I have had a well formed clump of yeast at the bottom of bottles that is rather hard to stir up.

How does it smell?

Click to expand...

Ive read: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/bottling-tips-homebrewer-94812/#post1030387 Revy's wise advice.

And I accept it. Its just the Being sick part I'm worried about. If it was just the flavor, I'd just wait. But... There's nothing I can do except wait anyways so...

Just trying to Diagnose for next time.

You might read up here on the off flavors, their sources and how to avoid them.
http://www.howtobrew.com/section4/chapter21-2.html

It is widely accepted that beer is very, very safe to drink. That being said, everyone is different and our bodies react in different ways.

There are other factors - it is flu season, sometimes the food we eat is spoiled, and if you are like me, then you are old and temporary illness just happens.

Our water has higH iron, but we have an iron filter and a second filter. I used Poland spring for 80% of this, batch. We,ll see how the next batch turns out with100% of house water.

I'll try the beer in a month and see what develops.

I agree that this is probably two different things. First, I have a horrible time with extract twang in my brews. They have a sharp solvent-like, mild metallic taste. Sounds similar to what you are tasting. Something else that is common between your experience and mine is that my beer tasted fine at bottling time, and after bottle conditioning tasted "off". I suspected sanitation for a while, but after trying several different methods of sanitizing my bottles and bottling equipment, I decided it must be something other than my process. I resolved this issue by going to all-grain. It may not be possible for you to do this, but I'm amazed by the difference.

The stomach issues could be due to either excessive yeast ingestion, or some other coincidental illness.

Some off flavors aren't detectable till the carbonation & conditioning brings them out. As for the metallic,solvent flavors,read this; http://draftmag.com/offflavors/

if you are/were diarrhea sick; I'd say either yeast or marginal/bad food. You wont know until opening another bottle. Blowing chunks flu sick would be coincidence. Food poisoning would be similar to flu just shorter length.

First; extract twang is more of an urban myth unless you are brewing with less than ideal water or less than ideal techniques. What you drank is a very green beer. I'm curious. Describe your brew day and how your brew was fermented.

flars said:

First; extract twang is more of an urban myth unless you are brewing with less than ideal water or less than ideal techniques. What you drank is a very green beer. I'm curious. Describe your brew day and how your brew was fermented.

Click to expand...

I agree, the mention of "extract twang" really bothers me. I do both AG and extract and detect zero "twang" in my extract beers. I have caribou slobber on tap right now that was created with an extract kit. Five weeks in the primary, 5 weeks in the secondary, and 1 week carbonating in the keg-o; its one of my favorites.

OP, I would suggest giving that beer some time, however I am not a doctor so I can't comment on your sickness after drinking.

flars said:

First; extract twang is more of an urban myth unless you are brewing with less than ideal water or less than ideal techniques. What you drank is a very green beer. I'm curious. Describe your brew day and how your brew was fermented.

Click to expand...

I think the key here is "less than ideal water", since I think that's not well defined for extract brews. I was making awful brews with extract for about a year, and tried everything I could think of to improve my process. Then, I brewed at a friends house across the city, using his water. Unbeknownst to me, his water comes from a different source than mine. The beer was hugely improved. I started trucking his water in from across the city. Later, I went to AG using filtered water from my tap, and am making great beer. Extract from the tap still tastes awful. Why the difference?

I've looked at my water report, and it is a bit high in carbonates, but nothing is really majorly out of whack - it's Minneapolis water. I've come to believe that extract twang is highly water related, and nobody has really determined what exactly causes it.

All that to say, I'm not so sure it is an urban myth, though jumping to extract twang as an explanation of off flavors without exploring process first is probably not the most helpful approach.

Interesting thought about the water. Tap water here in NE Ohio comes from Lake Erie,& is generally good for many ales,light to dark. The we started using steeping grains,& I found our OH spring water tasted a bit better,but is 79c per gallon. Flash forward to partial mash,& the consensus here was to use distilled or RO water with additives they discuss on here. Distilled worked well for PM. Then further discussion here & some folks were having sucess using spring water in mashed wort beers. Then I found that 2 local sources of spring water went down to 10c per gallon,& I now use the water from Artisian Springs,the bigger of the two local sources,both 10c per gallon.
The two latest batches used it,& the yeasties from Germany seemed to love it. Steadiest fermenter I've ever seen. It'll be interesting to taste them when they're ready,as the yeast was WL029 kolsh yeast.

Brew day was my first ever for this one. I made the mistake of keeping the lid partially on, but from what I've read, since its extract, it shouldn't be a huge prob, but....

I pitched the yeast at 73F. a little high I know, but the directions with the kit said anything below 80, so then knowing what I knew, 73 was fine.

I fermented in Primary for 3 weeks in bucket. Fermentation seemed fast, but since I couldn't see it, I have to rely on the bubbles, which were not vigorous. Temp was around 70-73 during the first 3 dyas, then I kept it at 65-68. Yeast was Windsor from CS kit. I opened the bucket once when talking to Northern Brewer guy and there was a krousen ring.

Saw no signs of infection.

At 3 weeks I did 2 gravity readings and were the same, so I cold crashed it for 3 days at 40-44 degrees, then bottled.

DenverUSMC said he did 5 weeks primary and 5 weeks secondary for CS. This seems a long time to me, but maybe this beer needs that long? I have heard this beer gets much better over time.

flars said:

First; extract twang is more of an urban myth unless you are brewing with less than ideal water or less than ideal techniques. What you drank is a very green beer. I'm curious. Describe your brew day and how your brew was fermented.

Click to expand...

ANother question. I;ve left it at 70 degrees this week.

I have some PET bottles in the batch and they seem very hard.

What if a bottle is fully carbed, but is not fully conditioned? What do you do? Will it still condition in the fridge? The fridge will stop carbonation, but will it stop conditioning as well?

I plan to put one in the fridge to taste again, but I'm a little scared to leave the others carbing with the PEt bottle so hard.

flars said:

What you drank is a very green beer.

Click to expand...

+1. Give those bottles a total of 4 weeks at 70*F, then put a couple in the fridge 2-3 days before trying another. In the mean time, go buy and enjoy some good craft brew.

Just because the PET bottles are hard doesn't mean that carb is finished. They still need a chance (at 70*F) for the CO2 to be reabsorbed into the beer and for the flavors to mellow.

I have never heard of anyone getting sick from homebrew. I have also been told that nothing that can make you sick can survive in beer.

I also know that the mind is more powerful than most people give it credit. If you think something will make you sick, you will probably get sick.

Also, most people who do get food poisoning blame it on something they ate 6-8 hours after the real culprit. It takes a while for the bacteria to multiply to the point where they can make you sick.

Finally, if you read the reviews at Northern Brewer you will see a common thread through the whole thing talking about how they were disappointed with the beer until it had aged. Then over night it transformed into one of their favorites.

I had no thoughts it would make me sick, just that it tasted bad. I was shocked that I felt ill. I never got sick, just felt ill.

But I'll wait on this one and see, but I'm going to suggest to NB to change their aging schedule on this one or else not include it as a noobie kit with their starter kit. If it needs more time to develop, they should state that. As many folks have written it seems, its not an early drinker.

bleme said:

I have never heard of anyone getting sick from homebrew. I have also been told that nothing that can make you sick can survive in beer.

I also know that the mind is more powerful than most people give it credit. If you think something will make you sick, you will probably get sick.

Also, most people who do get food poisoning blame it on something they ate 6-8 hours after the real culprit. It takes a while for the bacteria to multiply to the point where they can make you sick.

Finally, if you read the reviews at Northern Brewer you will see a common thread through the whole thing talking about how they were disappointed with the beer until it had aged. Then over night it transformed into one of their favorites.

Click to expand...

jp27300 said:

ANother question. I;ve left it at 70 degrees this week.

I have some PET bottles in the batch and they seem very hard.

What if a bottle is fully carbed, but is not fully conditioned? What do you do? Will it still condition in the fridge? The fridge will stop carbonation, but will it stop conditioning as well?

I plan to put one in the fridge to taste again, but I'm a little scared to leave the others carbing with the PEt bottle so hard.

Click to expand...

I've found through observation that conditioning follows carbonation by about a week for average gravity brews. So 4 & even 5 weeks at 70F or a bit better will give better quality. And at least a week in the fridge to settle any chill haze,& get co2 into solution for good head & decent carbonation.
2 weeks fridge time gives thicker head & longer lasting,fine bubbled carbonation. No worries about the PET bottles getting too hard. That's what they do normally. Never had one pop,& I've got 45 of the 25.16oz Cooper's PET bottles. I like the lugs at the bottom of those,as they catch the yeast trub & hold it well when pouring.

bleme said:

I have never heard of anyone getting sick from homebrew. I have also been told that nothing that can make you sick can survive in beer.

Click to expand...

I know a lot of people that have gotten sick after drinking homebrew. I think their beers were "infected" with alcohol.

"Here is my bottling process: Washed each bottle with PBW and bottle brush, rinsed each and drain in a dish rack. Filled a large tub (like a party beer tub) 1/4 way with starsan and sub merged each bottle and left them for 5 min or more."

You didn't use a metal tub I hope. Acids and metals don't get along, and if your tub was metal, your starsan was busy dissolving and depositing it on anything that touched the water inside of it (your bottles). That would explain the metallicy bitterness. If it is a cheap metal tub, you may want to take a bottle of homebrew someplace they can test for heavy metals, you'd be surprised how many things have lead in them. I hope that's not the case, but if the tub was metal, I'd have the beer tested before drinking any more of it. No reason to get lead poisoning or toxicity of some other metal if you can avoid it.

tacks said:

"Here is my bottling process: Washed each bottle with PBW and bottle brush, rinsed each and drain in a dish rack. Filled a large tub (like a party beer tub) 1/4 way with starsan and sub merged each bottle and left them for 5 min or more."

You didn't use a metal tub I hope. Acids and metals don't get along, and if your tub was metal, your starsan was busy dissolving and depositing it on anything that touched the water inside of it (your bottles). That would explain the metallicy bitterness. If it is a cheap metal tub, you may want to take a bottle of homebrew someplace they can test for heavy metals, you'd be surprised how many things have lead in them. I hope that's not the case, but if the tub was metal, I'd have the beer tested before drinking any more of it. No reason to get lead poisoning or toxicity of some other metal if you can avoid it.

Click to expand...

No no metal tub. Cheapo plastic from wal mart.

I've recently learned however, that bottling, with priming sugar, is in effect another full fermentation process. I thought it was just a carbing process. So, basically it has to go through to whole process of fermentation in the bottle, with all the off flavors and such which need to be cleaned up.

Knowing this, I'm not thrilled at a redo of fermentation so to speak. I understand that time will do its magic. While yes I am impatient as a new brewer, I think I'm leaning toward leaving the beer longer in primary, then filtering, kegging then counter filling bottles if I want. A down the line process for me but I think I may get a product more to my liking and less worrying, lol.

So. Abe anew thread, but after filtering and kegging, does it have to condition in the keg after primary? I am a little confused regarding bottle conditioning. Does it do something different in the bottle, other than car ing, than it would do in the primary?

I have seen on you tube a video of the bottling of Kate the great, where they counter fill it and it seems ready to go. I would be curious to k ow what happens between them primary ing, maybe secondary and bottling to make it good to go.

The second fermentation in the bottle isn't the same as primary at all. It's initial fermentation in primary where off flavors are made. If they aren't given 3-7 days after FG is reached to clean up & settle out clear or slightly misty,bottle carbing & conditioning will magnify what it can't clean up.

What I read was from Palmer I think (not that he's right, but..)

I'm curious what happens like over 6 weeks to make a green beer taste better. What's going on in the bottle? Maybe another thread might be good.

unionrdr said:

The second fermentation in the bottle isn't the same as primary at all. It's initial fermentation in primary where off flavors are made. If they aren't given 3-7 days after FG is reached to clean up & settle out clear or slightly misty,bottle carbing & conditioning will magnify what it can't clean up.

Click to expand...

All those organic compounds in there are unstable so they are constantly breaking down and combining with each other.
Sometimes those changes make it better.
Sometimes they don't.

You will run into the same thing with wine, mead or even Scotch.

As long as you aren't dumb enough to bottle in a cheap metal tub with starsan, and not know what the problem is.... I'm glad. It would be stupid of me to say nobody's ever done that, but I'm glad that toxicity is not the problem for you. Help me out next time I get stuck in the corner and the answer is looming over me, and please let us know if you got sick because of the beer or something else was the culprit (If you figure out what the issue was). Best of luck - The Big Mitten

*Update*

So I left the bottles for a total of 6 weeks in the bottles. The back of the throat taste is basically gone. The beer is drinkable, but overall I'm not impressed. Gonna leave a 6 pack for few months in the bottles to see what happens.

Time is clearly the key. One month is now my new condition standard.

Thanks or all the assistance.