contaminated beer?

This is my first batch of home brew, and I'm paranoid that my beer was contaminated somewhere between transfering the wort from my brew pot to my primary fermentation bucket, and pitching the yeast. Today, after 6 days of initial fermentation, I finished racking the beer from my primary to my secondary fermenter, and siphoned some into a glass to sample the beer. Is there a way to tell if the beer is contaminated, maybe a bad odor, or obvious taste that would help me determine if it's bad?

If it tastes like beer, it's good. If it's bad, I think it'll be pretty obvious. If you can't tell it's bad, then it's good enough

I was real paranoid on my first one. Relax boss fermentation is ugly at first then you learn the cycle and begin to think it's beautiful.

The best advice I've had from this website is as simple as "Don't worry, have a homebrew!"

When I got paranoid about contamination it promted me to keep peeking inside my container... but yeah, doing that is gonna increase the chance of infection :cross:

Just wait and see how it turns out... Just start worrying if anything... hairy... starts appearing... *shudders*

Unless it just tastes ass-nasty, it's not contaminated.

Probably the most typical unwanted nasty in beer is wild yeast...a beer with way too much wild yeast tastes like a plastic band-aid, roughly.

Your beer might not taste all that great at this point--it can be raw and kindof harsh. But if it taste even vaguely like beer and not like something completely nasty, you're good.

I think raw is a good word to describe the taste. I imagine it is the hops I'm tasting, and will get better after my secondary fermentation. I kind of figured I was worrying about nothing, but it's always nice to check with people who have experience.

We use the term "Green beer". Raw also says it. Contamination tends to be really obvious, although lacto infections can be "Does this taste a little sour?" and even that can age out.

It did taste a little sour, but I'm brewing a hefeweisen, and planned on serving it with lemons anyway. Thanks for all of the input.

i tasted my current batch of Porter Ale before bottling and was dissappointed in the flavor. but thanks to these folks i kept going and hoped for the best. last night i tried a bottle (i just cant wait the 2 weeks i had planned) and the off flavors I thought i had tasted were gone...and the beer was delicious. so yea, i would say just keep going, see what happens.

Just be patient! Bury it in a box, in a cool closet or basement, and try to forget about it for a while. Mine was good after 3 weeks, but was fantastic after 3 months! It went fast after that! Brew some more in the meantime!

Yes thank you. This is my first reply on HBT. This site has really helped me along the way for the last two batches I have done. I would agree with previous replies about "Not To Worry." I think that when you stop really worrying about your homebrew you might get lazy. I think it is a sign of being cautious about sanitization.

By the way does anybody know anything about why I had golf ball size yeast clumps floating in my fermenter. Safale S O4 in a nut brown ale.