radicalsubversiv
Member
Howdy all,
After years of dreaming about it, I finally decided to give brewing a try, with the help of some friends and some borrowed equipment.
The bad news is that I've just tried some, three weeks after bottling, and the taste's off -- tastes a little too much like champagne, only not as sweet. Over-carbonated, with a bit too much of a bite (perhaps too alcoholic?). Not completely undrinkable, but pretty unsatisfactory, so I'm trying to figure out whether it needs more time or whether it's spoiled.
The story in brief:
Bought a Brewer's Best English Pale Ale kit, replacing the dried yeast with a White Labs 005 British Ale liquid yeast.
Brewing went well, right until I unthinkingly dumped the wort straight into the fermenter without cooling first. It took forever (a couple hours) to cool, even in an ice bath, and of course we were stuck with the break left in the fermenter.
Undeterred, we stuck in the airlock and let it sit, checking on it 48 hours later and a couple other times throughout the week. At no point did anyone notice bubbling in the airlock. (N.B., though it was in a basement, the temperature was probably fluctuating from about 74-80 degrees, this being Washington, DC in the summer.)
Fearing the worst, I decided to take a hydrometer reading 7 days later. I was surprised to find that it had definitely fermented, and had exactly the right final gravity reading.
With no secondary fermenter available, we decided to bottle. Things went pretty well -- we even managed to leave the vast majority of the trub in the fermenter when racking to the bottling bucket -- except that without a bottle-filler we may have introduced too much oxygen into the bottles while filling.
Fast forward three weeks, and we open two bottles. The first gradually bubbles over somewhat before being poured, and clearly has a LOT of sediment suspended in the beer. The second doesn't bubble over (though still has some pretty serious head), and the appearance is much better. But both have the same basic problem described above.
Are we just tasting too early? If not, any thoughts on the likely culprit? I've taken a look over some common problems and this doesn't seem to quite fit any of them (esp. tasting too alcoholic even with the right final gravity reading).
Thanks in advance for any advice you might be able to offer!
-- Michael
After years of dreaming about it, I finally decided to give brewing a try, with the help of some friends and some borrowed equipment.
The bad news is that I've just tried some, three weeks after bottling, and the taste's off -- tastes a little too much like champagne, only not as sweet. Over-carbonated, with a bit too much of a bite (perhaps too alcoholic?). Not completely undrinkable, but pretty unsatisfactory, so I'm trying to figure out whether it needs more time or whether it's spoiled.
The story in brief:
Bought a Brewer's Best English Pale Ale kit, replacing the dried yeast with a White Labs 005 British Ale liquid yeast.
Brewing went well, right until I unthinkingly dumped the wort straight into the fermenter without cooling first. It took forever (a couple hours) to cool, even in an ice bath, and of course we were stuck with the break left in the fermenter.
Undeterred, we stuck in the airlock and let it sit, checking on it 48 hours later and a couple other times throughout the week. At no point did anyone notice bubbling in the airlock. (N.B., though it was in a basement, the temperature was probably fluctuating from about 74-80 degrees, this being Washington, DC in the summer.)
Fearing the worst, I decided to take a hydrometer reading 7 days later. I was surprised to find that it had definitely fermented, and had exactly the right final gravity reading.
With no secondary fermenter available, we decided to bottle. Things went pretty well -- we even managed to leave the vast majority of the trub in the fermenter when racking to the bottling bucket -- except that without a bottle-filler we may have introduced too much oxygen into the bottles while filling.
Fast forward three weeks, and we open two bottles. The first gradually bubbles over somewhat before being poured, and clearly has a LOT of sediment suspended in the beer. The second doesn't bubble over (though still has some pretty serious head), and the appearance is much better. But both have the same basic problem described above.
Are we just tasting too early? If not, any thoughts on the likely culprit? I've taken a look over some common problems and this doesn't seem to quite fit any of them (esp. tasting too alcoholic even with the right final gravity reading).
Thanks in advance for any advice you might be able to offer!
-- Michael