contaminated; what now?

This is my 4th batch of extract beer, and the first that has gotten contaminated. I was really suprised to see that this one got contaminated, because I was extra cautious with the cleaning and sanitizing, even more so than I was with my previous batches. Everything looked great in primary, but 24 hours after I racked to secondary a ring of white spots started to form on the surface of the beer. Its been two weeks in secondary and it still looks about the same. There is are a bunch (about 10) white spots on the surface about a 1/4 to a 1/2 inch in diameter. They form a ring on the inside of the cardaboy. Looks like mold to me.

My question is should I taste it and see if it tastes ok, or just toss it? If its mold can it make me sick? If I bottle it, leaving the mold behind, is more mold going to form in the bottles? Has anyone every had a moldy beer that was drinkable?


(on a side note, is there any way to get a picture on my post? I took a picture of it but I cant figure out how to get it on here)

take a picture so WE can see.... more than likely it is not contamination, but yeast colonies kicked up to the surface of the beer when you racked...it's pretty common...

they just rise to the surface and sit there.....happens all the time...very rarely is the top surface of a beer EVER perfectly clear...

Nothing harmful to you can live in beer.

Never dump a batch unless it smells and tastes like satan's anus...

If mold develops on the surface you can usually rack below and save the beer...

But again I doubt it's anything other than yeasties.

Upload it on a pic hosting site like photobucket...then you can post it on here

Try the beer (don't make a point of eating the unknown stuff though) - worst thing that can happen is that it will taste bad.

It formed or perfect ring of little dots before, but I bumped the carboy when I was taking the pictures and and the white stuff kind kind of spead out.



Let me know if these pics are not good enough to tell whats going on, and I will try to get some better ones

The picture is not that close but I do not see anything that resembles a contamination. Without a taste you will not know. Some questions are.....

How long has it been in the primary? (2 weeks is about right for 50 point ales. You really don't need a secondary for ales.)

Did you have a normal fermentation with a nice krausen and did it get started right away? (Delayed fermentation may let bacteria get a foothold and cause off flavors. If a fermentation gets started within hours of pitching the yeast then there is usually no problem with infections if you used good sanitary practices because bacteria can not compete with large numbers of yeast in the wort.

WBC said:

If a fermentation gets started within hours of pitching the yeast then there is usually no problem with infections if you used good sanitary practices because bacteria can not compete with large numbers of yeast in the wort.

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What would you consider hours? Not trying to steal this thread, but mine usually is going by morning if I brew it and set it aside by 6 at night. I've woke to check on it and found it not going after 6-8 hours, but bubbling away by morning. 12 hrs at 6am.

Carbonation most likely.

HOP-HEAD said:

What would you consider hours? Not trying to steal this thread, but mine usually is going by morning if I brew it and set it aside by 6 at night. I've woke to check on it and found it not going after 6-8 hours, but bubbling away by morning. 12 hrs at 6am.

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12 hours is OK but when it gets to be 24 then bacteria may get a good start. Here is a good way to test this.... When you next brew just put some wort in another sanitized container with a sanitized air lock and see if something gets started (no yeast). That is a good indicator that bacteria is in there. See how long it takes for it to develop activity. When you open it you will know right away it is infected because it will smell like rotting yuk. If it did not then maybe wild yeast got in there. If it does nothing at all in 3 to 5 days then no bugs were in there.

You call that contamination, you silly n00b.

I'm having a hard time getting a good close up but here are a couple more pictures.






this batch seemed like it started out great. It had a super thick krausen and smelled pretty good. I had it in primary for a little over a week, after it finished out I racked it to secondary, and the next day it looked like this. Its been in seondary for I think three weeks now. I just havent done anything with it because I assumed it was going to be bad.

I was right, it's N00bnerves...er, I mean yeast colonies...

It's fine.

nickwin said:

I had it in primary for a little over a week, after it finished out I racked it to secondary, and the next day it looked like this. Its been in seondary for I think three weeks now. I just havent done anything with it because I assumed it was going to be bad.

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It's fine. Next time unless your dryhopping, leave it in the primary for three weeks, your beer will benefit and you can skip the secondary.