Hello, Newbie with a question

First off hello, and thanks for any help in advance.

I brewed my first batch of beer recently fermented in primary for a week and racked to secondary for 2 weeks then bottled.

Since I had a half bottle left over when I bottled I tasted it and although it was flat the beer did not taste bad. Brown ale BTW. (close to a Sam Adams, a little more sweet.)

Figured I would try one after a week in bottles. When I opened the bottle it had a very slight vinegar smell and the taste was dry(very little aftertaste) and a little bitter.

Am I just being impatient and it needs longer in the bottles or paranoid?

I know I messed up during the boil when I added the priming sugar. When I bottled I use dextrose that I boiled in water until it went clear. When it cooled I then added it to the bottling bucket and racked from the secondary and filled the bottles.

Again thanks for any advice.

Patience. One week is about 3 weeks too soon.

And remember: RDWHAHB!

MDbrewing said:

I know I messed up during the boil when I added the priming sugar. When I bottled I use dextrose that I boiled in water until it went clear. When it cooled I then added it to the bottling bucket and racked from the secondary and filled the bottles.

Again thanks for any advice.

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Can you elaborate a bit on how you think you messed up?

Tasting a beer one week after bottling is like tasting cold coffee and expecting the best.

Give it some time, but let's hear more about about your priming process.

It is so hard to wait when you first start brewing. You need to get a good supply built up so you don't keep dipping into your reserves or at least that is what we are trying to do.

BierMuncher said:

Can you elaborate a bit on how you think you messed up?

Tasting a beer one week after bottling is like tasting cold coffee and expecting the best.

Give it some time, but let's hear more about about your priming process.

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I added the priming sugar into the wort when I was boiling it. Then later on when I read the rest of the directions I realized what I did wrong. Purchased some more priming sugar and boiled it in 3/4 cup of water until the water clarified. I let it cool then added it to the bottling bucket and bottled. Yeah, I just reread my first post and it didn't sound right to me either.

Thanks to everyone for the help!

And remember, when your half-dressed, half-asleep wife walks into the kitchen in the morning asking if she can help she really doesn't want to help. She wants coffee. It's at this time they glance at the directions when you ask them to reread the last line back to you and their reply is, add everything else, finish boiling. Followed by the question, can I have my kitchen back now?

Adding the priming sugar should have little or no effect at all on the taste of the beer. You basically added a little (very little in comparison to the malt) extra fermentable sugar. If you took gravity readings and compared it to the target (I didn't know what my target was on the first couple brews), you might see the difference if any.