Help with Centennial blonde....

On 5/10/08 I brewed a centennial blonde recipe found on this forum, but due to my lhbs being out of a few thing here is what the recipe ended up being:

6.5 lbs light breiss LME
1 lb. Caripils (steeped at 170, maybe a little hotter, 30 minutes)
.25 oz. Yakima pellets (13.1% aau) (60 min.)
.25 oz. Yakima pellets (13.1% aau) (20 min.)
.25 oz. Cascade pellets (6.3%, 10 min)
.25 oz. Cascade pellets (6.3%, 5 min)

Dry windsor yeast (re-hydrated, pitched at 70 degrees)

*the yakima and the windsor yeast were substitutes.

This is my 6th batch, and all but the first one, i let them sit in a water bath to keep the temps down. On this beer i did not put it in water, and the fermetation was very vigorous and fast, done in 2 days. The temp didn't jump past 72 or 73 though.

After a few days i tested and tasted, it was at FG, but tasted really bad, like the band-aid flavor i have read about. Since i haven't had this problem before, i am not certain it is infected, there were no visible signs of infection, no floaties or off-colors. The beer actually looks great. After a week in the primary (plastic bucket), I moved it to a 5 gallon carboy where it still sits. I thought after tasting a couple more times, that is was lightening up, but there is still a weird flavor to it.

I know i did a few things wrong, not cooling the batch down for the first week, and i think i steeped at too high of a temp.

My options, IMO, are:

1. do nothing for a few more weeks, then bottle and hope for the best. Maybe try and cool the batch down with ice? Will that help?

2. Add Lemon zest. I read of someone using this recipe and adding lemon zest to make a lemonale.

3. Experiment with it and try to dry hop, and make it more of an IPA?

Will either the lemon or the dry hopping mask the off-flavor? Just wondering what the opinions of others might be, or if there is another option i am not thinking of.

thanks

I'm not sure what can save the current batch, maybe let it age out more.

As for what may have gone wrong, this is what "How to brew" has to say about that off-flavor

Medicinal
These flavors are often described as mediciney, Band-Aid™ like, or can be spicy like cloves. The cause are various phenols which are initially produced by the yeast. Chlorophenols result from the reaction of chlorine-based sanitizers (bleach) with phenol compounds and have very low taste thresholds. Rinsing with boiled water after sanitizing is the best way to prevent these flavors.

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Also, how did you measure temperature during the fermentation? If you just measure ambient temperature this won't give you a very informed idea of what is going on inside the fermenter.

Also I read up on that Windsor yeast and it's not a neutral yeast like nottingham

Optimum Fermentation Temperature 64.0 °F - 70.0 °F
Description Danstar Windsor ale yeast originates in England. This yeast produces a beer which is estery to both palate and nose with a slight fresh yeasty flavor.

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So this strain is known for it's ester production, and you had it above it's optimum temp so that's probably going to accentuate that property even more.