All my beers are too thick & rich

Cheepbeer said:

OK I did the Newcastle recipe that Yooper suggested to me... all went without a hitch the instructions were perfect. It's all in the fermenter... I warmed up the yeast. I cooled the wort in a cold water sink with ice... I followed the instructions to a tee. About 3 hours worth of work if you count the cleaning and sanitizing. My hydrometer readings were 1.040 - 5.3% - 40brix whatever that may mean (Im still learning)... the brew smelled nice.

Thanks Yooper.

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Cheepbeer said:

I put the yeast in 4 oz lukewarm water like it said on packet????? 15 minutes before intro to wort????? It was magical! (really started off foaming)

Temp in bucket is 66 degrees. its pretty cool in my basement now that summer is over.

Is getting the yeast hydrated a waste of time? I wonder. In the past I have just tossed it in dry. This time i stirred in the foamy 4 oz of hydrated yeast. Hope I did right.

I did not aerate the wort too vigorously because the directions did not say to.... I did stir very well though.

There is still time to shake it up a lot if you think I should???

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nutty_gnome said:

This thread title totally sounds like a first world problem!

http://therealfirstworldproblems.tumblr.com/

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Cheepbeer said:

Haha the thread title may be a bit misleading... I did not mention it was thick, rich, and tasted like crap.

Well last night my kids felt a little "Chilly" so they turned the baseboard heater on downstairs and forgot to turn it off...
Making the room and my wort 74 degrees. probably for about 8 hours straight... Im cooling it down now. Hopefully no real damage done.
65 is a hard temp to maintain in my house.

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Yooper said:

Well, what's done is done. But I didn't mean 65 for a room temperature, I meant 65 for fermentation temperature. Often, fermentation produces heat and so the fermenting beer is typically 5-10 degrees warmer than the ambient temperature.

It might help keep the temperature more constant if you put the fermenter in a water bath, that way room temperature changes wouldn't really change the temperature of the beer too much, as it would take a long long time for 5 gallons of beer, plus 5 gallons of water surrounding it, to change temperature.

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jonmohno said:

ehh,samples are pretty vague as far as outcome.Let it be,but I personally dont see what more hops can hurt.It will just be aroma though which will fade with time. It wont balance your maltiness really,your bitter is done and done with the boil.Shure you can mask some stuff with hops until it fades quickly. Although youd be surprised how they dry up and become differnet with bottle conditioning.

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