My beer doesnt taste like beer

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Vorsicht709

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Dec 5, 2007
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Location
St John's, Newfoundland
Just cracked my first bottle of homebrew, its nicely carbonated however it has NO flavour, the only thing you can really taste is the alcohol. I used a Morgans Canadian Blonde kit and added a kg of High malt Gluclose (the woman at the brew sore suggested it). My OG was 1.040, and my FG was 1.009, and the fermentation temperature was around 70. It was in the primary for about a week, In the secondary for a week and a half, and carbed in the bottles for two weeks. The beer doesnt taste bad it just doesnt have much taste, and it is beautifully clear, and wonderfully carbonated. Any suggestions?
 
Post some of the specifics like the recipe, OG, ferment temps and days, etc...That will give a better idea of how to answer your question.

Is it a plastic taste? Cardboard or bandaid taste? Stuff like that will help people figure it out.
 
Hate it when that happens...Just let it age a little Longer and try it again, Did you use a Kit or Extract, AG what was the recipe?
 
lots of details.

does it not have any bitterness? too sweet? no flavor?

specificity
 
Vorsicht709 said:
Umm just tasted my first homebrew and it tastes a little weird. I cant describe it, its not bad, however it doesnt really taste like beer does it need to age more?

The reason is probably because it isn't what a Molsons or Labatts will taste like, but rather what good beer should taste like.
We need more specifics in order to see what you are tasting, like what kind of kit it was and the type brewed.
Most kits sold by Brewery Lane are either the canned kind which can make reasonable beer given the right tools and ingredients or they can be the no boil kind such as Barrons or Brew House which are wort Micro brewery style.
These baged kits are fresher than the canned kind and will make better beer.

Cheers and welcome to another Newfoundlander.
Merry Christmas
 
I guess its a no-boil, the only boiling i did was the water I put into the bucket to which I added the Gluclose, and malt extract. I assume its hopped because I didnt add any hops (although thats what I expect lead to the lack of flavor).
 
Vorsicht709 said:
and added a kg of High malt Gluclose (the woman at the brew sore suggested it).


Not sure exactly what this product is. However it sounds like a "alcohol booster" type of deal consisting of simple sugars to raise the abv. If it is, this could be the cause. Simple sugars ferment out completely and leave only alcohol and not the residual sugars and flavors that malt does.
 
Well, since it doesn't taste bad, that's a great start. I think the lack of flavor comes from a couple of sources- the booster and the prehopped extract. I'm not sure what you have available in your stores (we need a fellow Canadien to help us out with availability in Newfoundland) but if you have it available for the next batch, I would recommend a "pure" malt extract and hops recipe.

I'm sure there is nothing you did wrong and you got a good start, so if you can enjoy what you made (even if not really beer-like to you) that's a big plus.
 
It does sound a lot like you've got two bad things going for you. You're not sure if it was hopped and you added glucose. "No flavor" seems to me that it was not, in fact, hopped and alcohol flavor seems to support that.

There's not too much you can do about that, if that's the case, except brew a new batch (which I'd recommend even if the beer was good!).

Take notes, it's a really killer thing to be able to look back after the beer is done and think about what happened. List down ingredients, procedure, anything that jumps out.

Good luck on figuring this out, and here's to a spectacular next brew! :mug:
 
Vorsicht709 said:
Eddie, I used a kg of glucose, 1.3 kg of malt extract, and My final volume was 23 litres. And the extract was "Light to medium" hopped according to the website.


Okay. 2.3 kg total, one of which is glucose that is too high a percent of simple sugar. Sorry, cannot do the math at the moment but sounds too high. That will give you a pretty light bodied light flavored beer. Next batch stick with malt. If you want to add some sugars don't add any more than 20% of the total amount of fermentables.
 
Sure- I have lots of ideas! What do you have available? John Bull Liquid Malt Extract, or any dry malt extract? All kinds of hops? It really depends on what you have available.
 
Vorsicht709 said:
Eddie, I used a kg of glucose, 1.3 kg of malt extract, and My final volume was 23 litres. And the extract was "Light to medium" hopped according to the website.

let's see...that's 2.2 lbs of glucose, 2.86 lbs of malt extract and a final volume of 5.8 US gal.

That should yield you an OG of 1.035 and it should ferment out to about 1.009. It sounds like your beer turned out as good as it could given what it had to work with.

What beers do you like? Maybe we can help you figure out a recipe that'll work better for you.
 
An APA I have on tap ATM is a great way to start your brewing. You'll not get very close to those type of brews with the ingredients found at most of the LHBS here, with the exception of Brewery Lane.
To get the clean taste of a lager you need the capability of temperture control during fermentation and really the ability to go AG. as well as using liquid yeast cultures.
I'll answer a lot of your questions by PM to get you in the right direction.
 
You Could try this, it is very simple.

3.3 Lbs Muntons Amber LME
3.3 Lbs Light LME

1oz EK Fuggles 4.5% (60min)
0.5oz East Kent Goldings 4.5% (60min)
0.25oz EK Goldings 4.5% (15min)
1.5oz EK Goldings 4.5% (5min)

Dry hop 1.5 oz EK Goldings in secondary
Primary 7 days Secondary 14 days

Safale Us-56 Dried american Ale Yeast

1 tsp Irish Moss at 15 min

This is a very simple recipe and Im drinking it as I type and it tastes great. It is very close in taste too Samuel Adams Boston Ale, If you like that you will like this.
 
Morgan Canadian Blonde - Colour 4 ebc, bitterness 16 ibu’s
Light-medium hopped, straw colour, light-medium body. 100% 2 row barley.

Sounds like you got exactly what you should have.
 
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