I think I found a problem....want to verify.

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togabear

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I brewed two really good AG beers on my first go. My 3rd and 4th are not so good-but I think I found the problem. Wanna make sure though, can anyone confirm this?

I got a nice digital thermometer and I made sure it was calibrated when I first got it. I brewed my 3rd and 4th AG beers with this thermometer in the same week and got slightly high OGs. After 3 weeks in the carboy, I kegged and carbed them earlier this week. They both have a very strong bitter and mouth puckering taste and almost no malt...i guess almost very grainy? Except for the off flavor they taste like okay drier beers. The first one is drinkable, the second one is really bad. I checked my hop usage and the bitterness wasn't from that.

I luckily tested the digital thermometer today after tasting that...it reads 25 degrees lower than what it actually is....I hit mash temps of 185F...crap. Back to my old one.

Most importantly, Is my beer screwed?!?! And is that the taste you get from high mash temps? Will aging really help much more or will that taste always be around? I was going to drink the lower OG beer (1.050) soon and leave the other one a month or so.
 
P.S. I was going to put this in the drunken ramblings section, but I didn't have drinkable beer to get drunk on.
 
The mouth puckering taste is most likely an astringent character originating with the exceptionally high temp that you mashed at. Unfortunately, it isn't going to get a whole lot better. The tannins responsible for this character will settle out with time, but they will never disappear completely. Sorry.
 
Yes mashing at those temps will definately create off flavors. You probably extracted a lot of tannins from the grains, And I believe that I remember reading that tannins don't really condition out.
 
Crap. Thats what I thought. Ill keep the first one as its not bad. If it mellows even just a little it will be a enjoyable, but far from perfect beer. The second one....I think I might chuck it. Ill keep it for a month and see if it gets better....if not, good bye cause I need the keg space. I hope it does.
 
I made a mistake my first batch and left my steeping grains in though the whole boil! It was tanic at first but a several weeks to a few months later is it much better, not great but I can tell the tanins are less pronounced.

-ArXiX
 
Thanks for the info ArXiX-hopefully the beer will be drinkable soon. Im now sure the first one will be, the second one-still not sure. I just put them in the back of my closet and Im going to forget them until I need a keg.

TheJadedDog, thanks for the vote of confidence...lets hope I dont do that again.
 
Actually, does anyone know if adding gelatin will help? Supposedly removes tannins and if I add a little more than whats usually called for maybe I can clear some of that stuff out and make a more drinkable beer.
 
It's possible, but the tannins are quite astringent and won't ever entirely go away. I'd try and give it a shot and see what happens. I believe that gelatin works better on chilled beer, but I'm not 100% sure.
 
Hey all. So I added 1/3 of a cup of gelatin to the bad keg and a packet two the okay keg. I could smell the gelatin on first pull, but not on the second after the beer cleared. The bad beer is much better tasting after only 16 hours. I am obviously going to wait a little longer.

It still has a strong tannin(?) smell or whatever smell else the high extraction temp pulled out that is not good. Going to dry hop both beers to help cover this up. I think it will improve a fair amount more as time goes on. Wont ever be a good beer, but this method did make it drinkable after being horrible.

For future reference for anyone with a similar problem, this does actually work!
 
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