Just finished first brew - questions on taste

Hey all,

My brother in law and I just finished our first brew. We bought the Cooper's kit (well, he got it for his birthday a couple months ago) - it was the plain lager kit. We sterilized everything and took our time with stuff, as not to screw it up from the beginning. We left it in the primary around 22-23º C for 10 days, then transferred it to the bottles with the carbonation drops. We kept those bottles on a shelf in the pantry in the dark for another 15 days at a pretty constant temperature (only place in the house that naturally stays about 71º F).

Well, our beer is fruity. We, by no means, are upset or think our beer is ruined. We intend to drink it an enjoy it. It tastes like a Berryweis to us. Our questions are about HOW we arrived at that taste.

Did we ferment at too cool a temperature?

Did we not sterilize well enough?


Thanks in advance!

Blake

My first batch was the Coopers Real Ale and it has an off taste that might be considered fruity. I haven't had any experienced home brewers taste that batch yet to give me their opinion but I think it just might be the limit of the kit. But it could also be a few other things that I did wrong too.

I should say that I let others try it and no one complained but for me it wasn't something I was proud of.

Any number of things could be the cause:

You had a lager kit, but fermented at a temperature that was too high, even for an ale. That fruity taste is most likely because of esters, from a way too warm fermentation temperature. Keep in mind that although fermentor was keep in a room at around 70F, the actual fermentation probably raised the temperature much higher (75-80 degrees). You probably also have a hot alcohol taste as well. Temperature control is important for both ales an lagers, especially at the earliest stages of fermentation.

FYI: Lagers are typically fermented at 50-55F, and lagered at lower temps below 45F for an extended period of time.

Next, your beer is really young. It should have been kept in primary for 2 weeks at least, than lagered anywhere for another month or two. 10 days followed by bottling means your beer will be very green. That, along with the too warm fermentation means it will be awhile before this beer mellows.

My advice at this point would be to storage it somewhere cool and forget about it for a few months.

Good luck!

PS..check out Palmers "How to Brew" book while you wait for that beer to mellow. Some good info there:

How to Brew - By John Palmer - Contents

pretzelb said:

My first batch was the Coopers Real Ale and it has an off taste that might be considered fruity. I haven't had any experienced home brewers taste that batch yet to give me their opinion but I think it just might be the limit of the kit. But it could also be a few other things that I did wrong too.

I should say that I let others try it and no one complained but for me it wasn't something I was proud of.

Click to expand...

It was my first brew as well. It tempting to conclude that the kit was to blame, but I know that my brewing technique was not great at that point in time either (most notably controlling fermentation temperature).

If I recall the Coopers directions correctly, it doesn't mention anything about lager fermentation, and instead has you ferment the beer as an ale. By following the Coopers directions, there is NO WAY you are going to get anything resembling a lager! Homebrewing lagers are actually outside the range of a beginning homebrewer IMHO.

If I had my way, I'd steer people away from the coopers kits and toward the kits offered by AHS, Morebeer, Northern Brewer, etc.,

I think that Coopers lager kit actually uses a clean ale yeast. You still probably fermented a little warm and that's where the fruity esters are coming from. My experience with this is it won't age out but it is still a bit young of a beer. Give it another week and chill a few for 24 hours and taste again.

I would watch very carefully the carbonation. If over time it tends to get more and more carbonated to a point of being REALLY carbonated I would well, be careful.

PROBABLY everything is OK but 10 days to ferment and bottle is pretty quick. 3 weeks is a norm with longer being not a bad thing at all.