Question for people who have kegged and bottled...

Would you argue that you can taste the priming sugar in bottled beers... vs kegging that uses force carbonation?

One of the local brewers down the street from me says he can. I honestly cannot.

No..........

I started kegging back in february and I can't tell the difference.

priming sugar ferments nearly completely, so what's left behind to taste is a little more alcohol than the beer had at the start.

But, perhaps he is a super taster and can detect the tiny bit of stuff left behind from the corn sugar?

Give him a test. Have some one pour samples of some force carbed beers as well as samples of several beers carbed in the bottle with sugar.

Then you give him all the samples, let him taste, and have him divide them into two groups.

If he can really taste the sugar, then it doesn't even matter what styles all of the beers are. They can all be totally different.

Well he kegs, and he's been giving samples from some friends (myself included) who all bottle... he swears by it. He's even bottled at home.

So here's a question. All the kits at the LHBS come with 5oz sugar... beersmith usually calls for around 4oz. What happens with that extra oz... does the beer still carbonate the same? Or does it sweeten the beer. I can't imagine 1 oz impacts 5 gallons. Are all bottle priming methods sugar based?

wookiemofo said:

Well he kegs, and he's been giving samples from some friends (myself included) who all bottle... he swears by it. He's even bottled at home.

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Yeah, but in all those cases, he ALREADY knows which beers are force carbed and which are bottle conditioned. I say give him the blind test and see if he can really tell the difference.

wookiemofo said:

So here's a question. All the kits at the LHBS come with 5oz sugar... beersmith usually calls for around 4oz. What happens with that extra oz... does the beer still carbonate the same? Or does it sweeten the beer. I can't imagine 1 oz impacts 5 gallons. Are all bottle priming methods sugar based?

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The 5th ounce ferments just like the first 4 ounces do. This will give more carbonation. It doesn't hang around to sweeten anything. Yeast eat everything they can.

My guess is that the kits come with 5 oz because some people might want higher levels of carbonation that others. You should use the right amount of sugar to get the level of CO2 that you want in the end.

I should also note, I gave him a bottle of a cascade pale ale that was dry hopped with an ounce of cascade. He came back telling me the aroma was pin point to vanilla cake frosting.

So he either has extremely refined senses and relates cascade hops to vanilla frosting, or things taste/smells sweeter then they are!

I did critique the beer after his assessment, and I will admit that I can see how he could conclude that aroma. But to me it's straight cascade hops.

Give him a bottle filled from a keg...see if he can still taste the sugar that isnt there

If there is a difference it's so slight that it's really not worth talking about.

Throw this into the mix: keg beer carbonated with priming sugar!

I can't taste the priming sugar in bottles beers, but I do notice a smoother carbonation. It may be in my head, but a lot of my bottle conditioned have a smoother texture than the kegged versions. I still keg most of my beers though, except belgians and wheat beers.