Cidery odor/watery body

First time brewing.. used an IPA kit that contained the following:

6.6lbs canned light LME
1lb Golden DME
1lb Caramel 40L
8oz Victory

1.5oz Columbus pellets (bittering)
2oz Cascade pellets (bittering)
1oz Cascade (aroma)

11g Nottingham yeast

Also threw in 1/2 oz of summit whole cone, for first 30 min of boil.

Primary was done in a 6.5 gallon plastic fermenting bucket. It was a warm day, and I can't really run AC all day. The 2nd night after pitching the yeast, they bucket reached 79 degrees. I'm thinking this is where things went bad. The fermentation became very aggressive, pushing foam out of the airlock. I had to run vinyl tubing to a seperate vessel and submerge it. Not sure why it got so aggressive. Since then, the brew has had an overwhelming cider smell. I have read that this can be caused by use of refined sugar in the wort (I didnt use any) or bacterial contamination.

On top of that, when I transferred it to the secondary (5 gal glass carboy), I took a FG reading, everything was okay. I tried a little sample of the brew - very VERY watery body. Almost no sweetness to the body; no flavor! What the heck can I do at this point? Im about 3 days from bottling.. maybe someone can shoot me some advice. tips for next time, why is it watery? hmm.. I know I went a little far for a first time brew, but I like to cast myself out sometimes

In my experience, Nottingham isn't very tolerant of high temperatures. Violent fermentation and funky aromas sounds very familiar (unfortunately). Search this forum for a thread on how to set up a swamp cooler to keep your temps under control next time. It should work like a charm in SoCal.

But to try to fix this brew, I'd keep it at whatever temperature it's at and hold off on bottling for a couple of weeks to see if the off flavors / aromas fade. If it's getting better, keep waiting. If it's the same, just bottle it up and hope it tastes better cold and fizzy.

As for the watery body, it's probably just because it isn't carbonated. It's pretty common for beers to taste like that out of the fermenter.

That makes good sense.. thanks for the help. What would you recommend for a better yeast, next time around? Munich? Windsor? I just used what camke with the kit. The kit said dont bother rehydrating the yeast prior to pitching, which is a conflicting suggestion, considering the yeast sachet says to do such.

I have been told that liquid yeast cultures can work wonders. The numbers just confuse me..

BitterBomz said:

That makes good sense.. thanks for the help. What would you recommend for a better yeast, next time around? Munich? Windsor? I just used what camke with the kit. The kit said dont bother rehydrating the yeast prior to pitching, which is a conflicting suggestion, considering the yeast sachet says to do such.

I have been told that liquid yeast cultures can work wonders. The numbers just confuse me..

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Windsor yeast isn't very good for most beers, as it doesn't attenuate well and gets really estery (fruity) at higher temperatures. Munich yeast is good for yeast beers, with a distinctive banana flavor.

Nottingham has is a fine neutral yeast, but you must keep it under about 70 degrees (beer temperature, not ambient). After about 72 degrees, it gets pretty foul.

Most ale yeast strains require fermentation temperatures in the mid - high 60s. If you can go no lower than 72 degrees you could try dry S05 yeast. It's pretty "clean" up to about 74 degrees.

Just switch to belgians, a lot of Belgian yeasts produce delicious estery beers at higher temperatures

Yooper isn't S05 the same as Cal Ale White labs?

I had a pretty good result with a Bourbon Vanilla Imperial Porter that stayed around 74 with WLP001