WHat caused this taste ...

First, the recipe ...

It was a Brewer's Best kit, German Altbier Style:

3.3lbs Light LME
3.3lbs Amber LME
12oz Crystal 60L
1oz Black Patent

1oz Cluster hops 60 minutes
1/2oz Hallertau Hops 5 minutes

Dried yeast

It's a real sharp taste, overpoweringly bitter and leaves a pretty nasty aftertaste.

Here's my log ...


Brew Day - 9/29/05

Followed the Brewers Best directions pretty close.

I used bottles water throughout with the exception of the sanitization bucket (bottling bucket). Let everything soak in there for a couple of hours before I began prep.

Rehydrated the yeast about 15 minutes into the boil, poured in a spoonful of wort about 30 minutes later. I did notice the yeast starting to churn.

The wort (starting off with 2.5 gallons) was cooled to less than 100* before mixing in with the remaining water. The primary fermintation bucket was topped off to the 5 gallon mark. Took sample with thief, hydrometer reading was 1054.

Yeast was pitched, bucket sealed and put in closet.


10-1-5
Racked to secondary. Took sample, gravity was 1015.

Beer tasted much better than the raw sample. Smelled like beer also, still a bit yeasty tasting.


10-5-5
Smells more and more like beer. Tasted even better than before. Has a beer like aftertaste now rather than a harsh taste to it.
Gravity read 1.015

10-11-05 -Bottling day-
Tastes much smoother. Gravity was 1.014

Might be worth mentioning too ... the wort was pretty unbearable to drink, not sure if that's suppose to be the case or not.

I'm guessing the black pattent. That stuff gives a charcoal flavor.

I'd need more diagnosis on this, but......

....I doubt it is the Black Patent cause an ounce isn't enough to do that, IMHO. I'd lean more towards what he is describing as astringent.

Here is what Palmer says:
Astringent
Astringency differs from bitterness by having a puckering quality, like sucking on a tea bag. It is dry, kind of powdery and is often the result of steeping grains too long or when the pH of the mash exceeds the range of 5.2 - 5.6. Oversparging the mash or using water that is too hot are common causes for exceeding the mash pH range. It can also be caused by over-hopping during either the bittering or finishing stages. Bacterial infections can also cause astringency, i.e. vinegar tones from aceto bacteria.

Is that it?

ORRELSE said:

I'd need more diagnosis on this, but......

....I doubt it is the Black Patent cause an ounce isn't enough to do that, IMHO. I'd lean more towards what he is describing as astringent.

Here is what Palmer says:
Astringent
Astringency differs from bitterness by having a puckering quality, like sucking on a tea bag. It is dry, kind of powdery and is often the result of steeping grains too long or when the pH of the mash exceeds the range of 5.2 - 5.6. Oversparging the mash or using water that is too hot are common causes for exceeding the mash pH range. It can also be caused by over-hopping during either the bittering or finishing stages. Bacterial infections can also cause astringency, i.e. vinegar tones from aceto bacteria.

Is that it?

Click to expand...

Yea, you're probly right. I'm guessing the kit told him ot boil his grains and without enough grain to alter the PH of the liquid, tannin extraction.

Has this been bottled yet?

There is a kind of fining that is used (mostly in wine) to remove tannins. The tannic taste may eventually settle out on it's own anyway.

If my brain was working I could remembeer which ones reduce tannin... Sparkoloid maybe? Yeesh, I should know this! Fssstt.. (sound of brain burningout. not enough sleep). :cross:

[EDIT: Gelatin, Sparkolid, Polyclar, Chitosan or any positively charged fining should reduce tannin levels.]

ORRELSE, I thought of that. The grains were steeped by droppoing them into the boil ~2.5 gallons, and bringing up to 170*, then removing them. I don't think that's it, but my experience doesn't give me a lot of say in the matter. Although ... if the lack of a good steeping made the grainy taste week, then the hops could have become overpowering I guess???

I can't rule out the bacterial infection. I'd like to think that that's not it, but I can't definatively rule that out.

Yes .. it's been bottled. The last date listed on the log was bottle day. I left that out.

I do think that oxidation could be it, but I don't think the flavors follow that. I aerated the wort at somewhere around 90-95* instead of less than 80*.

Was it good tasting at the time of bottling, but now tastes bad?

If the flavor is due to tannins (make some strong tea for comparison), then finings like polyclar would have helped. Once bottled there isn't much you can do. Bottled water is a good idea if your local water tastes bad, but it will probably have a pH around 7.0. I use 5.2 to control pH in both the mash and in my sparge water. I suspect that it would be even more critical to use it when steeping specialty grains, since there isn't any pale to buffer the water.

Polyclar
Polyvinylpolypyrrolidone food grade. Polyclar VT

Stabilising additive for wine or beer. Removes polyphenolic compounds and oxidised melanoidins. This means that when used in beer it will remove haze-causing husk tannins and oxidised compounds that contribute to off flavours.

I'm not familiar with the Brewer's Best procedure...at what point did you add the LME? If you added the hops at 60 minutes to just your steeped water without any LME you could have extracted some tannins from the hops. Otherwise it may be something in your steeping procedure.

I have some oak stout bottled now that suffers some from the oak tannins (used too much, I believe) in the aftertaste, but it's definitely abating week by week. I'd give your beer some time.

If it's an infection you should see a ring around the neck where the beer level was.

It's also possible that you had a bad batch of LME. or hops?

Local water sucks .. we had a letter in the mail from the city a while back that said in many more more words, our water's toxic, can caiuse cancer, liver, kidney, nervous system problems, and something else because it comes from the paper mill's waste water, but not to worry, this is only caused over long term effect. THe EPA just recently *read before year 2000* started monitoring these levels that are more than 3 times what they should be.

Needless to say ... we don't use the tap water without filtration. I'm not about to sit at the fridge and fill up a pot with 5 gallons. So ... bottled water it is. It's cheap bottled water though, think I'm gonna try some better this next brew.

Adding LME ... the grains are steeped as described before, removed, brought to a boil, remove from heat, pour in LME. Bring back to boil, then add hops.

no rim around the bottles ...

Flyer, what was the yeast strain? Did you have a lag in your fermentation. I suspect infection. Your log looks ok to me. Think you got a hold of some fuglies.

Lag time was minimal. It had a good strong fermintation.

FWIW ... it cooks really well. Has a good flavor when its used to cook with. I just fried some fish using the beer as a batter and have boiled some Lil' Smokies with it before. The fish was damn good, and the smokies were pretty good as well.

What brand of bottled water is it? Some have some odd chemicals added. Should be ok with reverse osmosis or other filtered waters.

Someone mentioned walmart water and some local water systems use a substance that is simular ot clorine but doesn't boil out. But that should be a whole differant flavor issue.

WalMart water ... small town, aint nothing else here. Population ... less than 5k. *pulling out hair*

Let me take a guess...is the flavor anything like vinegar?

Could be you didn't rinse all the bleach off of your equipment/fermenter.

On another thread recently (I can't find it or I'd post the link) there was mention of problems with bottled water from walmart in that it a used chemical in it that is like chlorine but does not boil out.

Can anyone else here confirm that?

[Edit: Chloramide or Chloramine are two names for the chemical. Can anyone confirm it is in walmart water?]

Denny's Brew said:

On another thread recently (I can't find it or I'd post the link) there was mention of problems with bottled water from walmart in that it a used chemical in it that is like chlorine but does not boil out.

Can anyone else here confirm that?

[Edit: Chloramide or Chloramine are two names for the chemical. Can anyone confirm it is in walmart water?]

Click to expand...

There is no chlorine or chloramine in Wal-Mart bottled water...at least if the labels can be believed.

It's no bleach ... I used no rinse sanitizer for this one.

The second one I used bleach on. I popped the top prematurely on a bottle tonite. It's got a little bit of a harsh taste, NOTHING like the first batch though. I think it might just need to age a little more. It was drinkable.

Maybe it's just the hops? Check another bottle in a week or so and see if it gets better.

Good luck.

If I didn't know any better it IS mellowing out a little. I've gone through almost a whole case and have only drinken one or 2 of them. I cooked a huge pot of chilli with the beer last night. I'll let ya'll know how it turns out later.

I did try one from the 2nd batch last night too. It's not got the horrid taste the 1st batch does, but still needs some time in the bottle. It had a little psst to it, but not a whole lot at all.

i had an brewer best kit do that as well an amber vary yeasty taste and chilled hoppy taste ......i let bottled for 6 months and then iced the bottles down for 1/2 hour and man that was good beer but i had to wait 6 months to get a good taste out of it. some beers are that way i dont know why. this also was my first batch i did and darn i allmost gave up but i glad i did not.

i have only been doing this , well this will be my 3rd year 15 brews under my belt only. i a bock have a alcohol level of 12% that one was nuts but vary good......the taste will mellow out after a bit.........

ps flyer you sound like me i did the same thing with the batch i had

sorry it was late.....

uhhh... croba50, man? you talking to yourself?

Maybe that funny taste is from the half pound of hallucinogenic fungus in his beer?

Magic Mushrooms are NOT on TTB's list of approved ingredients.