Buttery Bad Taste

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Trokair

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 28, 2011
Messages
157
Reaction score
6
Location
Bristow
So I just finished bottling my first beer. It was an extract Belgian Dubbel. Sat in primary for 60 days. Went to test it and it tasted like butter and alcohol. I had just bottled my first wine a week before and got the same taste in the wine. Anyone have any idea what this is? The equipment, water, sanitizer (star san), and the airlock medium (vodka) were all the same for both. Help!!
 
This was this a lager? It sounds like you didn't do a D rest. If I was an ale then you left it in the primary too long and possibly autolysis. What temp did you ferment at we need more info

Belgian Dubbel Ale, no D rest necessary. Fermenting temp was between 65 and 70 the entire time.
 
Boil with the lid on? Take a long time to cool wort?
Ferment in a country crock bucket? J/k
 
This was this a lager? It sounds like you didn't do a D rest. If I was an ale then you left it in the primary too long and possibly autolysis. What temp did you ferment at we need more info

It is not from leaving it on the yeast too long. I leave big beers on the yeast for a long time on a regular basis.

We do need more info about the recipe and your process to help us figure it out.

How long has it been bottled? Belgians seem to need some time in the bottle to mellow out the flavors. If it is young, just let it sit and the flavor will mellow.
 
It is not from leaving it on the yeast too long. I leave big beers on the yeast for a long time on a regular basis.

We do need more info about the recipe and your process to help us figure it out.

How long has it been bottled? Belgians seem to need some time in the bottle to mellow out the flavors. If it is young, just let it sit and the flavor will mellow.

It is young, was not boiled with the lid on, did take a fairly long ammount of time to cool (not chiller yet). I was hoping that taste would mellow out of the wine but now that it is in my beer as well I am dreading something of a more sinister nature.
 
Boil with the lid on? Take a long time to cool wort?
Ferment in a country crock bucket? J/k

Those would produce DMS not diacetyl which is what the buttery taste would be as opposed to the corn like flavor dms would produce. Diacetyl is either produced because the yeast didn't get enough time to eat of the diacetyl they produced or theres a pediococcus infection which can also produce diacetyl.
 
Those would produce DMS not diacetyl which is what the buttery taste would be as opposed to the corn like flavor dms would produce. Diacetyl is either produced because the yeast didn't get enough time to eat of the diacetyl they produced or theres a pediococcus infection which can also produce diacetyl.

Would pediococcus normally have visible signs? And would it survive in higher percentages of alchohol like in wine? I didn't have any floaters in the beer and the wine was crystal clear.
 
Well just a bit more detail please sir :). How long is long on your cooling process? When sanitizing equipment is it a dunk or do you let it soak and or just stay wet with the starsan?
 
grouperdude said:
This was this a lager? It sounds like you didn't do a D rest. If I was an ale then you left it in the primary too long and possibly autolysis. What temp did you ferment at we need more info

Absolutely not. Diacetyl is what causes the buttery flavor. It's typically caused by under aerating the yeast or not leaving it in the primary until primary fermentation is complete. It is not related to autolysis. It can also be caused by fermenting at too low a temp...
 
chill it and re-taste. Diacetyl is more pronounced at warmer temps. many people making lagers will pull a sample, warm it up and taste it to see if a D-rest is needed.

Also, do other people taste this (don't ask them if they taste butter...have them taste it and then honestly tell you what they detect).
Diacetyl also can have a slick mouthfeel in addition to the flavor...do you detect this?
 
I will test it after chilling when i get back into town. Nobody else has tried it yet to give me their opinion. Im not sure of the exact time to cool but i was using the ice bath method and i think it took at least 30 minutes.
 
Chilling wouldn't have anything to do with the buttery flavor you're getting. It's a problem with fermentation or infection. You may have posted this, but what yeast strain did you use, what was your fermentation temp, and for how long?
 
Diacetyl is sometimes a common flavor in some ale yeast strains (notably ringwood ale yeast), but for the most part it's a flaw. A couple of causes are stressed yeast and infection like mentioned.

Underpitching of yeast, and variations in temperature can cause it, as can cold crashing too soon. I don't know if two months in the primary can cause it, although it could. Lack of aeration could definitely cause diacetyl production, and can too-high fermentation temperatures (again, a stressed yeast reaction).

Normally, the yeast create diacetyl as a byproduct of fermentation. Some yeast strains are especially prone to this and usually after active fermentation is done the yeast will go back and digest some of their own waste products like diacetyl. But if the yeast is underpitched, it may be too worn out to go back and finish up the "clean up" so to speak. Fermentation temperatures are generally raised right at the tail end of fermentation, to encourage the yeast to finish up and get to the FG and then clean up any diacetyl. If the fermenter got cold at that time, it would inhibit this process.

I've never left a beer in the primary for two months, but in theory that could be a factor as diacetyl is a byproduct of yeast activity. Some English strains have notable diacetyl production, and I've had issues with it in some lager strains and even a hybrid lager strain (San Francisco lager yeast).
 
I would think sitting on a yeast cake for too long wouldn't result in diacetyl. I doubt there could be enough production by any new yeast that has grown up to produce it. The only risk of leaving it on two long would be autolysis. I've seen plenty of ales left on yeast cakes much longer than two months without an evidence of autolysis though. I'm not hugely experienced though. If someone else has heard of diacetyl from leaving on a yeast cake too long I won't refute it.
 
Update on the butter flavor. It has mostly aged out of the beer after a few weeks in the bottle. There is still a little of the taste on the back end of a drink but not noticeable unless you are looking for it. Now i just have a really hoppy Belgian dubbel. Didn't strain the wort when i put it in primary. Hopefully that will mellow out with a few more weeks in the bottle. Thanks everyone for the input.
 
Not straining the hops out of the wort will not make any difference in the hop level. Every day the hop taste will get a little less.
 
Back
Top