Beer getting bitter in bottle???

[RBrewing]

Hello fellow brewers,
I brewed an imperial IPA and it was bottles 4-5 weeks ago. It was tasting superb and I had a few friends over last weekend and it was perfect. I had a bottle in the fridge and I drank it yesterday and it was bitter as heck. It holds a 2-3 finger head, has lots of lacing and mouthfeel. Any ideas? My first beer, bottled 6 weeks ago, a brown ale, has started to bitter as well. All of my other 11 brews are great just a bittering issue with these 2. The brown ale was a DME with specialty grains beer and the ipa was my own recipe as a partial mash...Any help would be appreciated. Cheers

 

[passedpawn]

Is it getting "thinner"? A wild yeast infection will slowly cause beers to get thinner, gusher when opened, and seem more bitter since some of the non-fermentable sugars that add body and sweetness are being fermented in the bottle.

 

[RBrewing]

Thanks passedpawn. No, the mouthfeel is quite thick and nice. I did notice this: My wife and just popped open a room temp bottle and it taste perfect. When I chill one in the fridge it gets bitter? Not sure why.

 

[RBrewing]

Here is a pic....

 

[Yooper]

The only thing I can think of is that IPAs ARE bitter. But they have flavor and aroma that is awesome for balance.

IPAs are beers that are best when fresh, as the flavor and aroma hops fade quite a bit with some time and all that seems to be left is the malt and the bitter.

 

[RBrewing]

Yooper,
Thanks...why would it get bitter after chilling overnight? Maybe chill hazing causing off flavors?

 

[Yooper]

Yooper,
Thanks...why would it get bitter after chilling overnight?

I don't think it's really more bitter. Try pouring it and the letting it warm.

What happens with colder beer, some taste perceptions are dulled. A beer "opens up" when warmer, and many beers are served too cold anyway. If may taste more bitter because the hops aroma and flavor, already fading, are not present in a very cold beer. But if you pour it and let it warm up, maybe it won't taste as bitter if you have the aroma.

 

[RBrewing]

I will give it a try....Its really a noticeable difference from last week. It was so smooth and well balanced, this week it is bitter as heck.
Thanks again.

 

[Yooper]

I will give it a try....Its really a noticeable difference from last week. It was so smooth and well balanced, this week it is bitter as heck.

That's such a marked change. I don't really know why it would happen that fast, but I do know that hops aroma and flavor fade really fast in an IPA.

Another wild guess could be that there is a ton of bitter sediment causing some off-flavor, but that doesn't appear to be the case in your photo.

 

[MrVix]

I had the exact same thing happen to a simple willamette pale ale. I used the same sanitizing process, brewed the same, fermented, bottled, and conditioned the same way. The first couple bottles were excelent, the rest were very bitter. The only variable was the yeast that I used. I chalked it up to some bad yeast.

 

[RBrewing]

Considering this was my second brew, many things could have happened. I did dry hop quite a bit, and added a ton of honey in second ferm as well. Just strange that the flavor profile would change so drastic in one week.

 

[MrVix]

I have been homebrewing for over 37 years. I got started with my Grandfather. He fermented in a 10 gallon ceramic crock with a piece of plate glass for a lid with NO AIRLOCK! He sanitized with 1 oz of bleach in a gallon of water. He seperated and reused his yeast. I can never remember him ever losing a single batch of brew. I exercize extreme care thru all of my processes and I have still lost batches. I don't know, sometimes it must be either dumb luck or bad luck.

 

[RBrewing]

Very True....I think sometimes we tend to try and sanitize to much...Goes to show you, the old school way always works. I use bleach and water in bucket for my hoses and star san for everything else..