BPA with strong banana smell and flavor.

[Paquitin]

I brewed Jamils BPA using WLP550 and fermenting between 66-68f. After 5 days I Checked gravity and I was at 1.020, shooting for 1.010. Flavor and smell was bready and yeasty with some spiciness. A week and a half later I did a second gravity check and it's at 1.014, but now it's smells and taste like banana almost like a Bavarian hef. Temp might had drop 1 or two degrees more bc of weather. Is this normal or did something went wrong?

 

[duboman]

http://www.whitelabs.com/beer/strains_wlp550.html

I've never used this yeast but according to the posted reviews in the link it seems that the higher temps reduce the fruity, banana flavors and add spicy, peppery flavor.

I would think that what you have may mellow out during conditioning as a lot of flavors do.

 

[HerbieHowells]

I have done the exact same yeast substitute on that recipe, at similar temps. It came out a little spicy, and now that I think of it there has been a bit of banana to it, but has mellowed out quite a bit over time. It isn't going to end up as clean as De Konink, but it still a very tasty beer.

 

[bgeek]

I use the WLP550 for my BPA (Similar to Jamil's recipe with a bit more caramunich and ~1oz of carafaIII for color) and get similar flavors. The first time, fermentation temps got up to 80F and produced an extremely fruity and spicy beer. The fruitiness subsided after a couple of months, but the clove flavor remained (still good though). Second time, fermented at 68F which resulted in a clean fruitiness with a tiny hint of clove at the end. Right now I'm fermenting another batch at 72F, hoping for a little more clove. We'll see in about another week.