I did it ALL wrong, for science!

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vegas20s

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Long story, But I got a 3 year old MR. beer kit for free. I wanted to experiment a bit so If the beer stinks I only wasted my time and some stuff I already had in my cabinets. So here's all the stuff I did wrong in an effort to test the RDWHAHB mantra.


THE BAD:
3+ year old can of MR Beer Hopped Pale Ale

I used all tap water. (I live in Las Vegas our water has some peculiar smells and tastes)

I used the random pack of yeast that came with kit (yes it was 3 years old) and I used another random pack of yeast that came with another kit( It was in my fridge for a year) Made a starter out of the "booster" pack that came with kit. Mainly to make sure I had some good yeast. the yeast activated fine.

Also my pantry stays at like 75-80 degrees right now I AM NOT GOING to temp control. lets see what happens.

I would like to drink this so here is what I did to off set the potential damage.

The GOOD

Added inverted brown sugar. ( Inverting sugar is how candied sugar is made)

I added some honey at flame out

I took some pumpkin pie spices, made a tea from them and added at flame out.

I added a can of organic pumpkin at flame out. ( I did not buy this It was from my wife's Mother)

I cooled the batch to below 80 pored into a five gallon bucket and said...

RDWHAHB

I will call this brew "Chupacabra Pumpkin Ale"

It's been 24 hours now and the air lock is bubbling away. I know I will have something alcoholic in the end.
 
I have a strong feeling that this is going to be really dry.

It's cool you're testing this... unless you spent anything on it.

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to drink it. That water might affect the flavor more than you know.
 
The thing is I have not made a bad batch yet. I've had some ok brews and some really great brews. I just want to see what happens if I do some of the things we are not suppose to do. I have also read some posts where people thought they jacked every thing up and after they let it age the brew turned out ok. Maybe I just have to see things for myself to make sure it's true. No matter what I'm still having fun brewing beer.
 
vegas20s said:
The thing is I have made a bad batch yet. I've had some ok brews and some really great brews. I just want to see what happens if I do some of the things we are not suppose to do. I have also read some post where people thought they jacked every thing up and after they let it age the brew turned out ok. Maybe I just have to see things for myself to make sure it's true. No matter what I'm still having fun brewing beer.
Click to expand...

That's cool. I plan to take a little bit of beer from my next batch and oxidize the the hell out of it. It will be nice to have a side by side for education.
 
The funny thing is that I thought things started going "bad" after you started talking about "The Good". Personally, I thought you were doing OK until you started mucking with it by adding honey, spices, sugars, etc. I think that is going to be this beers undoing before any of the so-called "bad" things you mentioned!

But don't let me rain on your parade...good Luck!
 
There really is no difference between your good and bad list. And it's not so much science as it is tossing common sense aside. It's gonna be nasty if it even ferments. :)


_
 
I've made a couple of beers in a variety of ways and only 1 really turned out...badly.

The only time I've ever made a bad beer was in using commercial ice and dumping it directly into the wort to cool it. I wanted to see if I could notice a difference between my normal brews and this "super-cooling" method...I don't have the most discerning pallet, but that s*** was nasty.

But I like the attempt here. Hope it works out for ya.
 
wildwest450 said:
There really is no difference between your good and bad list. And it's not so much science as it is tossing common sense aside. It's gonna be nasty if it even ferments. :)
Click to expand...


Seems to be fermenting just fine.


I don't see why adding honey and inverted sugar is a bad thing?

As to the amount of spices I added they were well below the amounts that are used in the chai spice ale recipe, posted somewhere on HBT.

I've read both pro's and cons to the pumpkin addition in a pumpkin ale, I guess that could have been in the bad, but it was to help with any off flavors from the bad group.

I agree that it's not really science.

What I am testing is the RDWHAHB mantra. I feel this motto relies on yeast. Since I've been brewing I've come to view yeast as some of God's most magnificent creations. They are freaking awesome! I just want to see how much I can throw at them. I think I'll still have something "drinkable," maybe not great, but drinkable. But, alas I could be wrong, maybe even VERY wrong. We'll see.
 
Of all the things I've read here, I've never seen the 'F-it let's see what I can get away with' approach. I like it. I think I'm gonna favorite this one. Let us know how it turns out.
 
NPK said:
Of all the things I've read here, I've never seen the 'F-it let's see what I can get away with' approach. I like it. I think I'm gonna favorite this one. Let us know how it turns out.
Click to expand...

I like this too. It's especially great for the noobs to know that there is an endless list of things you can do wrong and still make beer.
 
A three year old kit is probably going to taste nasty, adding all that other stuff isnt going to mask the nasty base. Its kind of like polishing a turd.
 
people add spices / honey/ pumpkin/ a whole chicken all the time. though here it may be a little... unorganized? i get the best results when i keep things pretty simple. however that doesn't mean that this beer will definitely be bad. **** it could be really good who knows. it should at least be interesting. you said you were just trying to use up old stuff, so no real loss if it doesn't turn out. i'm pretty interested to hear how it turns out. the beer may be pretty murky with the pumpkin in it so don't let that scare you away. my pumpkin beer last year was great, even though it looked like river water
 
mlyday said:
I three year old kid is probably going to taste nasty, adding all that other stuff isnt going to mask the nasty base. Its kind of like polishing a turd.
Click to expand...

myth busters proved that you CAN polish a turd. (i think they used a lion turd)
 
true. but off flavors and **** flavors don't have to be the same thing. so while his beer won't fit into any style, it may still come out drinkable.
 
rycov said:
true. but off flavors and **** flavors don't have to be the same thing. so while his beer won't fit into any style, it may still come out drinkable.
Click to expand...

That's the hypothesis I'm proposing, to see if you can jack up a whole bunch of stuff and still have a brew be drinkable.
 
rycov said:
people add spices / honey/ pumpkin/ a whole chicken all the time. though here it may be a little... unorganized?
Click to expand...


I actually gave some thought thought to the spices and brown sugar. I figure the spices would help with any weird flavors from the old kit and hi temps and the brown sugar would compliment the spices. I threw the pumpkin in because I had it, other wise I would have tried to do more of a chai spice flavor.

I will admit the honey was last minute on a whim. Thought it might add some more flavors to help the pumpkin pie thing.

Funny story about chicken. I was cooling my wort via ice bath and grabed the wrong spoon off the counter. It was from dinner which was some chicken and tomato rice thing. I figured my brew was going to DIE of an infection. I never had a problem.
 
i'm sure you can. not everytime, but at least some of the time. be sure to post back when its all done!
 
I suspect it's not the ingredients that will cause the most problems. At worst, it will be a bit stale from the old kit. But the high fermentation temps will definitely produce some really weird flavors. Nevertheless, good luck on your attempt for the sake of research.
 
beerhappy said:
But the high fermentation temps will definitely produce some really weird flavors. .
Click to expand...

Down here in Southern Nevada we melt all summer long.;)

The thing is I'm lazy and it's a pain in the butt to keep my brews at or under 75 degrees. I've had a couple, although later in the fermentation process go over 75 with out having much in the way of bad results. So, is 5 degrees over the recommended 75 going to give me that much in the way of off flavors? I dunno, I want to find out though.
 
The water will probably ruin the beer if nothing else does. When I visit Vegas I have to brew coffee with bottled water or it is undrinkable.
 
themurph said:
The water will probably ruin the beer if nothing else does. When I visit Vegas I have to brew coffee with bottled water or it is undrinkable.
Click to expand...

I was thinking this myself. I'm poor though, and I drink Vegas tap water. I have a full water report and our water is safe, it's just hard and full of sulfur. So, it smells and has a sorta metal taste. Funny thing is, if you add lemon to it, it tastes just fine. My point is this: high temps may give some fruity esters which will go good with the pumpkin pie idea. Stale (old) flavor is masked by the spices a.k.a. "polishing the turd". But, the tap water with it's smells, flavors and chlorine will probably come through the most. But I'm hoping I've got enough flavor in there to mask the crap that we have for tap water. Interestingly I did add lemon and lemon peel to the spices. We'll see what happens though.
 
vegas20s said:
5 degrees over the recommended 75
Click to expand...

Not that it matters at this point, but how did you arrive at this? I'm under the impression that, aside from some very specific styles, recommended ferm temps are generally in the 60s and below.
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by vegas20s
5 degrees over the recommended 75
Not that it matters at this point, but how did you arrive at this? I'm under the impression that, aside from some very specific styles, recommended ferm temps are generally in the 60s and below.
Click to expand...
http://www.fermentis.com/fo/pdf/HB/EN/Safbrew_T-58_HB.pdf
t-58 59-75 fermentation temp range
http://www.fermentis.com/fo/pdf/HB/EN/Safale_US-05_HB.pdf
us-05 59-75 Fermentation temp range

Notty is lower I believe it is 72 max

I have not used it but I believe coopers says it's good into the high 70's

I dunno about liquid yeast I have not used any, I think if I remember right they all say up to 72 degrees with the exception of the Saison types which need fermentation brought up to the high 80's.

I have not been brewing at those temps. With notty I've been trying to keep it in the mid 60's with fementis types I've tried to keep it in the up 60's -low 70-'s range. I do this cause that is what's being suggested by other brewers on sites like this.
 
UPDATE 6-26-2011

Fermentation has started to die down. I sat there 10 min waiting for the s bend air lock to bubble again. So bubble frequency is over 10 min. This makes sense with the hi temps and all. Six days is rather quick compared to most my batches. I usually slow down around 10-15 days and bottle after 2-3 weeks. :ban:

Right now the fermenter is about 78 degrees. I would say that the fermenter never got to be more than 80. :rockin:

A note on the yeast: I know this doesn't say much, however, the smell from the rapid fermentation was something like an s-04. I would describe it as, sweet and creamy with hints of vanilla. Depending on the results I may just save some of the trub for re-pitching later on.

:off:
SIDE NOTE: The first thing I've learned, which is why I'm doing this, for the learning experience; if these are what my uncontrolled temps are I think I can use some t-58 to make some interesting saison and Belgian "type" beers.
:mug:
 
Update! I went ahead and bottled this "stuff" on Saturday. As I cracked open the fermenter. It smelled like spices and then I got hit with a cider smell. I didn't have a hydrometer when I started but I have one now. I was figuring out what the estimated OG (.48)was and realized that 3/4 of the fermentables were sugar. That and the high temps most defiantly contributed to the cider smell. The adjusted FG was .011. The taste was indeed dry and had hints of cider and spice. It did not taste like beer, but I'm going to bottle condition and see what I get. I get the feeling it would taste good with fruit juice, maybe cranberry or pine apple.

Out of all the things I did it seems the high levels of sugar was the worst thing I could have done. The tap water didn't seem to come through. The high temps seems to gave off some fruitiness but not a huge amount. And it might just have been all the sugar that made it so fruity. My first batch had 1 to 1 ratio of corn sugar to a can of Irish stout and while the up front taste was indeed a stout it finished with a cider taste.

While I'm still interested to see how this bottle conditions ( it's in extra bottles that I normally don't use so it won't be taking up space) here is what I've learned so far.

1. High temps in my pantry would probably not do that much damage and would work very well with a belgian or saison type beers.

2. I need to stop adding sugars to my beers unless appropriate for the style and when I do make sure I don't over do it.

3.My tap water isn't that bad of a thing for brewing.

4. I don't really have a good Idea of what the old malt from mr. beer did to the flavor. I think it was over powered by the sugars.

5. Both pumpkin and spices were not present enough to give a good spice flavor. There is the smell of spices but not so much taste. This was a 3 1/2 gallon batch I think I would have to add considerable more spices to get any hints of flavor out of my usual 7 gallon batch.


That's it for now I'll keep you updated as I start experimenting with the stuff in bottles.
 
Subscribed. Would love to know how it turns out...

It would be hilarious if this somehow turned out the best beer you've made, good luck recreating it!
 
I'm done stuff like this a few times. Every single one of the beers i've ever made has used either pittsburgh, philadelphia or Camden NJ municipal tap water, and have all come out fine. I also don't have and have never had AC or any kind of temp control and even use liquid yeast which is supposed to have a lower temp range, and it all comes out great. I think it may be harder to make bad beer then good beer, think about all the stuff they used to not control in the hundreds of years of brewing beer (including in mesopotamia and ancient egypt) and it still came out great.
 
I'm all for the RDWHAHB philosophy, but I hope no noobs take all the wrong lessons away from this thread. What I see here is someone who intentionally did things as poorly as they could, and ended up with something that by their own admission doesn't taste like beer. All that's been proven here is what you see in countless other threads, that all the "good" processes that are recommended on here for making beer actually do make a difference. Since this is what the OP said they were testing I'd call the experiment a success, but not one I'd want to drink.
 
stageseven said:
I'm all for the RDWHAHB philosophy, but I hope no noobs take all the wrong lessons away from this thread. What I see here is someone who intentionally did things as poorly as they could, and ended up with something that by their own admission doesn't taste like beer. All that's been proven here is what you see in countless other threads, that all the "good" processes that are recommended on here for making beer actually do make a difference. Since this is what the OP said they were testing I'd call the experiment a success, but not one I'd want to drink.
Click to expand...


I would actually like to try this again but with out using sugar (it would have to be with free ingredients again). I think the sugar at a 3 to 1 ratio was the nail in the coffin.

That being said I still bottled this and I'm going to give it some time to conditon to see what I get. I don't expect miraculous results but if I get something that tastes better than lite beer I'll be happy.

I am still pretty new at this, I've only been home brewing for about a year and I am still learning and improving. What I would like to say is that most of what I've learned about my process has been from advice on HBT. I have not brewed a bad batch of beer, until I brewed this batch where I intentionally ignored that great advice. The lesson for all you new brewers is this: If you want good and even great tasting beer listen to wonderful help you get on HBT.

BUT, if you are like me and you like to know what makes things tick (I'm an equipment mechanic) then you can't help but want to know how far you can bend the rules before something goes wrong. By doing that you will learn, you may not want to drink what you learn, but you will learn. And just for the record I will drink this batch to the last drop. I may cut it with apple juice or something, but I will drink it. Some how I feel it would be wrong not to.:mug:
 
Full disclosure: I have not been drinking much beer at all due to a sinus infection. Last beer before this was 2 weeks ago. That being said I Drank a bottle the other night. It's been in bottles for about 2 weeks. And guess what? It's starting to taste like beer. Not great beer mind you but beer none the less. I tried to get the wife to taste it, (she will NOT drink beer) and in her words "it smells like beer. :)

The head dissipated fast. The nose was very yeasty. It doesn't have any over powering tastes. It has mild caramel notes and is kind of watery. It made me think of a "light" beer but with hints of malty caramel. Since I only used one can of mr. beer pre hopped to 3.5 gallons of wort, it is incredibly under hopped. If finishes with hints of spice and fruitiness that are not unpleasant. :D

If 10 is the best beer I've ever had and 1 is the worst this beer is some where around 4-5. :mug:

I think I could probable serve this to other folks who prefer in-bev style beer and they my in fact like it. :ban:

I don't plan on drinking this too much so it will be interesting to see how it ages. :mug:

Not the best pic but it gives you the idea.
PICT0028-1.jpg
 

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