randerson81873
Member
- Joined
- Apr 13, 2022
- Messages
- 13
- Reaction score
- 6
I’ve been brewing for a couple years, but my brews have been about 50/50 for having the same terrible off taste to varying degrees from “drinkable” to throwing out the batch. I’ve tried varying a number of things but the inconsistency in how it shows up is making it difficult and really frustrating in identifying what is causing it. I’ve researched as much as I can but it’s hard to google a taste and I don’t feel like it really matches most of the descriptions out there, so hoping to find some advice here!
I brew almost exclusively ipas, with the occasional wheat or stout, but usually very hoppy beers and almost always involving a dry hop. I use the anvil foundry electric kettle and ferment currently in glass carboys, previously in plastic buckets from northern brewer. I’ve done shorter fermentations, as short as 2 weeks, in just a primary and have transferred to a secondary to varying lengths, as long as 2 months, but that seems to have no affect on the bad taste showing up. I keg but I always try the flat beer before transferring to a keg and the bad taste will be present before it goes in the keg so I don’t think any of that process is relevant.
The flavor is hard to describe, it’s a very dry, and pungent taste, a little plastic-y and almost like really cheap and terrible vodka or something that came out of a plastic bottle that you can taste a bit. I will say I think it has something to do with the yeast, after I transfer the beer when it’s done fermenting, the yeast at the bottom reeks of the smell of the same taste, and in the plastic buckets even after they have been scrubbed, cleaned, sanitized, and dried, weeks later it will still have a faint hint of the same smell in it. I was rewashing and sanitizing before using them again on brew days but that’s the reason I switched to glass. I’ve only done a couple brews in glass, the first two were great, no problems, but this last 3rd one has the same bad taste again, bad enough I can’t even finish a glass of it, I’m letting it sit in the keg for a bit just to see but I’m likely going to dump it.
I used to live in Arkansas, after troubleshooting for a while I determined it was possibly the chlorine treatment in the water reacting with the yeast, brewing with packaged water didn’t reproduce the taste. But since then I’ve moved to Boise and have been using water from a glacier water dispenser outside an Albertsons, which I used for the last 3 brews in the glass carboys and this last one reproduced the same bad taste again.
I’m mostly brewing with safale 05, I almost always use them right away, but if not then they stay refrigerated and don’t expire. But I’ve gotten the same bad taste with other yeasts. I let them warm to room temp before use and I usually just pour the dry yeast into the wort once it’s cooled to lukewarm and transferred into the carboy. I lift the kettle up onto the counter and let it pour through the spigot into the carboy with enough height that it foams and oxygenates really well, fermentation always kicks off really strong and appears to be doing well every time. There are never questionable findings in the carboy to suggest mold or infection.
I sanitize with star San, I wash all brew parts with soap and water and then a pbw soak. My next thing I was going to try is going back to packaged water for a bit until if or when the bad taste shows up again, but I’d prefer using a cheaper and simpler source then having to buy gallons of water for every brew day.
Overal just frustrated with not being able to kick this bad taste and looking for any advice on what to try next! I don’t want to dump any more batches!
I brew almost exclusively ipas, with the occasional wheat or stout, but usually very hoppy beers and almost always involving a dry hop. I use the anvil foundry electric kettle and ferment currently in glass carboys, previously in plastic buckets from northern brewer. I’ve done shorter fermentations, as short as 2 weeks, in just a primary and have transferred to a secondary to varying lengths, as long as 2 months, but that seems to have no affect on the bad taste showing up. I keg but I always try the flat beer before transferring to a keg and the bad taste will be present before it goes in the keg so I don’t think any of that process is relevant.
The flavor is hard to describe, it’s a very dry, and pungent taste, a little plastic-y and almost like really cheap and terrible vodka or something that came out of a plastic bottle that you can taste a bit. I will say I think it has something to do with the yeast, after I transfer the beer when it’s done fermenting, the yeast at the bottom reeks of the smell of the same taste, and in the plastic buckets even after they have been scrubbed, cleaned, sanitized, and dried, weeks later it will still have a faint hint of the same smell in it. I was rewashing and sanitizing before using them again on brew days but that’s the reason I switched to glass. I’ve only done a couple brews in glass, the first two were great, no problems, but this last 3rd one has the same bad taste again, bad enough I can’t even finish a glass of it, I’m letting it sit in the keg for a bit just to see but I’m likely going to dump it.
I used to live in Arkansas, after troubleshooting for a while I determined it was possibly the chlorine treatment in the water reacting with the yeast, brewing with packaged water didn’t reproduce the taste. But since then I’ve moved to Boise and have been using water from a glacier water dispenser outside an Albertsons, which I used for the last 3 brews in the glass carboys and this last one reproduced the same bad taste again.
I’m mostly brewing with safale 05, I almost always use them right away, but if not then they stay refrigerated and don’t expire. But I’ve gotten the same bad taste with other yeasts. I let them warm to room temp before use and I usually just pour the dry yeast into the wort once it’s cooled to lukewarm and transferred into the carboy. I lift the kettle up onto the counter and let it pour through the spigot into the carboy with enough height that it foams and oxygenates really well, fermentation always kicks off really strong and appears to be doing well every time. There are never questionable findings in the carboy to suggest mold or infection.
I sanitize with star San, I wash all brew parts with soap and water and then a pbw soak. My next thing I was going to try is going back to packaged water for a bit until if or when the bad taste shows up again, but I’d prefer using a cheaper and simpler source then having to buy gallons of water for every brew day.
Overal just frustrated with not being able to kick this bad taste and looking for any advice on what to try next! I don’t want to dump any more batches!