Is it moldy? Is it safe to consume?

[aldioparuna]

Hi all forum members,

I'd like to ask whether my beer is safe to consume as this is the first time i encountered something white floating on my fermenter.

It all happened couple days after I put toasted dessicated coconut into my fermenter which has been fermenting for 5 days.

Here was my recipe that I used
- Pale ale malt
- Carared
- Munich Malt type 2
- Rolled oat
- Honey
- Toasted coconut (boil)
- Toasted coconut (dry-hop after 5 days in fermenter)

Would really appreciate any answer

 

[Sammy86]

Tough to tell…looks like pelicle starting to form but could also be the coconut floaties.

I think you need another opinion

 

[aldioparuna]

Tough to tell…looks like pelicle starting to form but could also be the coconut floaties.

I think you need another opinion

The coconut was put in a hop bag, might as well some fine particles escape and floating is it?

Just need to know whether it is safe or not haha

 

[Sammy86]

The coconut was put in a hop bag, might as well some fine particles escape and floating is it?

Just need to know whether it is safe or not haha

Its safe but its not going to taste good…the pellicle will sour your beer quickly.

You can keg/bottle quickly from below the white stuff and see what you get or in my opinion dump it, washing everything thats come into contact with that beer extremely well with some potent stuff to kill any bacteria in there and try again.

Don’t be surprised if you’re buying a new bucket/fermentor

 

[Kickass]

Its safe but its not going to taste good…the pellicle will sour your beer quickly.

I disagree with this statement. It might not be good but it might also be just fine. I’ve had contaminated beers that had no negative flavor impact.

Yes, it’s safe to drink. Alcohol and low ph make fermented beverages almost bullet proof.

The presence of a pellicle does not mean your beer will have undesirable flavors. It simply means some other single cell organism, similar to brewers yeast, made its way into your beer. Likely from the coconut.

If it tastes good drink it.

 

[aldioparuna]

Here's how it's look like when the fermenter open. The big floating white stuff is the coconut bag

 

[gunhaus]

Looks like fat from the coconut - but it may be an infection.

 

[madscientist451]

Pull a sample, and taste a small amount. If you don’t like it, no point in assuming any more risk. If it’s ok, go ahead and keg or bottle it.

 

[Brewdog80]

Yep, only YOU can determine taste. Pull a sample, try it. Obviously flat, but you should be able to tell about off flavors.

 

[hotbeer]

You never know for certain till it's finished whether it'll be good or not. And that includes bottling/kegging and appropriate conditioning time.

Infections... if it is infected, just mean that there are wild yeast or bacteria in there that got a good enough hold on things to change the beer slightly or greatly from what it was intended to be. Infection does not mean poisonous.

While your first picture looked a little ominous with the blackish look, the last picture looks fine. I wouldn't be worried if it were mine. Whether infected or not, I'd always proceed as normal. There isn't much of anything reasonable that you can do at this stage other than the same thing you do for beer that isn't infected. Wait and see what it's like when you try that first glass of it.

 

[AmarikinBrew]

Skull crawlers, from tropical environment. They will invade your skull thinking it's a coconut.

 

[AmarikinBrew]

Since you toasted the coconut, did you immediately add and made sure no contamination beforehand happened?

 

[JAReeves]

Sometimes, infections can be happy accidents. Unless it's black or red mold, it shouldn't hurt anyone. So if it tastes good, cool. If not, clean everything well and hope you knocked it out, or buy new plastic/vinyl/silicon.

 

[AmarikinBrew]

Well that ARTificial FRO is a big mistake, pardon the pun.