kolsch yeast oktoberfest taste on bottling day

[ekjohns]

So i did an oktoberfest with kolsch yeast and let it ferment for 2 weeks in primary. On bottling day it tasted kinda tart and overly sweet. I know there is alot of conditioning that needs to be done but i was wondering if alot of the flavor has to do with the high (upper 60s F) temp with the kolsch yeast. wyeast says the yeast is good with low esters up to 70 so i was not as anal about keeping it down in the low 60s. thought?

 

[dontman]

It really is impossible to diagnose any off flavors at this early stage. Give it 6 weeks in a cold environment and then bottle or keg and then wait 3 weeks and it will be ready to drink for better or worse. You should be fine with that temp and you should definitely be fine once it has had a chance to lager and mellow.

My kolsch yeast Oktoberfest is just coming into its own now. I brewed it on 7/22 and kegged it on 9/10.

 

[ekjohns]

well i bottled today and ill give it 3 weeks or so in the dark bottles. thanks for the reply. im slowly building up to getting a ferm chamber with temp control

 

[nmarolf]

@ dontman:

Did you transfer your kolsch/oktoberfest to a secondary ever, or just go from primary to keg? I have a kolsch fermented oktoberfest that is in it's third week of fermentation, first two weeks were at 59F and the third week i've allowed it to come up to 64 and there is still quite a bit of bubbling in the airlock.

Just wondering what your procedure was once you hit final gravity? Any gelatin?

thanks.

 

[rocketman768]

Why was it in the upper 60s? I thought the point of using kolsch yeast for a oktoberfest-ish ale was to ferment it in the mid to upper 50s to simulate clean lager taste.

 

[ekjohns]

mine was in the upper 60s cause i dont have a lager chamber. I thought the purpose of kolsch was to allow you to get a lager taste at ale temps

 

[nmarolf]

I believe the purpose of the Kolsch yeast is to produce a Kolsch beer, a beer akin to that which is brewed in Cologne Germany, something neither ale or lager, a Kolsch. (Not trying to be a jerk here). Neither of us are brewing a Kolsch, but we are experimenting a little with a kolsch yeast to see if we can get an Oktoberfest-style beer with this yeast. Wyeast intimated that you can use their Kolsch yeast to ferment "pseudo-lager" beers. I don't expect my Oktoberfest to really be a true Oktoberfest, but I expect something, not an ale, that might resemble a lager yeast fermented Oktoberfest.

I do agree with Rocketman that the usual method for doing this would be to ferment with the Kolsch between 56-60F. That will get you the most lager-like qualities, and thus a more oktoberfest-like beer.

But what the heck, wyeast does say the yeast will give a clean fermentation up to 70F, and why not do some experimentation crossing yeast and styles? It is fun to see what you get.

 

[malkore]

I have done an oktoberfest using wyeast 2565 kolsch strain. I did keep my temps no higher than 60F, and the end result was a pretty clean, non-estery beer.

It was a pretty good beer too, but it wasn't quite true to style. It lacked that certain crispness, which could have just been my mash temperatures, but also could have been the lack of a true lager strain. the marzen I just checked on today in primary had that smell of sulphur that was missing in my kolsch-strain attempt.

Don't judge it til its aged and carb'd though.

 

[SOB_OCDAVE]

I made an Oktoberfest on 10/10 and rack to secondary about a week ago. My OG was 1.056 and I used the white labs kolsch yeast. FG was reading around 1.012 when racked to secondary and tasted a bit sweet which is what I expected. I mashed at a bit higher temp. (156F) but I think after bottling it will be a nice malty ale with a full body.

 

[michael.berta]

I had the same issue. I used that yeast on an Oktoberfest and had the weird tartness. It went away after 8 weeks of lagering and now it tastes great. So give it a while and you will be fine....

 

[nmarolf]

Good to know the tartness goes away after a while. Mine has been lagering for about 2 weeks and it is pretty tart and has a slight wine characteristic to it.

Unfortunately on my recipe, I missed the part where the guy said to toast the 1lb of 2-row. So basically I have an "oktoberfest" that is more like a lite lager since I brewed it all with base malts and no specialty malt. Dang it! I'll have to brew another one.

 

[ekjohns]

well the smell went way down after cold conditioning but now it has that taste of the turb that you get at the bottom of the ferm. I know i bottled too early and had a lot of carry over junk to the bottle. I did take something out of it...never rush anything. I got a dunklewiezen that im gonna try and keg here in the next few days that has been in the primary for about a month letting it get all that good conditioning. Can you leave it too long? if so what is too long

 

[SOB_OCDAVE]

ekjohns,

Check out the Sept 09 issue of BYO Magazine or check online at *********** to find an article entitled, "Does Delayed Racking Harm your Beer?". It is an article about an experiment performed by by Chris Colby and James Spencer from Basic Brewing Radio at (www.basicbrewing.com). The basic conclusion of the experiment was that leaving the beer in the primary fermenter for a reasonable amount of time, 2 to 4 weeks, does not promote any negative effects. As a matter of fact, there were some subtle differences that seemed to be debatable whether they were good or not so good flavor profiles after a month or so. Personally, I think 4 weeks on the trub is fine. But I always rack to a clean secondary carboy and let it age for two weeks or more before bottling.