A little over a week ago I brewed a low gravity, all-grain saison. It was my first all-grain batch, and I specifically chose it since I was getting ambient temps in my apartment in the 80s, which I thought would be great saison "weather." Over the last few days airlock activity slowed down significantly, so I thought it was a good time for a gravity check.
Unfortunately, I recently discovered a hydrometer I had been using was actually off by .005, leading me to believe I was getting much better efficiency than I actually was, so I bought ingredients for this brew assuming an efficiency that was higher than I'm actually getting, so this ended up being REALLY low gravity. The OG was supposed to come in at 1039, but due to hydrometer inaccuracy, I actually ended up more around 1033/34. I amended my efficiency in the software to reflect this hydrometer error, and my new estimated FG was around 1008, but when I took the gravity reading tonight (with a new, accurate hydrometer,) it was hovering just over 1000 which leads me to believe my OG might have actually been even lower.
Anyway, so the smell of the beer: spot on. Blindfolded you would have picked that out as a saison. Extremely pleasant spicy, estery banana aroma. However, I took a sip and...nothing. It's like saison scented water. I was shocked at the difference of the potency of the smell and the taste. There are no noticeable flaws or off-flavors; the nose is textbook saison, but the palette is just bland, thin, and dry. Now, I understand that a good part of this is likely due to just undershooting my gravity, so I'm not really looking to find out what I did wrong; the question is if there anything I can do to save it. Crowdsourcing. Will time save it, or if it's watery now will it be forever more? Should I add something to the mix (extract, sugar, or fruit, etc?) Brew something else and blend? What say you homebrew community?
Unfortunately, I recently discovered a hydrometer I had been using was actually off by .005, leading me to believe I was getting much better efficiency than I actually was, so I bought ingredients for this brew assuming an efficiency that was higher than I'm actually getting, so this ended up being REALLY low gravity. The OG was supposed to come in at 1039, but due to hydrometer inaccuracy, I actually ended up more around 1033/34. I amended my efficiency in the software to reflect this hydrometer error, and my new estimated FG was around 1008, but when I took the gravity reading tonight (with a new, accurate hydrometer,) it was hovering just over 1000 which leads me to believe my OG might have actually been even lower.
Anyway, so the smell of the beer: spot on. Blindfolded you would have picked that out as a saison. Extremely pleasant spicy, estery banana aroma. However, I took a sip and...nothing. It's like saison scented water. I was shocked at the difference of the potency of the smell and the taste. There are no noticeable flaws or off-flavors; the nose is textbook saison, but the palette is just bland, thin, and dry. Now, I understand that a good part of this is likely due to just undershooting my gravity, so I'm not really looking to find out what I did wrong; the question is if there anything I can do to save it. Crowdsourcing. Will time save it, or if it's watery now will it be forever more? Should I add something to the mix (extract, sugar, or fruit, etc?) Brew something else and blend? What say you homebrew community?