Metallic taste

Having problems with a metallic taste in most of my ales...frustrating...did not have before.......using plastic fermenters, but think that oxygen is causing the problem...any help would be appreciated?

 

Are you using well water, tap or bottled? Are you doing extract, pm or all grain?

 

What is your brew kettle made of?

 

stainless potts....filtered water....all grain...

 

I have it happen from tarnish on my immersion chiller before.

 

Are all of your mash tun fittings ss, or copper?

 

Unlikely from your pot since it's stainless.

According to Palmer in How to Brew, could also be from, "hydrolysis of lipids in poorly stored malts."

 

I had an infection that had a really bad metallic taste. Made the whole thing into "dumper-brau" as I've heard it called....

Maybe double-check your brew gear for any nasties hiding in the nooks and crannies.

 

As you can see it can be any number of things lol.

 

Did you recently start using a new kettle? All I can say is I had a "mettallic" taste in my first batch , less so in second, and even less so in third, only thing I can think of is my kettle needed to be used a few times. That shouldnt be the case with "stainless" but "stainless" is not an exact type of formula either.

 

I had the same problem last year and discovered that it was the spring water I was using.

 

Could be a number of things causing off flavors, but if you have a routine, are fairly consistent with what you use to brew with, how you keep clean and sanitary, and aren't violent with the finished product, things don't start going wrong out of nowhere.

Now if you're like me and haven't made a consistent product yet because there are so many different beers to be made, finding a specific oddity is difficult to find. Sometimes just the style of beer we make can hide a flavor that wasn't noticed until a different beer is made. Hoppy IPA's and bold dark Porters and Stouts can hide a lot of problems and mistakes.

Metallic flavors*in your beers are perceived as the taste of a rusty nail, or coin-like, tinny and blood-like.*One source of these off-flavors is from aluminum pots or other un-plated steel surfaces. High iron concentrations in the brewing water can account for some of these flavors as well.

When stainless steel is cleaned without passivating the surface (oxidizing to produce a layer of protective oxide on the surface) the unprotected steel can also cause off flavors.

Check the quality of your bottle caps, filter your water if necessary or use bottled water if you must, and keep all of your grain stored under proper conditions to prevent or reduce the coin-like off-flavors in your beer.

Hope this helps.

 

If it previously tasted ok using the same equipment and water then it could be an infection. Any wild yeast lurking about on your equipment can dry out your beer giving it a metallic taste. Signs are really low FG, over carbonation, low flavor profile and wine or champagne like taste.


Sent from hell
using Home Brew

 

It looks like there is lots of input already, but I thought I'd leave these links here. Great resources for troubleshooting off flavors.

http://www.howtobrew.com/section4/chapter21-2.html

http://www.northernbrewer.com/connect/2011/08/common-off-flavors/

https://morebeer.com/themes/morewinepro/mmpdfs/mb/off_flavor.pdf

 

^These^ Generally. I even got it with steeping grains & Wheat DME's before that obviously were improperly stored before I got them. Passivizing stainless is as easy as letting it dry after cleaning & rinsing, one article claimed I'd run across in this conversation previously.

 

So Bar keepers friend (found at Wal☆Mart, Target, amazon.com) has the Oxalic acid that will clean the metal that may be causing the metalic flavors and after cleaning with a green scrubber (Not brillo, or even stainless steel brush) and letting it dry will return the protective surface and metalic flavors should be non-present.

 

Just be careful with anything containing oxalic acid. It doesn't like plastic or rubber.

 

Yes, that is true. Going to use Bar Keeper's Friend exclusively for the boiling kettle and perhaps the big spoon.

Just have to remember to keep the scraping of the spoon with the bottom of the kettle to a minimum.

 

Yes, that is true. Going to use Bar Keeper's Friend exclusively for the boiling kettle and perhaps the big spoon.

Just have to remember to keep the scraping of the spoon with the bottom of the kettle to a minimum.

 

do your beers taste metallic when they are fresh? or weeks down the road? I had a number of my earlier batches get a similar flavor. I determined some were small bottle infections and also to stop using s-04 yeast

 

I don't get anything metallic from S-04. Maybe temps made the yeast throw off flavors?

 

I used bar keeper's friend on my stainless steel boil kettle exclusively now. No metallic taste since.

 

Where did you get the cleaner?

 

You can find it in most grocery stores. Home Depot usually has some on display in the front of the store. It can be found in a powder or in a liquidish solution.

 

If you're lazy like me, even amazon.com sells and ships to your door

 

Awesome thanks! My pot needs some loving

 

Just curious, does anyone have any reasons why Barkeepers Friend would be better on a stainless kettle than PBW?

 

I guess both are OK as long as you rinse it well & dry it off. I use PBW & a Dobie scrubber on my SS kettles.

 

Does the Dobie scrubber you use scratch at all? I've used regular scotch-brite NON-SCRATCH sponges and it still scratched.

 

No, it's a nylon mesh-covered yellow, fine grained soft sponge. Dobie is the brand name. They last a long time too.

 

Cool i will have to get a couple

 

Aluminum pots are tricky and need to be cleaned without using materials that will strip of the oxidized layer or pit the metal. Soaking in PBW or oxyclean has cause some people problems with aluminum, but stainless steel is (from my reading) a little easer to clean and re-season.

Aluminum pots can be re-seasoned with boiling just water in the pot for up to 30 minutes, and stainless steel can be re-seasoned with Oxalic Acid that is in Barkeeper's Friend. Just clean with a blue or green scrubie sponge and then rinse, and let it dry.

To me that sounds quicker and less expensive the all the fuel needed to boil an aluminum pot for 30 minutes.

 

Stainless steel passivates after washing & allowing to dry. You don't need anything like Oxalic acid to do that. It's not like aluminum where you need that heavy coating to protect it.

 

Yeah? I had used some stainless steel wool to scour the bottom and then I had metallic flavors. Used the bar keeper's friend and BOOM* no more metallic flavor.

 

I did that once. Upon closer inspection, I found little tiny strands of steel wool, like the short hairs you see in the sink after wet shaving. They stuck to the inside of the kettle & rusted. I used PBW solution & a Dobie scrubber on it. Dried & no more problem. I never used steel wool scrubbers on my kettle again. The steel used to make them seems to make it easier to get stuck in the surface of the stainless. Also, passivated stainless doesn't have any visible coating to it. It's more something to do with the even dispersion of carbon in the steel. Just like the difference between a fine Ulfberht blade & imitations. The more evenly the carbon is dispersed in the steel, the better quality it is. Especially in our applications.

 

I don't think the vessel in which op boils is the issue, otherwise there would be a much more rampant problem of metallic taste. I think the mention of oxygen in op'a post is more right on. You should review your processes and reduce you likelihood of picking up oxygen post fermentation.

 

Oxygenated beer usually taste like musty damp cardboard from a moldy basement. Rarely maybe a sherry-like flavor. I never got metallic flavors from oxygenated beer.

 

Sounds appetizing. It's interesting how we can say it tastes like a smell.

 

I've never had oxygenated beer either. I've just started using the brita filter to rid the wort of chlorine and in conjunction with Oxalic Acid, I haven't had any metallic taste.

 

I have once. I messed up a few things on bottling day and what could have been a great simcoe/amarillo IPA degraded in a matter of weeks into a funky disaster. It tasted the way wet cardboard smells..musty and earthy. It was fantastic at first..but not for long.