All of my beers taste exactly the same

[gnr9933]

After about 7 batches I'm disgusted.

Amber
Hef
Red
Blue moon clone
blue moon clone
Another amber
another wheat

They all taste damn near exactly the same, same color, everything. Kind of a malty taste I guess, not pleasant but drinkable. I have been using dry yeast, rehydrated, no starter. 5gal batches, steeping specialty grains and LME.

I am going to try an all grain in two weeks, if that tastes the same as my last 7 batches I am going to keep the kegerator and just keep good microbrews on tap.

disgusted with my lack of brewing skill. I've read a lot, watched a lot of videos.. just cant find a process that works for me.

I am guessing it is a yeast problem. That they aren't eating enough of the malt and that the malt is overpowering whatever else is in there and thats why they all taste the same.

I am going to use a starter with my all grain coming up and will try Beirmuncher's centennial blonde. I dont care if it is the greatest thing ever, I just want different.

Sorry for any typos, feeling to frustrated to slow down and spell check

 

[dobes]

I would not give up so soon. I went through a lot of trial and error before making good beer. Frustration led me to wanting to give up a few times but now after brewing for a few years I learned a ton, make fairly good beers most of the time and once in a while come out with something that I cant believe I actually made. Learn from the brewers here that's what I did.
When I started brewing after making a few ok and a few not so ok batches I found the best thing was to keep things simple. Don't go trying a bunch of new techniques on 1 batch. Just be sure to keep things extremely clean and don't forget to sanitize. Just by paying close attention to that my beers became better than average. After that I would just read about what makes beer better and try different things to what I felt comfortable with.
Good Luck on your next batch!!!

 

[barnaclebob]

Take really good notes on the all grain batch that you brew so that if it does have problems you can tell us exactly what you did and we can help diagnose specific issues. Record things like your desired mash temp, actual mash temp, all times, hop additions pre boil gravity, OG, FG, fermentation temp/time, etc.

 

[fizgig]

With all those recipe differences and a similar flavor, I'd look at your water and fermentation temperature. Try bottled or reverse osmosis water, google fermenter swamp cooler.

 

[unionrdr]

Not to mention, maybe using the same yeast on all of them? I branched out to different yeast that are more specific to the style. I also brew with local spring water. But I recently found that Giant Eagle's spring water gives better hop balance. And pitching the rehydrated yeast at high krausen will get it visibly fermenting a lot sooner in my experiences, with yeast temp within ten degrees of wort temp, which should be mid-60's F. In about three hours, matter of fact. Healthy yeast pitches make better beer. Also attenuate better.

 

[flars]

Can you give us the details on the two ambers? Recipes, brewing notes, yeast, fermentation time, and fermentation temperature.

This will help the search for the problem.

 

[giant]

Not to mention, maybe using the same yeast on all of them? I branched out to different yeast that are more specific to the style. I also brew with local spring water. But I recently found that Giant Eagle's spring water gives better hop balance. And pitching the rehydrated yeast at high krausen will get it visibly fermenting a lot sooner in my experiences, with yeast temp within ten degrees of wort temp, which should be mid-60's F. In about three hours, matter of fact. Healthy yeast pitches make better beer. Also attenuate better.

Once again, unionrdr is correct. Yeast adds flavor to the beer, and if you're using the same yeast for each beer, then you're removing one of the factors that could add variety to it.

DME/LME won't give you any flavor really, so you need to supplement it with adjuncts, steeping grains, or misc add-ons, such as fruit, coriander, etc.

The hops you use will also have an impact.

 

[kh54s10]

Try brewing 2 very different extract kits. I like Northern Brewer's kits. Use spring water. Control your fermentation temperatures to the low end of the yeast's recommended range.
If using liquid yeast, make a starter.

You should notice quite a difference.

My first was NB's Irish Red Ale. Fermented a little warm, it was good. My second was NB's Patersbier. It was excellent! And very different. (my first taste of a Belgian Beer.)

 

[Sam_92]

Do a Belgian beer like above poster mentioned, it will not taste the same I guarantee it. (I do not guarantee you will like it t but it will be different.)

 

[Plop]

As a beginner it is easier to start with kits. Some home brew shops make their own. When I started I never had a bad batch with them and it was a great introduction. They were all LME/DME + steeping grains + yeast.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Based on OPs status, it's likely OP won't be back.

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

OP is kill.