Bad feeling

[madcore]

Ok so opened up my Irish red after 4 wks and see below.... Hope that's not what I think


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[fartinmartin]

Looks like you should be bottling it to me.
No, not bottling it, bottling it, i mean get it in the bottles.

 

[madcore]

I just put it in the keg but was worried the it was starting an infection on top


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[jbaysurfer]

I just put it in the keg but was worried the it was starting an infection on top


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

I doubt it. At worst a bit of mold, but it could just be residual yeast material. I'm going with, you're fine.

 

[Yooper]

Yes, it looks like an infection starting. Keep it cold, and drink it fast, and you shouldn't have any problems.

 

[madcore]

Damn I bet it's from when I took he airlock off and covered the hole to cold crash


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[jbaysurfer]

Yes, it looks like an infection starting. Keep it cold, and drink it fast, and you shouldn't have any problems.

Yeah, so...ignore my post that came just before Yooper's, I defer to her. ;-)

 

[madcore]

Arg so when you say drink fast how much time? 5 gallons could last me a few months


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[Doctor_M]

Time to have a few friends over and have a kill the keg party!

 

[Yooper]

Arg so when you say drink fast how much time? 5 gallons could last me a few months


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

It's got something started, but it's hard to say what. As long as it continues to taste great, then that's all that matters. Keeping it in the fridge will slow down the growth of any microbes, so it may last a while before becoming sour. It will probably get worse with time, but maybe not before you drink it all.

I think a lot of brewers recommend 4 weeks primary, but I've noticed that any contamination that happens is in a bucket with a wide headspace or in secondary so I'd try for my next batch to package it sooner in a keg to keep the headspace to a minimum after fermentation ends and the beer clears a bit.

 

[Cajun_McChicken]

Did you skim that scum off the top before kegging? Seems to me it's like cutting the moldy part off of an otherwise perfectly good piece if bread.

 

[Misplaced_Canuck]

Damn I bet it's from when I took he airlock off and covered the hole to cold crash

How to fill up an airlock with no suckback.

MC

 

[madcore]

Yes the stuff flirting on the top stayed in the fermentor


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[djfriesen]

Did you skim that scum off the top before kegging? Seems to me it's like cutting the moldy part off of an otherwise perfectly good piece if bread.

Unfortunately it isn't quite that easy. If a pellicle is forming, there is something in there. Racking from under it will only transfer the innoculated wort, not leave the infection behind.



As yooper said, the best bet is to drink it quick. That, or you could let it sit, hoping you got a good-tasting infection (apparently accidental infections CAN be good occasionally), and bottle it as a sour red in about a year. If it's good now, I'd drink it quick. The chances of it being good a year from now are pretty slim. I may have missed it, but did you take a gravity reading and/or taste it?

 

[madcore]

I did take a gravity reading and it's was 1.018 just .002 over projected. I just had a few sips of it out of the keg now that it is carbed up, it's not bad but if it wasn't infected I would leave it another week it is super cloudy and age would improve it.... Well not this time going to have to rebrew it


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[madcore]

Nooooo poured myself one tonight and the taste......It's going sour already my favorite kinda of beer and I can't brew again till I get the money to upgrade my kettle to electric to do eBIAB :-(


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[madcore]

Just opened my keg and boo the remaining 4.5 gallon is set to dump :-(


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[GarageDweller]

when I saw your original photo the thing that made me think it was infected vs. yeast rafts was the large trapped bubble to the bottom right. may not always be surefire, but you don't typically have something floating on top of the beer that traps the co2 that is being released. sorry for your loss though man. clean the living ****e out of everything and get back at it asap! just an experience to learn from.

 

[madcore]

oh ya everything is getting a deep clean but artless i have a very good idea where i picked it up. about a week ago I have to move it and took off the airlock to keep it from sucking back when it was in the fridge.and of course that's the time that my son(18 months old) slams his finger in the door when the wife was watching him. So it sat for about a day or little more with only the hole covered no airlock

I am going to be adding 2 elements to turn it over to eBIAB here with in the next few weeks just waiting for me to gather $100 bucks to buy everything and convert so i can make better beet than just what they are giving me in extracts.

 

[Croyzen]

That looked like a dumper right off the bat. This is one of main reasons I ferment in glass carboys... surprises! I like to see fermentation, high krausen, flocculation, etc. It won't stop an infection but at least I'll get the bad news sooner. Since I have at most two beers going at once and normally just one, I check them here and there. There's something to be said for watching the fermentation process and knowing what it looks like. How different yeast strains behave, etc.

Got to have that airlock! A little star san diluted filtered water won't hurt the beer if some would happen to get in. An irish red shouldn't take long to ferment. I would think sitting in the fermentor for a couple of weeks (probably be done fermenting in a week) and then bottle conditioning them for 3-4+ weeks would be just fine.

 

[madcore]

It was done after a week but I wanted to give it more time being told it would help the flavor and clarity to let the yeast have time to clean up


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[Croyzen]

I think the magic happens in the bottle also. So rather than letting the batch sit in primary for a couple extra weeks, on many average sized beers and basic ale styles I will just let sit an extra week after fermentation is done and then if it's going to bottles, bottle it. Then I'll let it sit in the bottles for 4 weeks or more rather than 2 or 3. I'm paranoid about infections so I'll skip the secondary unless the beer calls for extended aging just to keep it simple and eliminate possible problems.

I bet the missing airlock was your problem if everything was cleaned and sanitized correctly. Good luck on the next batch! Brew on!

 

[madcore]

With me doing keg would I just move it to the keg and leave it or add co2 and let it sit??


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[kombat]

I'm hesitant to blame the missing airlock. The hole was still covered in foil, right? And this was during cold-crashing?

The refrigerator is not a hospitable environment to microbes to begin with. And if the hole was still covered, how would they have gotten in? I routinely replace my airlocks with sanitized foil and an elastic band on all my carboys when moving them into the fridge to cold crash (to avoid suckback). They sit in there for 5 days, then come out and go straight into the keg.

I'm inclined to blame something else in the OP's process for the infection. Future batches will tell the whole story.

 

[madcore]

no it wasn't in a refrigerator but my garage. it was under 35 degrees with it being winter. we don't park cars in the garage but its still a garage.

but yes everything is getting a deep clean and I only have 4 other batches (this was my 5th) all good besides this one.

 

[Yooper]

It was done after a week but I wanted to give it more time being told it would help the flavor and clarity to let the yeast have time to clean up


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

Yes, many people do that with good results.

I'm not one to leave my beer in a bucket with a wide headspace that long, though. As fermentation slows, there can be a risk of oxygen permeability and while it's a small risk, you never see an infection in a beer that is about 10 days old in a bucket. It's always a longer period of time, especially in a bucket with a wide headspace.

Since you're kegging, next time wait until the beer is finished and then wait at least another 3 days. The beer will start to clear. You can keg it then, and either store it at room temperature in the keg to condition then (like you would a secondary) or if it's ready, it can go in the kegerator for chilling and carbing.

Some people do prefer the character imparted to the beer by a lengthy contact with the trub and that's another reason that some people will go 3-4 weeks in the fermenter. I'm not one of those so I see no advantage to leaving the beer sitting in the primary for a month when it could have been moved to the keg a couple of weeks ago and more than likely infection avoided.

 

[Homercidal]

There isn't any reason not to move out of the bucket when it's done with primary. All the better if you have a keg, because you can let it secondary in the keg, and then pour off the glass or two of gunk and jumper that keg into another one for really clear beer without risk of contacting air. Any cleanup that is going to be done by the yeast will be done in the keg just as if it were a secondary and it only takes a few days. Don't cold crash too early or you risk shutting down the yeast before they finish cleaning up the stuff that they created early on in the fermentation.