Beer tastes sweet...again

[ryanbullen]

Hello
I have just finished my 3rd kit and yet again it is far too sweet.
The first 2 kits I did I followed the recipe/instructions exactly and ended up with the same result, far too sweet and did not taste like beer.
Both of these recipes called for adding 1kg of brewing sugar to assist with fermentation. Both brews reached the suggested final gravity but still tasted really sweet and nothing like they should have.
My 3rd attempt which I just finished I swapped the 1kg of sugar for another can of malt extract. The starting gravity was obviously higher (roughly 1055) however the final gravity was around 1010, I thought this to be acceptable so I dry hopped it and racked it to a pressure barrel but it still tastes really sweet. What could I be doing wrong please?
I'm thinking it could be that my ingredients, mainly the yeast, are not fresh

 

[ryanbullen]

Can i just add that the brew is definitely carbonated. I get a full head on every pint, it is just the taste/aroma that bothers me

 

[ryanbullen]

Second addition...
Possibly the malt extract I am using is either un-hopped or I am boiling away the bitterness by using too much boiling water..?
Again this is an assumption but hopefully can provide some answers

 

[Gnomebrewer]

Firstly, just to check, do you actually like the styles of beer that you're trying to brew? If you're used to drinking BMC, then homebrew might taste 'sweet' given that it (more often than not) has much more body.

That aside....

Sugar (including dextrose) will dry the beer out (it ferments completely), so replacing sugar with malt extract will actually increase the body a little bit. Also, the final gravity doesn't tell much about sweetness - a full-bodied beer at 1.018 can taste dry if it's fully fermented.

Sweet tasting beer could be to do with:
- too little bitterness to balance the malt. Post the recipe that you used as well as your process.
- poor fermentation (yeast not fully attenuating the beer). How much yeast did you pitch? What temp? How did you aerate?

And you can't boil away bitterness - extra boiling will increase bitterness (assuming there were hops in there to start with).

 

[flars]

A kit which includes hopped malt extract would not have instructions for a 60 minute boil. A prehopped kit may have a 15 minute boil for sanitation and may also include late hop additions at 15 minutes and 2 minutes. A 60 minute boil is for extracting hop bitterness from the first addition of hops when unhopped malt extract is used.

Using malt extract which is not prehopped and having no hop additions will result in a sweet beer.

The type of yeast used can also result in a sweet finish. Some English style yeasts will not ferment out some sugars that an American style yeast will.

Can you provide the style and name of the last beer kit brew that turned out to sweet?

 

[Stillraining]

My hunch is no hops in extract or not enough...You cant really boil away bitterness it actually gets more bitter the longer you boil. Aroma is 180 degrees the opposite.

 

[brandonnys]

Gnomebrewer, flars, and stillraining are probably right, there likely isn't enough hops in your kit. BUT, without knowing what you used exactly, it's just a guess.

Can you post your kit contents and the style it's supposed to be?

 

[ryanbullen]

Thanks for the replies.
The kit was a "Festival Beers: Razorback IPA", it contained a can of pale malt extract, a bag of sugar (which I didn't use), hop pellets and the yeast. I'm not sure what type of yeast as it didn't say. I then added a can of dark malt extract instead of the sugar. Also dry hopped with fuggles, cascade and another type of hops which I can't remember.
I read that heating hopped malt extract gets rid of the bitterness so was thinking that is maybe what happened?
The beer is drinkable and quite strong alcohol content. Around 6% if I have done my calculations correctly. I just thought this one might actually taste like beer

 

[ryanbullen]

Addition...
I didn't actually boil the wort, just added boiling water to the extract as the instructions said to

 

[20grit]

Are you sure the "bag of sugar" isn't the priming sugar? That doesn't get added until bottling time.
The kit I see online has three hop additions. Simcoe, Centennial, and Summit. You should have to do a boil and add these at various points to do any bittering.

Sounds like the instructions with your kit may be garbage. They tend to be lacking, in most cases.

 

[z-bob]

I think it was the can of dark malt extract instead of sugar that did it.

One thing you can do with a beer like that to make it enjoyable is mix it with a can of BMC. Or even better, a can of classic Michelob, because Mic is a little hoppier than Bud, etc.

Wait a minute, what did you do with the hop pellets? Those were probably for bitterness and would have needed at *least* a 30 minute boil. (60 minutes is typical)

 

[TurnipGreen]

1010 as a final gravity sounds pretty dry. I wonder if it is just a hop to malt balance thing?

How much and what type of hops did you add?

 

[ryanbullen]

Yes I have read somewhere online that the instructions to most kits are not very good. At no point did it mention a boil. The instructions said to add the hops after fermentation which is why I got this kit. I don't have a boiler yet although I am thinking now that this would be a good idea

 

[flars]

Took this list of ingredients from a reviewers post about the Razorback IPA.
2 bags of LME
650g Dextrose
75g IPA hop pellets (50g+25g bags) Simco, Centennial & Summit
10g IPA yeast
100g priming sugar
�Hop sock' shall we say for aiding with syphoning due to the added dry hops

Are these the ingredients in your kit?
What was your final gravity?

Using the bag of dextrose would have boosted the ABV and dried out the the beer making it less sweet. Dextrose is 100% fermentable. Substituting the LME would have added to the sweetness of the beer. LME isn't as fermentable as the dextrose.

 

[ryanbullen]

Oh, the bag of sugar was said to be added before pitching the yeast

 

[flars]

Just saw that you did say your FG was 1.010. Adding the bag of sugar and not the extra LME might have dropped your FG to 1.003 to 1.006.

 

[SteveHeff]

Ryan, go through your brewing process with us, for the benefit of everybody (and yourself) so that we can understand HOW you made the beer.

1. We already know that you did not boil the wort.
2. You substituted LME for the dextrose.

Did you only add the hops to the beer as dry hops or did you add them during your hot water addition? Is the LME supplied by the kit hopped?

Walk us through your process and I'm sure we can help identify any issues and help answer your question. Brewing with a kit is not a bad thing. Many delicious beers are made this way.

 

[ryanbullen]

This was not what I got in my kit. To be honest I couldn't remember which kit I used so I looked on the website of the shop I got it from and this sounded like the same one.
The kit only had 1 can of extract and 1 pouch of hops.
Final gravity was 1010

 

[ryanbullen]

I have used the full 1kg bag of dextrose in previous brews and still finished with the sweet taste

 

[ryanbullen]

Ok, SteveHeff this is was my process as accurately as I can remember 😀

1. Boiled 5 or so litres of water and mixed with the 1st can of extract (this came with the kit)
2. Added the 2nd can of dark extract with another litre of boiling water and stirred until dissolved
3. Cooled to around 24° and pitched the yeast
4. Fermented for a few days, fermentation stopped at around 1020 gravity, I added all 3 of the hop pellets I bought in a hop bag. This re started fermentation so I left it for another 4 days and it fermented down do 1010.
5. Transferred to pressure barrel with roughly 100g of priming sugar.
6. Had a pint last night 😀

 

[ryanbullen]

It did not say if the extract was hopped or not but I presumed it would be

 

[ryanbullen]

Sorry I missed out the part where I topped up with cold water to 23 litres

 

[ryanbullen]

Turnip Green
I added fuggles, cascade and another type of hops which I can't remember. I added the full pouch of each but only added after fermentation in a hop bag

 

[liquidcourage]

How much time between putting the beer in the pressure barrel and having the pint?

 

[ryanbullen]

Around 4 days

 

[Gameface]

I don't know much about hopped extract. I'd imagine there's some that is only a little bitter and some that is moderately bitter? Any chance you can tell us exactly what kind of extract you used?

Your primary issue, the one you had on both batches, I'd guess, is that there wasn't enough bitterness in the pre-hopped extract to balance against the residual sweetness. Perceived sweetness is a balancing act between the bitterness and the residual sugars. You can have a relatively large amount of residual sugar and counter it with enough bitterness so that it does not taste sweet at all.

You compounded your issue on the second batch, which might have actually turned out more the way you wanted, by substituting more malt extract for dextrose. The extract left more residual sugar than the dextrose. And by more I mean that the dextrose would have left essentially none, where the extract left some.

 

[ryanbullen]

I'm sorry I don't know what type of extract it was. This batch was brewed under quite a heavy intoxication lol. I usually keep notes of what I've done but this one I just went for it. From what I can gather then, the problem is more than likely not enough hops in the extract. I am getting a boiler next pay day so I will be able to counter this (hopefully)

 

[pdxal]

Ok, SteveHeff this is was my process as accurately as I can remember 😀

1. Boiled 5 or so litres of water and mixed with the 1st can of extract (this came with the kit)
2. Added the 2nd can of dark extract with another litre of boiling water and stirred until dissolved
3. Cooled to around 24° and pitched the yeast
4. Fermented for a few days, fermentation stopped at around 1020 gravity, I added all 3 of the hop pellets I bought in a hop bag. This re started fermentation so I left it for another 4 days and it fermented down do 1010.
5. Transferred to pressure barrel with roughly 100g of priming sugar.
6. Had a pint last night 😀

In addition to the possibly non-hopped or lightly-hopped extract mentioned and not boiling any hops to develop any bitterness or additional bitterness if the extract was hopped I'll mention one other thing. Adding 100g priming sugar and not allowing it to ferment completely before refrigerating and serving will cause a beer to be sweet(er) as well.

 

[liquidcourage]

4 days is way too short of a period of time to see the actual taste of the beer. Let it sit and mature for about two weeks before you drink it. There could be recipe problems as well, but without giving the beer a couple of weeks to mature you'll never know what the beer tastes like at its prime.

 

[Beerthoven]

ryanbullen - If you don't want to drink a bunch of sweet beer, it is possible to add bitterness after fermentation by boiling some hops in water and adding that to your beer. For example, boiling 1 ounce of Magnum hops (13.2% AA) in a gallon of water for an hour would add about 65 IBUs to 5 gallons of beer (I used BeerSmith to figure this out). That seems about right for an IPA. You'd want to let the water cool and strain out the hops before adding it, of course, and you might have to top up the water a little bit so it doesn't all boil away. I've never personally done this but others here have. If you search, you can probably find some threads that talk more about it.

 

[ryanbullen]

Right ok I've learned a few things there. Thank you beerthoven and liquid courage. I will try the additional boiled hops next time. I think my electric hob will manage to boil a gallon of water 👍
I'll leave this batch for a few more weeks then Liquidcourage and hopefully will see an improvement 😀

 

[ryanbullen]

Pdxal I will stick the brew belt back around the barrel and leave it alone for a few weeks 😀

 

[Malty_Dog]

Addition...
I didn't actually boil the wort, just added boiling water to the extract as the instructions said to

What? At what point then did you add hops?

*Edit - never mind - it sounds like you never boiled them!! Problem solved. You have to boil hops to extract bitterness.

 

[ryanbullen]

Yep I know that dude. From now on I am going to presume that the extract is not hopped and boil it myself

 

[Malty_Dog]

Yep I know that dude. From now on I am going to presume that the extract is not hopped and boil it myself

Cool, you got it straightened out then. It's an awesome hobby, you'll be hooked for good now. Good luck with the next batch!

 

[ryanbullen]

I'm thinking of starting another batch today while this one conditions 😀

 

[z-bob]

Pro-tip: don't get drunk while you're brewing. Have one beer; maybe two. You can have more during clean-up.

 

[invictusbrew]

Everything I am reading online about these kits say that:
1. The LME is in fact hopped.
2. The hops that come with these kits seem to always be for dryhopping.
3. There are two bags of dextrose in each kit - one for fermentation, the other to be used at bottling.

Everything OP says he did seems to be just about right for the instructions that come with the kits except switching out the dextrose for more (probably unhopped??) LME. This could certainly diminish some of the perceived bitterness and I would recommend you use the sugar as intended next time. That being said I have always found the pre-hopped malt extract kits to come out sweeter than I prefer my beers - this is certainly a personal preference issue, but you may be the same. Unfortunately, it sounds like you do not yet have the ability to do the required boil for an extract batch where you would add your own hops for bittering? Best I can say is try more of these kits and see if there is another that you would prefer over this one? Since you're not sure which one you had, maybe try the Razorback IPA next

 

[serum]

My dad and my brother both made this kit and it's pretty good when done as per the instructions.

The hops don't need boiling. It's got hopped extract and the hops provided are for a dry hop. If you do it all as per the instructions but leave it fermenting for a bit longer than it says on the box it should be fine.

Adding dark dme is a bad move. Either use extra light or just use the dextrose they give you as that will keep the body light.

 

[ryanbullen]

Thanks serum. I'll remember that for next time. Also I forgot to say I added finings a few days before I racked to the barrel. Will this have an effect on how well the secondary fermentation goes?