Blonde Ale Wort Turned Brown

[CharruaInBelgium]

I've done a few brews already mostly with dark beers (they are my favorite!) and decided to try to brew a Blonde Ale. I stepped the grains in 4 liters or water (going for 10 liter at the fermentor) and the color was looking fine. Then I added the 2 kgs of Light DME shortly before the water started to boil and the color of the wort turned brown. I thought once I topped off the water it would be closer to yellow but it remained brown.

What am I doing wrong? Did I screw up when adding the DME? It's been frustrating because it has happened 2 times now and dont know what I need to do to end up with a blonde!

 

[buzd]

I've found that boiling extract always ends up darker than you would expect.

 

[WrQth]

What did your hydrometer sample look like?

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Pull a sample and look at it in a glass. The larger volume pretty much always looks disappointingly dark, in the glass much better. To avoid darkening the extract as much people will often put in half the extract (sometimes more) near the end of the boil.

 

[NothingRhymesWithCurtiss]

This has happened to me on a few extract batches, and what has helped me is splitting when you add the extract: put half in at the beginning of the boil and the remaining when there is 15 minutes left.

 

[m00ps]

Sounds like Maillard reactions. When doing extract beers, you want to add the majority of your extract right before flameout. You dont want to be boiling extract for very long.

 

[TurnipGreen]

I agree with the folks above but it could also be oxygenation. I recently had a lighter beer turn darker due to oxygen. Espesially if you are bottling, make sure you're not splashing at all, all your hoses are super tight, and how ever you deliver it to the bottle lets the least amount of air in the beer.

 

[CharruaInBelgium]

Thank you all for the feedback. I'll try to split the extract (50% @60 and 50% @5-10) and see if it works. The wort was dark by all measures. In the hydrometer and in a glass the color looked closer to a Newcastle rather than a Duvel or Triple Karmeliet.