Did I oxidize my beer?

[TycoRossBrewing]

So I recently bottled an American Imperial IPA and right after I finished bottling I thought I might have ruined the batch..here is why. We dry hopped the batch when we racked into the secondary and used loose cone hops. When we went to finish the batch we had a lot of plant material floating around the vessel. Well this is where my possible genuis/possible fool kicked in. Since I wanted to remove as much plant matter as possible I racked the batch into a five gallon bucket and used a kitchen hand strainer to catch all the plant matter that slipped through the sediment cap on my auto siphon. Although it filtered the beer perfectly, i had a lot of bubbles at the top of the bucket. I then let that bucket sit for an hour or so, racked it into the bottling bucket, primed of course and then bottled the batch. Is there a chance I ruined the beer by oxidizing the brew? Should i have used a different method of removing the plant material from the beer? Has anyone used the method abovementioned, if so, how did it turn out? What can oxygenation do to finished beer?

 

[brettg20]

Too much moving the beer around...probably gonna get some cardboard flavors to be honest

 

[brettg20]

Can you control temps? If so crash the beer to knock out the hops, yeast etc

 

[kev211]

I think only time will tell, but putting it through a strainer probably wasn't the best idea considering oxygenation. That's actually what a lot of people use to oxygenate their wort before pitching yeast. Also, for an IPA, personally I don't think its necessary to have a secondary.

As for other methods of removing the hop particles, I only know of cold crashing. Lowering the temps will allow those hop particles to fall out of suspension. But if you cant/don't have the means to cold crash you can always fill the bottles with the hop particles that are floating around. They won't harm anything, and will drop to the bottom of the bottle when you refrigerate them

But, in the mean time, let your beer age, and Rdwhahb. Ive had very oxygenated beers mellow out over time so even if it is a little funky, don't dump it.

 

[GrainToGlass]

An oxidized beer will taste stale/cardboard/paper. Is your beer ruined? I doubt it, but your filtering technique might shorten it's shelf life. If you have the fridge/freezer space consider cold crashing to drop out everything in suspension.

 

[TycoRossBrewing]

If i were to have just filtered it with the strainer as i put it in the bottling bucket, would that have still oxidized the beer? I dont have a way to cold crash as mentioned in this thread to remove the plant particles from suspension and i dont want any floaties in my finished beer. Any ideas on low cost filtration to fine the finished beer without excess oxidation?

 

[kev211]

If i were to have just filtered it with the strainer as i put it in the bottling bucket, would that have still oxidized the beer? I dont have a way to cold crash as mentioned in this thread to remove the plant particles from suspension and i dont want any floaties in my finished beer. Any ideas on low cost filtration to fine the finished beer without excess oxidation?

Probably. The process of running it through the strainer adds oxygen. Without cold crashing, probably not a great way to get those suckers to go away that I know of. I wouldn't worry about a few floaties. As soon as you put those bottles in the fridge the hops will sink to the bottom. Just don't pour or drink the las .5cm and you'll be fine

 

[atoughram]

Rdwhahb...

 

[eman_resu]

Any ideas on low cost filtration to fine the finished beer without excess oxidation?

You can put a hop sock or piece of cheesecloth or something on the end of your siphon that goes into the fermenter, secured with a rubber band. Everything sanitized of course. But I've only dryhopped with pellets, so I don't know how well it works with whole leaves/cones though.

 

[TycoRossBrewing]

Thanks eman and kev...makes a lot of sense. Putting a grain sock over my siphon tip when i rack into the bottling bucket wont oxidize the beer because its submerged? Is my assumption correct on that?

 

[joshesmusica]

i don't have the capability to cold crash either. because of the equipment that i have, it's not so easy to get a strainer on the fermenter end of my siphoning hose. so what i do is to just bottle the beers like normal using the spigot of my bottling bucket, and then since most of the hop materials are floating at the top of the beer in the bottling bucket, i just mark the last several (like 7-10 330ml) bottles that have that hop material in them. I don't personally care about the hops floating around in my beer, but i make sure to not serve those ones to family and friends.

 

[eman_resu]

Putting a grain sock over my siphon tip when i rack into the bottling bucket wont oxidize the beer because its submerged? Is my assumption correct on that?

That's the idea, yes. There is the possibility of clogging though. I do imagine the transfer happening a little slower than normal with cheesecloth and pellet hops (there's usually some hop gunk stuck on the fabric afterwards). But maybe the material doesn't have to be so fine with whole leaf/cones? Anyway, seemes to work for me...

 

[grevengrevs]

I used to worry a lot about filtering my beer out but after a few batches I kinda just let be. I use a hop spider during the boil to cut down on some hop gunk and when I rack to fermenter I take my time and try not to disturb the sediment on the bottom. I use sanke kegs and whatever has gotten in the keg comes out within the first 2 pints. Those are usually the ones I drink anyways to check for carbonation.