Failing to intentionally ruin a beer?

[dibby33]

Here is a question : Has anybody tried to ruin a beer intentionaly and failed?

There is a lot of talk everyday about how people think that they have ruined their beer and a lot of people tell them not to worry. Can it be shown how difficult it is to ruin a beer by sharing tales of failure to ruin a beer?

One reason that I can see for people to intentionally trying to *ruin* a beer is for learning to judge beers, i.e. to learn to recognise faults in beers.

 

[c.n.budz]

I've never tried but I'm guessing that it would actually be pretty easy. If I dunk my a$$ in my beer after running a few miles, I think it would be ruined(the beer, not my a$$)

If you mean ruining by lackadaisical technique and sanitation it would probably be tougher to ruin a batch, but I'm not about to try. Why don't you give it a shot and let us know how it turns out

 

[the_bird]

I've never tried but I'm guessing that it would actually be pretty easy. If I dunk my a$$ in my beer after running a few miles, I think it would be ruined(the beer, not my a$$)

Wait, isn't that how you make a Flanders Brown?

 

[Evan!]

There are kits you can buy that have isolated the various flaws in beer (diacetyl, DMS, etc) and put them into little bottles that you can sample. It's not cheap, but if you really want to become a first-tier judge, it's a good thing to check out. As such, I don't think it's really necessary to intentionally go through the trouble of brewing up a batch and then ruining it in order to learn how to judge the flaws in beer.

 

[PeteOz77]

I was just topping up the water in my Cerveza, and was wiping the rim (outside of the fermenter) with my kitchen sponge, and I heard something PLOP into the wort. I ignored it, but about an hour later, my conscience got the better of me, and I opened it back up, sprayed my hand and arm with sanitiser, and went fishing..... I found a chunk of dried out cheese and tomato paste (from pizza 2 days earlier) laying on the bottom.

So let's see...even though it wasn't intentional, I dropped a dried out piece of food that had been stuck to an unsanitary sponge, into my wort at the perfect breeding temp for bacteria, I plunged my hand and arm into the wort at the same temp, I used unsanitised bagged ice from the store to chill the wort, and it was an extract kit that I didn't do a full boil on...

That's a good start to a ruined beer, but it turned out fantastic..

 

[c.n.budz]

Wait, isn't that how you make a Flanders Brown?

Or a Nut Brown if I dunk a little further forward

 

[bru-er]

Or a Nut Brown if I dunk a little further forward

That is the funniest thing I have heard all day...week.

 

[Liquidicem]

Or a Nut Brown if I dunk a little further forward

HA! Thats great!!!

 

[dibby33]

so, basically there is no need to intentially ruin a beer! Funny that

Crazy man, crazy...

 

[Air Pirate]

I was just topping up the water in my Cerveza, and was wiping the rim (outside of the fermenter) with my kitchen sponge, and I heard something PLOP into the wort. I ignored it, but about an hour later, my conscience got the better of me, and I opened it back up, sprayed my hand and arm with sanitiser, and went fishing..... I found a chunk of dried out cheese and tomato paste (from pizza 2 days earlier) laying on the bottom.

So let's see...even though it wasn't intentional, I dropped a dried out piece of food that had been stuck to an unsanitary sponge, into my wort at the perfect breeding temp for bacteria, I plunged my hand and arm into the wort at the same temp, I used unsanitised bagged ice from the store to chill the wort, and it was an extract kit that I didn't do a full boil on...

That's a good start to a ruined beer, but it turned out fantastic..

you know, thats kind of amazing that it didnt spoil especially since you must have left at least a certain quantity of foreign material in the beer.

ive also wondered what the limits are to sanitization since brewing has been around for ages but microbe knowledge hasnt (except by trial and error). certainly our fore bearers ruined the occasional batch of beer but it does seem to be fairly resilient.

 

[PseudoChef]

I chilled my 888 right into an unsanitized carboy. Hope my swap partners don't mind.

 

[brewt00l]

Here is a question : Has anybody tried to ruin a beer intentionaly and failed?

If you count the porter wort collection pic I posted where folks said it was a candidate for HSA (splashing in the pic), it was a failure since after 9+ months there were no signs of oxidation. OTOH, I allowed air to enter my bottling equipment and then get introduced into the beer via a bottling wand and that created some truly awful oxidized beer in short order.


In general, it's pretty amazing how often I can screw up and do all the things you're not supposed to and a great batch of beer winds up in the bottle.

 

[z987k]

Doesn't Landhoney intentionally ruin all of his beers?

 

[Danek]

I rememember reading on some other HB forum about a guy who didn't believe in DMS, and consequently intentionally tried to get a nasty DMS taste in a batch of his beer. It was ages ago so I can't remember the exact details, but I think he boiled a load of pilsner malt with the lid on his brew kettle, and allowed it to cool very, very slowly. If I remember correctly, he managed to get a slight DMS taste to his beer. Seemed like a waste of grain to me, but at least he got some knowledge out of it.

 

[brewt00l]

I rememember reading on some other HB forum about a guy who didn't believe in DMS, and consequently intentionally tried to get a nasty DMS taste in a batch of his beer. It was ages ago so I can't remember the exact details, but I think he boiled a load of pilsner malt with the lid on his brew kettle, and allowed it to cool very, very slowly. If I remember correctly, he managed to get a slight DMS taste to his beer. Seemed like a waste of grain to me, but at least he got some knowledge out of it.

http://www.brewboard.com/index.php?showtopic=76187&st=0

IIRC he failed to introduce DMS in his trials

 

[dibby33]

In general, it's pretty amazing how often I can screw up and do all the things you're not supposed to and a great batch of beer winds up in the bottle.

That was what I was looking for. So to all you new people out there, just stop worrying and get more beers brewing

 

[Danek]

http://www.brewboard.com/index.php?showtopic=76187&st=0

IIRC he failed to introduce DMS in his trials

Yeah, that's the guy I was thinking of. And as you say, it looks like he didn't get any DMS taste - I guess I misremembered that part.