First brew turned out pretty bad, any tips for future brews??

[ComusLives]

Hey all,

I recently finished up my first brew, an attempt at a German Weissbier, and my end result has been lackluster at best. I'm trying to figure out what went wrong so I can improve on it in future.

I guess you guys need details so here goes. Apologies for the essay:
I used a wheat beer kit with generic German wheat beer yeast that came with it, and brewed it at around 21-22c although at one point towards the end of fermentation I checked the temp and it was around 19. I didn't get the chance to check the temperature during peak fermentation, so it may have gotten a fair bit higher during that. Took about 10 days, ended up at a FG of 1.015 down from 1.045, which was a little higher than I wanted but acceptable. Throughout this process it was a nice golden straw colour, and tasted decent bar the usual green apple taste that seemed to go away towards the end. Seemed to taste its best around bottling.

I then bulk primed it after about 15 days using 243g of table sugar to aim for 3.5 CO2 (a lot I know, but I wanted that for the style). I think I may have messed up a lot here, as it was a chaotic day. I may have used the wrong sanitiser for the bottles, they weren't allowed to dry properly before bottling, and my brew was exposed to the air for a fair amount of time.

I left them in a wardrobe for the last 17 days which has a temperature range of around 17-18f, possibly lower, and the beer seems to have gotten very dark, miles away from when it was in the FV, with lots of yeast still floating through it. Not as in cloudy, but as in visibly floating. I've tried a couple of bottles over the past two weeks at different points, and there doesn't seem to be much change. They seem to have carbonated fine as far as I can tell, as they're really foamy and fizzy when I pour one, but it doesn't stick around. It'll be flat by the time I finish a glass of it. The smell is bad, hard to describe, kind of rotten. The taste is "meh" at best, especially impacted by how flat it is. It'd be a mediocre beer as is, but there's this lingering metallic aftertaste that kind of ruins the whole thing. It sticks around for ages, even if you can't immediately notice it from the first sip. I've yet to actually want to finish an entire bottle, and when I do I definitely don't want another one.

I know mistakes are inevitable from a first attempt, but I'm looking to learn as much as I can from this one! Any tips or pointers as to where I may have gone wrong throughout the process? Thanks!

 

[mdindy]

poor sanitation is the best way to ruin your beer. I would recomend fermenting for atleast 2 weeks, even after fermentation the yeast can clean up some off flavors left in the beer, no rush to bottle. make sure the priming sugar is boiled well before adding. never be afraid to buy fresh yeast, never know how long the kit has been sitting around. those are just a few options to maybe help you have better luck next time.

 

[TheHappyHopper]

My guess is that the major problem lies in the bottle sanitization step. What sanitizer did you use? If you use a no-rinse sanitizer, like Star San, you don't have to worry about letting them dry.

Either that, or at the point where you mentioned that the beer was exposed to the air for awhile. Maybe something got in that infected the batch?

 

[LandoLincoln]

You may be experiencing an abundance of carbolic acid which happens a lot when you try to carbonate beer at high volumes. This will give you that nasty metallic taste. Or it might be residual cleanser chemicals if you used a cleanser instead of a sanitizer. What type of sanitizer are you using that requires it to be dry before using the bottles? That's not a good sanitizer.

 

[ComusLives]

Thanks guys! The sanitizer I used came with the equipment kit I got as a present, it doesn't say much on the container about it but it's a powder that you put in water, along with a little bit of dish soap. This was all in a bath which I let the bottles steep in to get the labels off before rinsing them all with tap water. I'm guessing I used the entirely wrong type then?

 

[JimRausch]

Yes, sounds like it was a cleanser, not a sanitizer. The off-taste could have come from that being not adequately rinsed off. Or it could be from an infection from something hanging around in the bottles. That sounds like the most likely culprit. I afraid this batch may be a dumper.
Don't be discouraged. Get back on the horse and brew again.

 

[bigmike99]

I've only used a sanitizer other than star-san once, and the taste was completely off. It's super easy using it and you don't have to go crazy if there's a few bubbles left in the bottles.

Also my first brew was a hefe and it didn't turn out great. Had no real temperature control besides the ambient house temp 65' which seemed to be fine. If you think you'll be brewing a bunch more in the future I'd invest in that first (right after the star-san). A lot of people have had success with the Cool Brew bags and they're relatively cheap.

Cheers

 

[Canuck137]

I would give it another go, most ppl have a mediocre first beer, myself included. You will notice improvements quickly if you adjust... I have only done 6 brews and the difference has gone from borderline undrinkable to borderline craft beer quality quickly.

I have done 3 wheat beers, bc they are my fave, so let me give you some advice from one noob to another.

1. Buy better yeast. Don't use the ones with the kits.
2. Use Wheat dry malt extract to make the brew instead of corn sugar.
3. Do a little crushed coriander and orange peel in the boil, leave it in the fermentation pail for 2 full wks.
5. I dry hop mine as well, one ounce for one wk.
4. Use a better sanitizer.

As for the cloudiness I have found using "Wheat Yeast" makes it more cloudy... American yeast results in a less cloudy beer. That was my experience anyway. As for temp control I'm to much of a noob to figure that out yet as well... I just try and maintain the whole process at room temperature.

 

[Happydad1689]

My first brew was awful, really awful. Temps got away from me and I got a to of fusel alcohol.

Aside from the aforementioned advice. Just keep brewing. You will get better.

 

[LandoLincoln]

Three things that can ruin your beer pretty easily and how to fix those things:

1) Chloramines. Many municipal water treatment plants now use chloramines to treat their tap water and it's really hard to get rid of it via boiling or letting it sit around. Gives your beer a nasty medicinal taste that never goes away. Fortunately there's a really easy fix for this: campden tablets. Crush up 1/2 of a campden tablet per 5 gallons in the water and mix it up good before using the water for your brew day and you'll be good to go. Or you can just use spring water, but that gets kinda pricey.

2) Improper temps during fermentation. Temperatures inside your fermentor can get 5-10° F higher than the ambient temperatures, so you have to figure out a way for that not to happen. Swamp coolers are the cheapest route, but they're definitely not the easiest, nor most reliable. A dual-stage temperature controller and a used chest freezer is definitely money well spent. Tape the thermo probe that comes with the temp controller to the outside of your fermentor and you'll be good to go.

3) Sanitation issues. There's a lot of misinformation floating around about what to clean, what to sanitize, what type of cleansers and sanitizers to use. For beginners I highly recommend two things: Oxy-Clean Free for cleaning stuff and Star San for sanitizing stuff. Oxy-Clean Free is pretty close to PBW but is a lot cheaper. Use it to clean anything that gets dirty. Rinse well. Used mostly for boil kettles and carboys or buckets. Star San is used to sanitize anything that touches wort post-boil. Get five gallons of distilled water and put 1 oz of Star San concentrate in that bucket and stir it up and you'll have about three months worth of Star San. Put some in a spray bottle and spray anything down that needs it. 90 seconds worth of contact time is all you need to sanitize anything that's already clean. And don't worry if the foam isn't completely gone from your equipment - it's not going to affect the flavor of your beer. The foam and any residual Star San will turn into yeast food. Don't Fear The Foam!

 

[ComusLives]

This is all great advice, thanks! You guys are great.

Star San is a little pricey where I live, and seems to rarely be in stock. Is there any other brands or anything that would do the same job? Or even better any recipes that may allow me to do the same thing with random household products?

 

[eadavis80]

One thing I do with Star San is make a batch and then reuse the heck out of it. I just keep a 5-gallon batch in a $5 bucket I got at ACE. Sanitize crap and then dump the used sanitizer back in the bucket. I brew about once every 3-4 weeks and even with all the brewing/racking/bottling, I only make a new batch of Star San about every 2-3 months, so a $10 bottle can last a year easy.

 

[PhinneyWoodBrews]

+1 on starsan use. A 26 dollar jug should last at least a year. Worth it.

+1k on treating your water with campden to get rid of chlorine and chloramine. I chased the metallic aftertaste in my first few batches by using distilled water, then just started treating tap with campden. No more metal.

Keep brewing, keep reading up on the process. It'll get better. Cheers!

 

[ComusLives]

eadavis80, That sounds like exactly what I'd want, thanks! Do you just pour from that batch into whatever you're trying to clean, and then back in? A method like that would save me a hell of a lot of water in my cleaning process. How does that work for bottles too? Just pour it into another container and use that to clean the bottles?

I'll have to invest in some Star San and some campden tablets so, it seems like even that will improve things substantially.

 

[eadavis80]

Yeah, like on bottling day, I'll just use 1/4 gallon or so of Star San with my vinator (check Northern Brewer if you don't know what I'm talking about) and fill/squirt each bottle and place on my bottling tree. After that sanitation is done, I just pour the Star San from the base of the vinator back into my ACE bucket. On racking days, I just throw my racking cane/tubing/auto siphon in my ACE bucket, then siphon Star San from ACE bucket into my secondary fermenter for a few minutes (to sanitize the secondary and the inside of the tubing), swish 1 gallon or so worth of Star San around that secondary to sanitize it and then dump that Star San back into the ACE bucket. Basically, as long as it's bubbling, it's still good to use. You can do PH strips to test for sure, but this has worked for me

 

[fimpster]

+100 on the starsan. a $10 bottle has lasted me 8 months and I still have a third of a bottle left. I use a similar technique as eadavis80 keeping it in a 5 gallon bucket, and when my bucket drops down a couple of gallons I refill with more distilled water and appropriate amount of starsan (0.2 oz / 5.9ml per us gallon).

Also, DONT dump your beer out yet. It's amazing how often an off flavor will go away and your beer will improve with time. It might not ever get better, but it might, and in a couple months if you have great (or even just good) beer, you'll be glad you kept it.

 

[Natdavis777]

You can also make a spray bottle with star san. A little goes a long way. Good for spraying down caps and other misc things. Good luck, and keep on. Every brewday is a learning experience!