Fusel taste

[Jtk78]

I recently made a NEIPA that I bottled yesterday. I had pretty good mash efficiency and ended up with anew OG of 1.070. I pitched Wy1318 and kept the temp at 64 for 4 days before slowly creeping it up to 70. I was bumping it like 1 degree every 36 hours or so until it peaked out. I tried it the last time I dry hopped 4-12-17, and the gravity was 1.014. Tasted pretty good at that point. The FG finished a little lower than I thought it would, down to 1.011. It has smelled great from pitch to bottle. But yesterday it tasted a bit harsh and I think it may be a fusel taste. Does this usually settle down with age, or could it get even worse?

Was there something I could have done at bottling to lesson it (only thing I thought of was back sweeting it with a non- fermentable)?

 

[kh54s10]

I have found that some of my brews tasted dramatically different from bottling day to when fully bottle conditioned. Though fusel is not one of the pre-conditioning tastes I have had. I would not worry too much until it is conditioned. Too late now anyway.

I don't know of anything you could do at bottling time. I have never done any adjustments at that stage. Though there may be something I have not heard about.

 

[mredge73]

To me fusel is more of a feeling than a taste. It is the warming or burning sensation when you take a shot of whiskey or other harsh spirit.
Your beer is ~7.8% ABV so you are in the imperial range (DIPA) and you will have some fusel alcohol in your beer.
This will fade with age and won't get any worse. The problem is that your hop aroma and bitterness will fade too; if you age it too long and your IPA will become a PA.
This is the reason why DIPA recipes always have an insane number of hops.

The only thing that I can think about that may have helped at bottling would be to carbonate it a little higher than normal.

 

[Jtk78]

I had a total of 11oz of hops, all late addition or dry hop, so there's not much bitterness, which is what I was going for. I'll also be fine if it looses a bit of aroma if this tames a bit. I also carbed it to 2.6 parts CO2, so I'm hoping that helps.

I'll give it a bit to condition and see what happens.