Help with my Hefe

[scratchypants]

Aside from it being the wrong time of year, my home brew-savvy friend thought I did quite well with my extract Hefeweizen recipe.

I was a little concerned because my LHBS didn't have enough wheat extract and they completely messed up my hops order (I wanted Hallertauer and Saaz and ended up with Tettnanger and Goldings). I subbed the last pound of extract with extra pale DME and I used all Tettnanger, taking their AAU difference over the Halleratuer and Saaz into consideration.

I was waiting for my kegging supplies to arrive (they have since) - all I had were my cornies. On day 4, I racked to a secondary and on day 13 (last Saturday), I prepped a corny and racked to it. I was concerned about not having enough cloudiness, so I stuck the racking cane down into the sediment a few times during the process. I capped the corny and drove it to my friend's place where we force-carbed it.

After an hour or so, we tapped and sampled. It was good - very good. I brought the keg back home. Yesterday I received my kegging stuff and hooked it up. So now, finally, the point...

The taste was different. It had the banana smell from a distance, but when I stuck my nose in the glass - it was different. Not pleasant - kind of a rotting vegetable smell. Not as fresh. The head was extremely thick and creamy. When most of it dissipated (which took a long time), there was a thick raft of extremely dense head left. It was drinkable, but I wasn't enjoying it.

My theory: I wonder if not shaking the keg before serving actually sucks up more yeast due to the location of the "out" tube. I'm going to shake the snot out of it tonight before serving and see what happens.

Did I suck up too much yeast when I racked it to the keg? Could my keg have affected the taste?

 

[Dave258]

Did you clean the keg and change the o-rings before you filled it up?

 

[NHBeerDude]

The banana smell is usually caused by esters. What temp did you ferment at? The vegetable smell is usually from dimethyl sulfide (wort bacteria).

 

[elmetal]

the banana smell is clearly desired in a hefe, the vegetable rotting smell sounds like DMS but who knows.

leave the keg sitting a while, (2 days) then pull enough to where you can see the color of the beer coming out change

throw the dark nasty stuff away (or drink it... I dont cus it tastes nasty) and hope for the best.

 

[Edcculus]

Cooked/rotting vegetables makes me think DMS.The odd thing to me is that DMS isn't too much of a concern when using extract.

It may be a little too yeasty. I'll let a hefeweizen sit in the keg for a week. This knocks some yeast out of suspension, but leaves enough to be considered "mit hefe". I discard the first yeasty pint, then its smooth sailing.

The beer might still be a little young also. Hefes are quick beers, but another week in the kegerator might clean it up some.

The vegetable smell is usually from dimethyl sulfide (wort bacteria).

DMS isn't always caused by bacteria (although it can be). In brewing, it usually occurs when wort derived mostly from pilsner malt isn't boiled long enough. Grain contains SMM (S-Methylmethionine). When heated, SMM changes to DMS. Luckily, DMS is very volatile. Since it has a half life of 40 minutes, a 90 minute boil will reduce DMS levels to almost nothing. See the HBT wiki article for more.

 

[jjp36]

DMS isn't a wort bacteria, its a chemical compound present in certain grains that is driven off by boiling.

I think what probably happened is that you sucked up a good deal of trub in addition to the yeast (since you transferred on day 4). When you shook the keg this was not as noticeable because it was evenly distributed. When you let it settle and pulled a pint you had a higher amount of trub and yeast in the glass. I would let it settle then pull a pint our two. After that you should have sucked out most of the trub and be left with better tasting beer.