Inconsistant flavor in the same batch

[ale_mongrel]

Now this IS my first, and I cant wait till I empty enough bottles to get another brew going, I have noticed something in this first brew that has me wondering..This was an all extract brew (basically beer kool aid) 6 lbs of Coopers Austrailian Ale with a set of instructions from my LHBS that he wrote himself. He suggested in his instructions that I do not add sugar during the boil the way the directions on the can of extract did. I followed his instructions, and aside from bottling a week early, everything went well and I have beer!! Now its hasnt been the greatest thing in the world but it was my first one, and I was just happy it tasted and smelled like beer. The taste started out weakly flavored, light copper in color (cloudy of course) not alot of head , and weakly carbonated. Now as I have read here and in other places time will heal a great many wounds with beer, I dont think time is the healer here as a very positive change has seemingly occured overnight. I opened a 22 oz golsch style bottle tonight after work and I was so surprised when I tasted it I nearly dropped the glass. My beer had a little head, slightly better carbonation, the watery taste I noticed a short day or 2 ago has virtually vanished. A bold mix of hopps and malt reached my taste buds and i damn nearly wept. Now My question is why is this?? I bottled the beer and the only thing that I can think of is that in a few of the bottles I didnt either dump all of the water/sanitizer soloution out, or the bottles I sampled yesterday didnt dry as much as the bottle Im drinking now. Even as I type this I think this is a strech, but then this is why Im asking you. so What say you wise brewers?

 

[malkore]

there's a slim chance that if you didn't dump all the sanitizer out, it could have left a layer of 'thinner beer'. But I doubt it.

the action of racking the beer into the sanitized bottle bucket does a great job of mixing in priming sugar solution, so it should mix in the sanitizer too.

Honestly...really green beer like yours can change quite a bit overnight. Maybe you didn't fill the bottles evenly, which affects carbonation.
Maybe the first bottle wasnt' as clean? or didnt' seal? or had sanitizer left in it so its watery.

There's a lot of factors, but normally things are pretty consistent in the whole batch...so inconsistencies should stem from the inconsistent bottle.

on a side note, coopers kits aren't that great. the sugar really thins it out too. for your next kit, look for one that includes steeping grains, no sugar (other than for bottling), and hop pellets instead of a hopped extract (many cooper kits are pre-hopped)

 

[sgillespie]

How long did you wait before you cracked a bottle open?

 

[Revvy]

It will help some of us in the future if you add a few paragraphs (like malcore did) in your posts, rather than a solid block of text. It's difficult to read and to pick out details to help you. Some of us have "old eyes"

Sometimes even hitting enter after 2-3 sentences makes it easier for some of us to see.

There's 3 things to consider, from what I gleaned from your post.

1)

What sanitizer did you use??? If you used a nor rinse sanitizer like starsan or iodophor, you actually DON'T want to rinse or dump out or dry ALL the sanitzer. Most of the sanitzers we use, especially Starsan and iodophor are No rinse/wet contact sanitizers. They are literally double edged swords. They kill two ways. They kill everything on the object prior to sanitizing, and then as long as they are still wet they form a sanitizer barrier that kills everything that comes into contact with object.

If you let the sanitizer dry any micro organism that comes in contact with the sanitized object, rather than being killed by it, makes the object no longer sanitzed.

If you let it dry you are reducing it's efficacy by 50%.

At the proper dillution the sanitzers won't affect your flavor at all.

2)

What you need to realize is that Each little bottle is a seperate microcosm, so they will react slightly different to each other. But usually they all will balance out given enough time.

Uneven carbonation and conditioning is simply a matter of not enough time.


Think about this, just a tiny difference in temps between bottles in storage can affect the yeasties, speed them up or slow them down. Like if you store them in a closet against a warm wall, the beers closest to the heat source may be a tad warmer than those further way, so thy may carb/condition at slightly different rates. I usually store a batch in 2 seperate locations in my loft 1 case in my bedroom which is a little warmer, and the other in the closet in the lving room, which being in a larger space is a tad cooler, at least according to the thermostat next to that closet. It can be 5-10 degrees warmer in my bedroom. So I usually start with that case at three weeks. Giving the other half a little more time.

The 3 weeks at 70 degrees, that that we recommend is the minimum time it takes for average gravity beers to carbonate and condition. Higher grav beers take longer.

Stouts and porters have taken me between 6 and 8 weeks to carb up..I have a 1.090 Belgian strong that took three months to carb up.

I explain this and more, in my blog, here Revvy's Blog, Of Patience and Bottle Conditioning.

[/B]
If a beer isn't carbed by "x number of weeks" you just have to give them ore time. If you added your sugar, then the beer will carb up eventually, it's really a foolroof process. All beers will carb up eventually. A lot of new brewers think they have to "troubleshoot" a bottling issue, when there really is none, the beer knows how to carb itself. In fact if you run beersmiths carbing calculator, some lower grav beers don't even require additional sugar to reach their minimum level of carbonation. Just time.



3)

Additionally, A larger volume sized bottle usually needs more time to carb AND condition. I have some pints, 22 oz bombers and other sizes that I often use, but since I enter contests I usually also do a sixer or two of standard 12 ouncers for entering. And inevitably the 12 ouncers are done at least a week faster than the larger bottles....some times two weeks ahead of time...

Also the rule of thumb is 3 weeks at 70 degrees for a normal grav 12 ounce bottle....to carb and condition....It takes longer for the yeasties to convert the larger volume in the bigger bottles to enough co2 in the headspace to be reabsorbed back into the solution...A ration I don't know how much...

Big Kahuna gives a good explanation here...

Simple. It's the ration of contact area just like in a keg. The c02 will need to pressurize the head space (Which takes LESS TIME) in a bigger bottle (More Yeast and sugar, roughly the same head space) but then it has to force that c02 into solution through the same contact area...thus it takes longer.

Hope this info gives you some insight into the process, and why some bottles are ready and the rest aren't yet.

 

[ale_mongrel]

Thanks guys that makes me feel better, I think what I will do is wait at least another week or so before sampling another and see what happens. And in the future Uncle Revy, I will be sure to mind my sentence and paragraph structure more closely when asking for help

Seriously thanks again for the quick responses, I think for my next batch, I have my eye on an IPA kit from AHS.com:rockin:

 

[RM-MN]

Now this IS my first, and I cant wait till I empty enough bottles to get another brew going

Empty bottles are rather inexpensive and if you don't give them away too often, they will last for years. You can salvage some pry off capped bottles or buy them new. It's a long term investment and allows you to have more than one style of beer to drink and lets you brew more now to get a pipeline going so you don't have to wait until everything you have brewed is gone and then wait more for the next beer to ferment and mature. I've added a second fermenter so I have my brews overlapping and sometimes use a carboy so I can empty one of the fermenters or add something else to the fermenting beer like fruit or hops.