Is there a chemist in the house? Infected beer.

[Max_Chavez]

So, I had a spontaneously infected wild beer. I believe that the I unintended yeast is what created a medium-strong ethyl acetate presence. After reading this article on distilling problem solving, I'm wondering if there is any application of baking soda here? And, whether all by products would be healthy to consume as is. Any thoughts?
I'm happy to toss it, but also interested if there's a learning experience here.
Thanks
http://homedistiller.org/distill/dtw/strip

 

[mnick12]

I am a chemist, and the link you posted explains it pretty well. The sodium carbonate hydrolyzes the ethyl acetate into ethanol and acetate. This is fine for distillation because ionic substances aren't going to distill over. However in the case of beer, sodium bicarbonate is not going to make a beer drinkable. First baking soda needs to be heated to decompose into the more alkaline sodium carbonate. This alone would ruin your beer. Second since your not distilling all of those sodium ions are going to be floating around in your beer! Not only would this make your beer unpalatable, it would be unsafe to consume that much sodium.

So in essence this method is fine for distillation, but not for undistilled beverages

 

[mrboz]

I am not going to go toe to toe with a chemist, but I have been reading up on sour beers and often times "infected" is a matter of time, as many yeasts (and bugs) will go through a period in which the product of their metabolism is nasty ... but given some time (in some cases 1-2 years, so take it for what its worth) they will clean up after themselves and you'll have a nice tasting beer.

I'm not suggesting you'll have a "clean" beer, rather a drinkable and perhaps a delicious beer.

It does seem that you want to be careful minimize oxygen in this environment of long fermentation (this is a complex area, so I want to be careful about generalizing) as acetobacter will convert ethanol into acetic acid in the presence of O2, so you'll end up with vinegar.

 

[TNGabe]

I am not going to go toe to toe with a chemist, but I have been reading up on sour beers and often times "infected" is a matter of time, as many yeasts (and bugs) will go through a period in which the product of their metabolism is nasty ... but given some time (in some cases 1-2 years, so take it for what its worth) they will clean up after themselves and you'll have a nice tasting beer.

I'm not suggesting you'll have a "clean" beer, rather a drinkable and perhaps a delicious beer.

It does seem that you want to be careful minimize oxygen in this environment of long fermentation (this is a complex area, so I want to be careful about generalizing) as acetobacter will convert ethanol into acetic acid in the presence of O2, so you'll end up with vinegar.

Some things will age out in mixed ferments, but ethyl acetate isn't one of them in my experience. It's a pretty sure sign of a beer that needs to be dumped.

 

[Max_Chavez]

Thanks, mnick, and others.
I think it's time to move on. Which is fine. Now to clean the hell out of that bucket!

 

[mrboz]

Thanks, mnick, and others.
I think it's time to move on. Which is fine. Now to clean the hell out of that bucket!

If you really think you have an infection in the beer, I would set the bucket aside for when you start dabbling in brett and sours, and go spend another $15 for a new bucket for your clean beers. The plastic is pourous and pretty difficult to fully clean. Many will insist a good StarSan rinse will do the trick ... why take the chance?

 

[Max_Chavez]

Oh, I'm dabbling. After a very thorough cleaning, the next thing that goes in there will be a brett berliner. So I don't fear too much will have a chance with the low ph and competition. But, I certainly get your point.