Is this an infection??

[dustyy14]

So I aged this beer in a secondary for 5 months. It's a bourbon barrel porter and I poured it into a keg about 2 months ago and have had it just sitting in the basement to drink in a month or so. I opened it up to take a look at it today and am not sure if this is mold or some yeast or something.

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[Citizen86]

Taste it and find out

 

[dustyy14]

I tasted it but don't really know what I should be looking for.

 

[Dcpcooks]

Sour or nasty is what your looking for. They're the most common descriptors of wild yeast and bacteria.
Sour can mean wild yeast
Nasty or rotten sulfer could be pedio sickness. Those are usually drinkable and sometimes good. Nasty can also be bacteria that impacts taste.

The good news is that very few harmful pathogens survive in finished beer. But there are lots of flavor spoilers out there.

I'd taste a sample and see. If it's ok I'd carb it and chill it. The cold will slow most things down so you can finish it.


The oil slick could be hop oils, it's been warm right? You could have some dead yeast and tub floating in co2 that kicked up when you moved it and opened it. A nucleation point if you will.

Or it could be a pelicle that broke up and most if it sank when you moved the keg. I wouldn't expect it to sink quickly though and you'd see residual signs on the wall/top of the keg.

 

[Riverevir]

Is this the northern brewer kit? If so, I recall something similar in mine when I did it and I can say that it is in bottles for 5 months and getting better every day. I don't think you have a problem here, but I'm also a relatively new brewer so my word shouldn't be the end all be all. I'll try and find a pic of the top of my fermenter from when I did this to show the similarities and circle back to show it for comparison.

 

[Riverevir]

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It's not a great picture, but the one on the right is the Porter and you can see things floating in it. I promise you it looked very similar to yours and was not a problem. If I find better pictures on my PC I'll send you a PM.

 

[jrgtr42]

Out of curiosity, why did you open the keg? Was the beer carbonated or still?
I'm no expert by any stretch, but it doesn't look like an issue to me - trub of some sort, either hop particles or yeast. How did it taste? That's the most important part.
In the future, I would probably recommend at least partially carbing the beer as soon as it's in keg - at least get some pressure on it, purge out O2, then repressure with CO2. repeat a coup0le times to make sure. Otherwise it shouldn't be a problem letting it sit before tapping.

 

[dustyy14]

Out of curiosity, why did you open the keg? Was the beer carbonated or still?
I'm no expert by any stretch, but it doesn't look like an issue to me - trub of some sort, either hop particles or yeast. How did it taste? That's the most important part.
In the future, I would probably recommend at least partially carbing the beer as soon as it's in keg - at least get some pressure on it, purge out O2, then repressure with CO2. repeat a coup0le times to make sure. Otherwise it shouldn't be a problem letting it sit before tapping.

I was having a leak problem with the beer side pin port so i had to take that off and replace it. Since it was leaking i wanted to take a look at the beer to see why it was creating pressure inside since i didnt have and co2 put in it. So maybe it was still doing some kind of fermentation to be creating pressure inside of the keg?

 

[radwizard]

After zooming in on the pic, I don't think its infected. Does it taste good?

 

[dustyy14]

So I checked on the beer this morning after putting the keg in the fridge for a few days and putting a little CO2 on it and its back to looking normal.

So maybe it was yeast or something that had floated up to the top??