LME and Extract Twang?

[zyx345]

Tonight I compared a few home brews I have been aging for the past +/- 5 weeks in the bottle. These were all 6# - 9# of Extract + Steeping 1# - 1.5# of specialty grains.

I noticed that the LME brews had a certain after taste that was slightly plasticy tasting and the DME brews tasted much cleaner without any plasticy taste. Same fermenting vessel was used for each which is a Coopers FV.

I should note that these were all kits from reputable companies, Northern Bewer and Midwest Supplies and the aftertaste was mild to barely noticable at best. Since I brewed these I am especially picky. All brews were excellent.

The one thing I did based on a DVD I have from Midwest was when dumping in the LME, in order to get all of the extract out I added a small amount of the boiling wort approx 1/4 cup to the container and shook it to get all of the LME out.

Is the plasticy after taste most likely a result of the LME technique I used or is this simply LME extract twang?

 

[Bob]

Sounds like the signature twang of malt extract syrup.

That's why I switched to DME in my paler beers; I don't mind it so much in Stout and Robust Porter and the like, so I might use syrup in very flavorful dark beers.

Cheers!

Bob

 

[unionrdr]

That plastic flavor is from Phenols. Band-aid like. Chlorine or chloromine can cause it. That's why if you use bleach or the like to sanitize,rinse well to get rid of the smell,or you'll be stuck on band aids. Good sanitation should fix it. I switched to star-san & got rid of that part of it. Also,keep temps down to within the yeast's range,& make sure the water you're using is good,with no appreciable chlorine smell.
They also say over crushing & over sparging of the grains can cause this. It can leach phenols from the grain husks. But in your case,I'd say chlorine is a touch much...

 

[zyx345]

That plastic flavor is from Phenols. Band-aid like. Chlorine or chloromine can cause it. That's why if you use bleach or the like to sanitize,rinse well to get rid of the smell,or you'll be stuck on band aids. Good sanitation should fix it. I switched to star-san & got rid of that part of it. Also,keep temps down to within the yeast's range,& make sure the water you're using is good,with no appreciable chlorine smell.
They also say over crushing & over sparging of the grains can cause this. It can leach phenols from the grain husks. But in your case,I'd say chlorine is a touch much...

Thanks. I use OxiClean Free to wash and Star-San to sanitize. I try to always rinse the OxiClean out with hot water. Its quite possible that the OxiClean did not rinse out thoroughly enough. No matter what I do, I somehow always mange to still smell it slightly. I'm going to be extra careful when rising out with my next batch.

 

[unionrdr]

That's the biggest reason I switched to PBW to clean with. Everything else seemed to be too hard to get rid of the chlorine like smell. PBW will clean virtually anything off your bottles & equipment without leaving any smell or off flavors after a quick rinse. I feel it's worth the money in terms of piece of mind.

 

[Toy4Rick]

Hey zyx345,

Do you taste maybe a caramel flavor? That is what I taste mostly with LME. I took the same Hef recipe and used DME and that flavor is gone, the Hef flavor really comes through and it's a bunch lighter in color. I even taste it in my current English Porter. For me, it will be DME from now on.

Toy4Rick

 

[jonmohno]

I havent really had those issues but take the suggestions into consideration before you blame it on the malt, you can also try adding half towards the end of the boil, you could try rinsing your bottles with preboiled or distilled water- i sometimes fill half a bottle with distilled water after sanitizing and rise the bottles with it,may be a PITA with 50 bottles though but i have 16 usually.
I use both and was using a lot of lme before but have been using dme again latley.My opinion is it seems to be cleaner lighter in color and more attenuable.
I like adding it as about 1/4 of fermentables now and mashing the grain so i can use differnet base malts.