Looks like a mild infection but I don't wanna dump the whole beer. Help!

[Cro Magnon]

Was going to bottle when I noticed white spotty stuff...and some roughly circular formations on the surface of the beer. Not so prominent that you can tell easily, but I've never seen it before and it's not CO2 bubbles. Feels like a terrible waste to throw away the entire beer, especially since I've read here that it's only on the surface, can't survive the alcohol etc. Problem is the fermenter is a bottle with a 2" mouth so I can't skim it off I've attached a pic...sorry it's really hard to get a pic through the mouth, what with the reflections and my room lighting etc. If you zoom in enough...hopefully you can see the white stuff on top

 

[RM-MN]

That looks like beer with yeast rafts that have been carried to the surface by the CO2 bubbles, not an infection.

 

[Cro Magnon]

Are you sure? I know it's hard to tell...and whatever they are, they're still really small at this point....but I've had yeast rafts in prior batches and they didn't quite look like this. Also...it's been two weeks and the krausen had settled several days ago...but this shows up now, suddenly..which is why I was concerned.

 

[tracer bullet]

Let it roll. Dumping it won't save any work to do it now vs. later. Give it another week and then get ready to bottle / keg. At that time take a swig, you'll know right away if it's good or ruined. It'll probably be good. It wont' be carbonated, and may have yeast flavors from that still being suspended, but if it tastes like beer you're likely fine.

I've only had 1 ruined batch ever, I was lazy and didn't clean an o-ring on my fermenter. It was obviously "off" and I could see a mound of junk literally growing on the ring.

Beer will have funny flavors as it progresses, especially from suspended yeast, and look strange at times too. I wouldn't give up yet.

 

[Cro Magnon]

Let it roll. Dumping it won't save any work to do it now vs. later. Give it another week and then get ready to bottle / keg. At that time take a swig, you'll know right away if it's good or ruined. It'll probably be good. It wont' be carbonated, and may have yeast flavors from that still being suspended, but if it tastes like beer you're likely fine.

I've only had 1 ruined batch ever, I was lazy and didn't clean an o-ring on my fermenter. It was obviously "off" and I could see a mound of junk literally growing on the ring.

Beer will have funny flavors as it progresses, especially from suspended yeast, and look strange at times too. I wouldn't give up yet.

Thanks for the help! Did you dump the ruined batch?

Also, if it is an infection, and I go ahead and bottle, and it gets mixed in with the alcohol, won't that kill it?

 

[tracer bullet]

I did dump that batch, it tasted pretty bad. It was a wheat beer that didn't have a strong flavor to start with and the funk was too much. And funny enough, it grew even in the alcohol, though that was just like 5% or so at the time. When you consider beer yeast can go well over 10% and keep working, you can imagine that something wild might continue to go as well. You probably need more like 50% alcohol to truly kill it. Not sure exactly, but - pretty high.

I dumped it out of the keg though, I did see it through to be certain. After week of sipping from the keg, I was certain.

 

[Cro Magnon]

I did dump that batch, it tasted pretty bad. It was a wheat beer that didn't have a strong flavor to start with and the funk was too much. And funny enough, it grew even in the alcohol, though that was just like 5% or so at the time. When you consider beer yeast can go well over 10% and keep working, you can imagine that something wild might continue to go as well. You probably need more like 50% alcohol to truly kill it. Not sure exactly, but - pretty high.

I dumped it out of the keg though, I did see it through to be certain. After week of sipping from the keg, I was certain.

Ah that's a shame. See that's the thing....I keep reading that mold can't survive the alcohol and only floats on the surface, protected by a CO2 barrier (this statement may apply exclusively to mold though and not bacteria). Interesting though you mention you prob need like 50% alcohol to truly kill anything. This is why it is not recommended to use something like vodka as a sanitizer cos even though it's like 35% + or whatever, apparently it's still not enough to kill everything...has to be like 70% +. So if something truly is in your beer, skimming and racking from underneath etc won't really do a thing. So basically A) you're going to drink it and hope it tastes good and doesn't kill you, or B) it tastes awful and you can't drink it anyway.
Thanks for sharing the info though!

 

[Sammy86]

Also, if it is an infection, and I go ahead and bottle, and it gets mixed in with the alcohol, won't that kill it?

No, the alcohol content of the beer isn't strong enough to kill it.