My beer is sooooooo close

[carnevoodoo]

hate to say it, but probably not. if the sweetness disappears, it's because fermentation was not complete and restarted in the bottle. if that happens, you may have bottle bombs.

The sweetness will probably stay (if my experience is any indication), but the flavors will mature, so overall the beer may become more drinkable. don't dump it, but don't get your hopes up.

I've heard of adding beano tablets to beer, which breaks down complex sugars into simple sugars, and allows almost complete fermentation. You could give it a shot, but you'd have to gently get that bottled beer back into a fermenter... You'd also probably end up repitching yeast, but you'd end up with a very dry beer.

Their gravity readings are fine. They're not getting this taste from an under-attenuated beer. I think adding beano to anything is just wrong. The beer is done, it just isn't up to par with what they want. I think the change in process and equipment is a big first step here.

 

[Yankeehillbrewer]

Our recipe with the OG 1.042 - FG 1.014 was

Oatmeal Stout

6 lb lme
3/4 lb roasted barley
1/2 lb choc malt
1/2 lb black patent
1 lb flaked oats
1 oz Saaz
Nottingham

We were a little worried about the burnt flavor from so much black patent, but it turned out good, a little smoky. It was a good recipe, just kinda twangy. We live in a 100 year old house in Denver, so the temp fluctuates a little, but its always between 65-70 degrees.

IMO, 1oz of Saaz is not enough to balance this beer out, not high enough AA%. Assuming you use the whole oz at 60mins at 3 AAU's, you would get 11.34 IBU's. Ray Daniels(Designing Great Beers) suggests to add a bittering hop addition that will give you a BU:GU of 1 in a Stout. With this recipe your BU:GU would be .21.

In my Oatmeal Stout(1.060) I use 1oz of Chinook at 60mins and then 1oz of Yakima Goldings at 20mins. I don't think I could balance it any better.

I hope this helps

 

[Ceedubya]

I will throw my vote in for:

1. partial mash (can add a lot of options to flavor, color, etc)
2. full boil (I made a cheap immersion chiller with 25' of copper and some compression fittings for under $30- totally worth it)
3. late extract addition. The last full extract batch I did was a wheat style with 100% DME. I added a pound up front and boiled the hops for 30 minutes, and then added the rest of the DME with about 5 minutes left (turn off the gas when you do this). This was the clearest, lightest colored (which is what I was going for here), and best (no "twang") extract beer I have made to date.

I am a few steps away from going all grain, but until then these are the changes that have helped my beer a bunch.

 

[GunnerMan]

it might not disapear but it might mellow out and make it much more drinkable. If it dosen't start to mellow out, then you can always brew some quick pale ales and wheat beers.

 

[IrishLass]

I picked up our new (well, used) equipment yesterday to start on full boils and all grain batches ...when we do a little more research. The craigslist seller happens to be an HBT'er, too! Super nice and very informative guy, thanks Josh!! And thanks again for sharing the ad, Voodoo Can't wait to give this beer thing another shot.

 

[carnevoodoo]

I picked up our new (well, used) equipment yesterday to start on full boils and all grain batches ...when we do a little more research. The craigslist seller happens to be an HBT'er, too! Super nice and very informative guy, thanks Josh!! And thanks again for sharing the ad, Voodoo Can't wait to give this beer thing another shot.

No problem.

Also, I say go for it with the all grain batch. You have most of what you need now and it really is no more difficult than soaking, rinsing, and boiling. Piece of cake.

 

[Homercidal]

If you are doing full boils, AND going AG, then I'd say you are good to go. Def. have to use a chiller though. 50ft of copper tubing at Menards was like $30. You could make one IC with that, or 2 CFCs (but you'd need a few more things). Either chiller will work good.

Once you start doing AG, you may notice your beer is cleaner and fresher-tasting, but you will only have begun to tweak your process even further. You'll find information on how to adjust temps to control certain characteristics of your beer, and all kinds of things. Plus, if you buy bulk and crush your own (maybe some time down the road) you will start saving some serious $$ per batch.

 

[Mutilated1]

So far we only do extract brewing. We've done nearly 20 batches and they all have a sweet, sort of syrupy flavor in the background, just keeping our beer from the perfect flavor we want. The gravities have all been close, we've followed recipes to the letter, and we're maniacal about our sanitization.

Our next plan of action is to upgrade to full boils, but we're not sure what else to try. Any suggestions?

I think that sweet syrup flavor is what people call the "extract twang". Since everyone's already mentioned going all grain, let me suggest some other things you might try.

Maybe try a different brand of LME, or switch to DME. I used to get that twang taste when I did extract batches and used bulk LME from the homebrew store, but I got it a lot less when I started using either DME or Cooper's Light LME instead.

One other thing I think helps avoid the twang taste is don't try and make really big beers with extract - if you make a beer about .040-.045 there is a lot less chance of the twang then if you start pushing .060 or higher.

Also, I know this kind of flys in the face of the common wisdom about making beer, but you might try some dextrose in your brew - not a lot if you're worried about the taste, but a little bit will get the yeast really going and dry the beer out - especially this is a good idea to do if you make beer from a can kit and use the yeast that comes in the can - that kind of yeast has a sweet tooth and it really wants some dextrose or simple sugar to take off and get going.

 

[LandofOZ]

why even boil the liquid malt extract, Instructions for my my muntons American Style Light Beer lme is ad 6 pints boiling water to the extract and suger in the fermenter to disolve and then top with cool water this is for a 5 gallon batch never had a sweet or tangy taste in 5 batches now I do add 4 oz of "ROSES" sweetened lime juice to the the secondary
Thoughts from others on the burned caramel from LME partial boils all my other brews 5 have been grain steeps with DME , full boils 2 1/2 gallon batches and I've not tasted any of flavors Lucky me i guess