My first batch

[Tam004]

Hello fellow brewers. I am new to brewing and this forum. I brewed my first batch of home-brew yesterday, it's an abbey ale. I tasted a small sample of it before it went into the fermenter. It seemed really hoppy. My question is, does the taste change much from the time it goes into the fermenter till it's ready to bottle?

 

[frazier]

Yes it will change much. Most of my beers taste unpleasantly bitter at that stage. They usually taste great at the end though. No worries!

 

[kenpotf]

It'll definitely change from the time of putting it in your primary until it's fully carbed and even afterward....good luck!

 

[Tam004]

Well thanks for your replies, I feel much better now about my first batch. I was afraid I was going to have to give it all away to my hop loving friends.

 

[birvine]

You might just find that you become a hop-loving brewer! I did.

B

 

[sidboswell]

I did.

we all did!

 

[unionrdr]

+1! I wasn't too wild about really hoppy ales till I tried a few brands of APA's,IPA's,Brown ales,etc. You start to learn what kind of hop schedule/flavor/bittering you like. It's an experience thing. The more I'm around brewers,the more I learn (best terminator voice).

 

[dnslater]

The hops taste will fade a bit. Interesting that others here have also learned to appreciate hops. I was never an IPA fan until I started home brewing. Seems like I have a new appreciation for hops and different flavor profiles. Still prefer a malty brown ale or stout most of the time, but an IPA or APA goes down smooth to mix it up from time to time.

 

[RevZen]

Hi Tam004,

I just opened the first bottle from my first batch yesterday (a nut brown ale brewed on July 17), and yes, the flavor did change over the fermentation/carbonation process - and it is quite good!

Happy with the results, good thing as I also brewed our 5th batch yesterday (an IPA, happily bubbling now), and I'd be awfully disappointed to have this much awful beer around!

SGZ

 

[themashedone]

yeast will do amazing things to your beer sometimes. as for a hoppy taste i found that i really enjoy a american honey brown ale with 3 split vanilla beans in secondary. it turned out phenomenal with a very nice bitter note to it.

 

[unionrdr]

Here's an interesting factoid. I used cooper's ale yeast in the making of my 1st IPA. I had a devil of a time trying to keep temps down during that heat wave. So I got some little bit of fruity esters from the yeast,even with wet tee's & a fan. Interestingly enough,it seems to have enhanced the citrus flavors from the Columbus.Nugget,& whole leaf cascade I used. Kinda blended right in so far.

 

[Tam004]

Okay, so today I tasted the fruits of my labor, my first all grain batch. It's an Abby Dubbel, brewed 6 weeks ago. It spent 2 weeks in the primary, 2 weeks in the secondary and 2 weeks in the bottle. It was a 1 gallon batch and it was bottled with 24 grams of corn sugar which I had boiled in a small amount of water for 2 minutes and cooled to room temp before adding to the beer before bottling.

It tasted okay but there is very little carbonation after 2 weeks. Should I worry or will it continue to carbonate with time?