Never dump your beer!!! Patience IS a virtue!!! Time heals all things, even beer!

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ncbrewer said:
^^^This. And if the beer is sitting in a closed closet on an exterior wall, it might be colder than the normal 70 degrees. Mine stays about 65 degrees in the winter - takes about five weeks to condition, more or less.
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Yea, wait a bit. I had a Raspberry Skeeter Pee that took 4 weeks to carb. When it did and I got done stove-top pasteurizing it, it was insanely good. Give it a bit.

Hell, if I remember correctly, there are a few posts in this thread where people couldnt get carbonation after a month, gave up on it, and then 6 months later it was perfectly carbed.
 
Marmike600 said:
Yea, wait a bit. I had a Raspberry Skeeter Pee that took 4 weeks to carb. When it did and I got done stove-top pasteurizing it, it was insanely good. Give it a bit.

Hell, if I remember correctly, there are a few posts in this thread where people couldnt get carbonation after a month, gave up on it, and then 6 months later it was perfectly carbed.
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Yep. I had a Belgian blonde that took four weeks to carb, but was closer to eight weeks before it really came into its own, conditioning wise.

Only ways that beer doesn't carb is if you didn't put the bottling sugar in correctly, or you have the beer so cold (say, in your fridge?) that the yeast are all dormant - and therefore, not producing CO2.
 
logan3825 said:
2 weeks is way to soon to check carbonation.
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Disagree. Most of my beers are "ready" after a week or so. Sure they continue to improve with some conditioning, but 2 weeks is almost always plenty of time.

homebrewdad said:
Are you kidding? Have you not read any of the hundreds upon hundreds of threads that state that three weeks at 70 degrees F is the baseline for bottle carbing? High gravity beers or lower temps can take longer to carb.
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Believe it or not, not everyone has read hundreds and hundreds of pages on HBT.
 
TyTanium said:
Disagree. Most of my beers are "ready" after a week or so. Sure they continue to improve with some conditioning, but 2 weeks is almost always plenty of time.
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Bully for you. Puts you in the minority, according to the same info we see posted over and over and over and over. To me, it's better to tell a newbie to wait three weeks and have them discover carbed beer than to have them opening bottles at two and be concerned if carbonation is not there. They panic, they add yeast and/or sugar to the bottles, they pour them out, or they worry for no reason.



TyTanium said:
Believe it or not, not everyone has read hundreds and hundreds of pages on HBT.
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Very true. But you'd think that a guy who has 330+ posts on HBT would have noticed at least one thread on the subject ("Hey! I'm about to bottle a batch of beer. I wonder how long it will take to carb up?"). Or would have spend fifteen seconds to search the answer here (or at Google) instead of prepping to pour out a batch that was flat.

I make more than my fair share of stupid mistakes. I have certainly made some stupid posts. But it just baffles me that some people will invest the time, money, and effort into brewing a batch of beer without doing the most basic sort of self education, and then be ready to just throw that time, money, effort, and beer away... when it would have taken less effort to discover that, most likely, everything is perfectly normal.
 
This "wait three weeks" rule is BS! Two weeks is enpugh time to get carbonation going. But ask: What temp were the bottles stored at? How much & what type priming sugar used?

And while I'm at it, popping a bottle at 1, 2, 3 weeks, etc., is THE best way to learn about your Bert's progression.
 
This "wait three weeks" rule is BS! Two weeks is enough time to get carbonation going. But ask: What temp were the bottles stored at? How much & what type priming sugar used?

And while I'm at it, popping a bottle at 1, 2, 3 weeks, etc., is THE best way to learn about your beer's progression.
 
Rhoobarb said:
This "wait three weeks" rule is BS! Two weeks is enough time to get carbonation going. But ask: What temp were the bottles stored at? How much & what type priming sugar used?

And while I'm at it, popping a bottle at 1, 2, 3 weeks, etc., is THE best way to learn about your beer's progression.
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In my experience, it's not.
 
passedpawn said:
When I used to bottle, I always opened one at 1 week. Most of the time is was partially carbed. Yes, it was much better after 2 or three weeks.

I don't understand why one would not open one early. Why not?
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Because you know it's going to be better with a little more time. Why drink a flat, green beer and have one less great beer to enjoy?

Of course, its your beer. Do what you like.
 
Hey! I remember this thread. Still disagree. In fact I'll be dumping a couple half full, oxidized kegs to make room for fresh beer.

"If you see a beer, do it a favor, and drink it. Beer was not meant to age."
-Michael Jackson
 
Cellarbrau said:
Hey! I remember this thread. Still disagree. In fact I'll be dumping a couple half full, oxidized kegs to make room for fresh beer.

"If you see a beer, do it a favor, and drink it. Beer was not meant to age."
-Michael Jackson
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Time won't heal oxidation. That only gets worse with time.

The point of this thread is that a great many off flavors due to brewing issues, fermentation temps, etc, can be lessened - or even eliminated - with time. The point is not that actual magic occurs in beer to fix any problem whatsoever.

If you sanitized your bottles with bleach and forgot to rinse them, nothing is going to heal that beer. If you oxidized your beer, time is only going to make it worse. If you mashed at 190 degrees, those tannins are staying. If you forgot to hop your beer, it's going to be a sweet mess, no matter how long you let it sit.
 
I think in general you have two types of brewers. The first doesn't really care about quality and doing things right they just want cheap beer. The others like most of the posters myself included, are trying to make the Best Beer possible. I don't short cut or do things because they are cheaper or faster or easier. If you think that your beer is fully carbed at 2 weeks drink it. Those of us "truly" in the know will do things right and wait for our beer to become the best beer possible. It's a matter of choice, yours. To those posters who have real world proven experience thank you. Some newbs here should swallow their pride and listen to experience.
 
Commercial breweries who bottle condition (Sierra Nevada, Rochefort, Ommegang, et cetera) typically ship out after about one week, maybe a week and a half. If your beer takes 3-weeks to carbonate you are doing it wrong. Maybe "wrong" is not accurate, but you are not doing it in the most efficient way.

Commercial brewers, remove the main fermentation yeast, then dose a new pitch of yeast along with the primer. This dosage of yeast is much smaller than what is typically left over in a fermented beer sitting in your fermenter (primary or secondary). Your beer should prime just as well as commercial breweries.

Don't go preaching about people not caring about the quality of their product because they are drinking beers before the arbitrary three weeks. If your beer is taking over twice the normal time frame, perhaps you should look at your process and fermentation schedule.
 
Boerderij_Kabouter said:
Commercial breweries who bottle condition (Sierra Nevada, Rochefort, Ommegang, et cetera) typically ship out after about one week, maybe a week and a half. If your beer takes 3-weeks to carbonate you are doing it wrong. Maybe "wrong" is not accurate, but you are not doing it in the most efficient way.

Commercial brewers, remove the main fermentation yeast, then dose a new pitch of yeast along with the primer. This dosage of yeast is much smaller than what is typically left over in a fermented beer sitting in your fermenter (primary or secondary). Your beer should prime just as well as commercial breweries.

Don't go preaching about people not caring about the quality of their product because they are drinking beers before the arbitrary three weeks. If your beer is taking over twice the normal time frame, perhaps you should look at your process and fermentation schedule.
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Not too many of us are commercial brewers, so I will stand by the comments I made. When YOU not Sierra Nevada can prove that you can have perfectly carbonated beer in a week, please show me how to do that. I would be very interested in doing that. The majority of the experienced brewers on this forum, many of us who have won numerous awards for our beers will tell you that a normal homebrew batch will NOT fully carbonate in a week. If you add additional yeast, raise temps, etc. you MAY be able to cut the three to four weeks down some but I am talking about a normal bottling process not including adding additional strains of fresh yeast etc. You have the right to your opinion for sure, but can you do it yourself (with no additional yeast added) in a week? I am calling your bluff ..... :mug:
 
EROK said:
Not too many of us are commercial brewers, so I will stand by the comments I made. When YOU not Sierra Nevada can prove that you can have perfectly carbonated beer in a week, please show me how to do that. I would be very interested in doing that. The majority of the experienced brewers on this forum, many of us who have won numerous awards for our beers will tell you that a normal homebrew batch will NOT fully carbonate in a week. If you add additional yeast, raise temps, etc. you MAY be able to cut the three to four weeks down some but I am talking about a normal bottling process not including adding additional strains of fresh yeast etc. You have the right to your opinion for sure, but can you do it yourself (with no additional yeast added) in a week? I am calling your bluff ..... :mug:
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Also to add to it most commercial operations ferment and transfer under pressure so their beer is already partly carbed up, even the ones who bottle condition. Unless you are fermenting in a conical or keg your not going to do that at home
 
I'm not saying the beer doesn't improve from week 1 to week 2 to week 3 even (though for fresh, hoppy beers or hefes I find 2 weeks is the peak).

Just saying my threshold for "enjoy drinking" vs "don't enjoy drinking" usually falls around the 1 week mark. If I enjoy drinking the beer at week 1, I'm gonna drink it at week 1.

Also, many of us bottle at 10-14 days, not 2-3 months. It's possible that makes a difference in carb time.
 
EROK said:
I think in general you have two types of brewers. The first doesn't really care about quality and doing things right they just want cheap beer. The others like most of the posters myself included, are trying to make the Best Beer possible. I don't short cut or do things because they are cheaper or faster or easier. If you think that your beer is fully carbed at 2 weeks drink it. Those of us "truly" in the know will do things right and wait for our beer to become the best beer possible. It's a matter of choice, yours. To those posters who have real world proven experience thank you. Some newbs here should swallow their pride and listen to experience.
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Boerderij_Kabouter said:
Don't go preaching about people not caring about the quality of their product because they are drinking beers before the arbitrary three weeks. If your beer is taking over twice the normal time frame, perhaps you should look at your process and fermentation schedule.
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I agree with BK. Why on earth should a beer take forever to condition, unless one of two things is true- either it was poorly made (and then some flaws MAY condition out), or it is a big "special" beer- like a beer that is oaked or spiced. Sometimes bigger beers (barley wines) or oaked beers need some extra time in the bottle to come together well, similar to fine wine.

But a normal beer at my house is usually kegged at day 10-14, and consumed shortly thereafter. I'd like to think that I don't fall into the "don't care" segment mentioned in the first post- and probably would be able to put my beer against theirs and compare quite favorably. While I'm certainly no expert (only about 350+ batches), I think I wouldn't call myself a "noob" or say that I "wasn't in the know". To insinuate that experienced brewers would know to leave their beer alone for a month (or whatever) is untrue. Most experienced brewers would laugh at the idea of not drinking a beer at 2 weeks in the bottle.

If a beer takes more than a short time to condition, generally it's because it was poorly made. Fresh ingredients, proper yeast pitching rate, proper fermentation schedule, and proper handling mean that most beers should be delicious by day 14-21 from brewday.
 
EROK said:
If you add additional yeast, raise temps, etc. you MAY be able to cut the three to four weeks down some but I am talking about a normal bottling process not including adding additional strains of fresh yeast etc. You have the right to your opinion for sure, but can you do it yourself (with no additional yeast added) in a week? I am calling your bluff ..... :mug:
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Yes, often the beer is carbed up in a week. Not always fully carbed, especially after cold crashing or lagering, but it's not like a beer that is undrinkable at day 7 is going to be marvelous at day 21 simply by magic. The beer may carb up better over another week, especially if the temperature is cooler, and sometimes it may take a bit longer to carb up fully if using a highly flocculant yeast. But overall, you can definitely expect some decent carbonation in a week with a non-flocculant yeast like you'd find in a hefeweizen.
 
EROK said:
I think in general you have two types of brewers. The first doesn't really care about quality and doing things right they just want cheap beer..
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Cheap beer! My last recipe was 10 pounds sugar and a piece of whole grain bread. Tasted okay, but man it really got me messed up.
 
Not to be "That Guy", but can we take the pissing contest elsewhere and let this thread go back to what it was intended for?

As I have seen posted before, ask ten homebrewers the same question and you'll get eleven different opinions. We all have different processes. Some of us drink beer young, some insist on aging it. Who is hurt by either?

The point of this thread is that you ought to consider not dumping a flawed beer, as time has a way of healing a lot of flaws. Not every flaw. Not sure what the hell that has to do with drinking beer after two weeks or two months in a bottle, much less measuring our collective d****.
 
homebrewdad said:
The point of this thread is that you ought to consider not dumping a flawed beer, as time has a way of healing a lot of flaws. Not every flaw.
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Agreed. If you have the space, might as well hang on to it. The additional age may turn it into a drinkable, or even great, beer.

homebrewdad said:
Not sure what the hell that has to do with drinking beer after two weeks or two months in a bottle, much less measuring our collective d****.
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Well, I don't know about you, but people say my e-peen is HUGE. :D
 
My experience bottling (I did bottle a ton of beer) was that the beer was drinkable and partially carbonated at 1 week, but it always had better carbonation throughout the volume of the beer after 2 weeks. I never waited for 3 weeks.

But for a new brewer, I think it's good advice to not panic until at least 3 weeks. Drink away when you feel the desire, god knows I did. But don't worry for at least 3 weeks.
 
passedpawn said:
My experience bottling (I did bottle a ton of beer) was that the beer was drinkable and partially carbonated at 1 week, but it always had better carbonation throughout the volume of the beer after 2 weeks. I never waited for 3 weeks.

But for a new brewer, I think it's good advice to not panic until at least 3 weeks. Drink away when you feel the desire, god knows I did. But don't worry for at least 3 weeks.
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Well said, pp. In my experience, bottle conditioned beer, talking only about carbonation, was "ready to sample" at 2 weeks. Most batches I've let go to 3+ weeks as I have enough of a pipeline not to be THAT impatient. I also condition a little cooler than some, so this may skew my timeframe a touch longer than others. But 2+ months should NEVER be required to naturally carbonate a bottled beer unless there is some extremely unusual procedures/conditions involved here.

But if someone is new to brewing, why not sample regularly to learn how the beer evolves? Nothing wrong with that, IMO.

Lots of RDWHAHB required around here, it seems.
 
Ace_Club said:
Don't you EVER quote Papazian at me! I BREW AWESOME SOAP!
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I've tasted it... it's true! :D
Evan! said:
The burning question of the hour is thusly: considering that time heals all things...if you wait long enough, does airlock activity become a good gauge of fermentation activity?
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HAHA!

And I have to disagree with Revvy's first post. Time DOES NOT heal a scorched wort. Never, ever, ever, nope. :tank:
 
Please everyone, keep it about beer and not the other members. The OP wrote his feelings about dumping beer and time healing it, etc. Open game.

I will say that time didn't fix a few of the messes I brewed up. Dumping them did free up a keg though, so that fixed a problem.
 
Yooper said:
I agree with BK. Why on earth should a beer take forever to condition, unless one of two things is true- either it was poorly made (and then some flaws MAY condition out), or it is a big "special" beer- like a beer that is oaked or spiced. Sometimes bigger beers (barley wines) or oaked beers need some extra time in the bottle to come together well, similar to fine wine.

But a normal beer at my house is usually kegged at day 10-14, and consumed shortly thereafter. I'd like to think that I don't fall into the "don't care" segment mentioned in the first post- and probably would be able to put my beer against theirs and compare quite favorably. While I'm certainly no expert (only about 350+ batches), I think I wouldn't call myself a "noob" or say that I "wasn't in the know". To insinuate that experienced brewers would know to leave their beer alone for a month (or whatever) is untrue. Most experienced brewers would laugh at the idea of not drinking a beer at 2 weeks in the bottle.

If a beer takes more than a short time to condition, generally it's because it was poorly made. Fresh ingredients, proper yeast pitching rate, proper fermentation schedule, and proper handling mean that most beers should be delicious by day 14-21 from brewday.
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To not confuse anyone here, I am talking again about getting to full maximum carbonation in the bottle. Not just drinkable carbonation. For example when you fast carb in a keg if you set at 30psi for 24 hours then go to serving pressure say 10psi, it is not fully carbed yet. Is it drinkable yes I guess, give it another 5-7 days in the keg and the carbonation should be AT serving pressure. There is a difference in a beers head, head retention etc. between the two points I am mentioning. I don't care really if you guys all agree or not. But for someone to say it carbonated to max volumes of CO2 in the bottle in a week, nope sorry that is not true. I will stop here on this.
 
I broke the don't panic rule today. But was quickly comforted and am now looking forward yet again to what I believe will be a great first batch. I think I'm going to print off "RDWHAHB" and hang it above my brew station.
 
By use of evil magic, I am enjoying a beer after 6 days in the bottle. I know proven science says that the carbonation I am enjoying isn't possible or real, but it tastes delicious and fresh all the same...
 
when you taste that last bottle that sat 3-4 weeks before you chilled it you will wish you had more. Just saying...... :drunk:
 

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