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I’m not liking the sound of that very much either...
Soapy taste in beer - almost solved - getting close
- Thread starter passedpawn
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dwhite60
Well-Known Member
On a tangent...
Where I live we used to be on a community well system. We had wonderful water. Problem was the HOA didn't maintain the system the way they should have so it was down frequently. If the power went out and you were on the top of the hill, where we are, you had about ten minutes to fill some buckets or flow would stop. We used to live further down the elevation and had water for a few days after we lost power during hurricane Fran.
Anyway, city of Raleigh decided to tap into a local lake to increase it's capacity. As we are only a mile away Raleigh plumbed us in. Yay! No more water problems.
Well, I find out our water now is like Charmin soft. I had taken a break from brewing during the switch over and when I started back I noticed something wasn't right. The hardness was much less.
Makes a big difference.
All the Best,
D. White
Where I live we used to be on a community well system. We had wonderful water. Problem was the HOA didn't maintain the system the way they should have so it was down frequently. If the power went out and you were on the top of the hill, where we are, you had about ten minutes to fill some buckets or flow would stop. We used to live further down the elevation and had water for a few days after we lost power during hurricane Fran.
Anyway, city of Raleigh decided to tap into a local lake to increase it's capacity. As we are only a mile away Raleigh plumbed us in. Yay! No more water problems.
Well, I find out our water now is like Charmin soft. I had taken a break from brewing during the switch over and when I started back I noticed something wasn't right. The hardness was much less.
Makes a big difference.
All the Best,
D. White
OP
OP
I use water that is "soft". I think that only means that some the the minerals are removed and replaced with sodium. I don't know if that could cause the flavor.
OP
OP
I'm kegging tomorrow. Fingers crossed.
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Hope it goes well
dwhite60
Well-Known Member
Apparently lake water is notoriously soft especially in the flat lands. Up in the mountains it can be quite a bit harder.
All the Best,
D. White
Are you checking mash pH or using a brewing calculator that estimates pH? Alkaline mash/wort can cause soapy flavors. Also, leaving wort on the primary yeast cake way too long can result in breakdown of fatty acids in the trub and soapy flavors. If you're cleaning/rinsing adequately then my money is on some combo of hops oils and alkaline wort. But that's just a guess...
OP
OP
I've randomly checked, and managed, wort pH over the years. I have a pH meter.
There's zero chance that the wort was alkaline (pH < 7). It's always 5-6pH, acidic, at least when I've messed with that. I'm not saying pH isn't the problem - believe me, I suspect everything. But I doubt it's the issue. In fact, some of the beer I dumped recently was pH adjusted before the mash.
I still don't know the issue I have been having. But the recent Octoberfests seem ok, and I brewed them with RO water, so I'm sticking with that until the problem pops up again. I'll post here when it does (I know people say that all the time, but I'm good for it
)
In my experiences with soft water soap is difficult to wash away. Might this identify the problem?
At my current location, we have extremely hard water so I'm unable to verify my hypothesis. OK, might need to retype the prior sentence as it sounds obscene.
OP
OP
All the new ocfest beers are on tap. No sign of soap.
I have since brewed a pilsner. One batch tap water, one with RO. We shall see.
I have since brewed a pilsner. One batch tap water, one with RO. We shall see.
Ahh... the ole' "better make two batches- for science"...
OP
OP
If I might misquote Thomas Edison, "Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent inebriation".
Hopefully the R/O water fixes the issue as this can be frustrating.
John
John
So I just got ahold of Brewing Chemistry and Technology which includes a bunch of fishbone diagrams. One of them is for troubleshooting soapy flavors and almost all causes come back to yeast handling issues but I think a couple are for water as well.
@passedpawn if you pm me your email address I'll send you a photo of the diagram if that's something that might be helpful to you
@passedpawn if you pm me your email address I'll send you a photo of the diagram if that's something that might be helpful to you
OP
OP
PMing now.
I brewed a batch of german pilsner a couple of weeks ago. Put the wort right into the carboys that contained yeast from the previous octoberfest. I'm cold crashing the pilsners right now. They do NOT exhibit any off flavors (in fact, quite good I think). I actually brewed TWO pilsner batches - one with RO water, one with straight tap. Neither batch has any off taste (they were quite similar).
So, I'm afraid I don't have any absolute solution or cause for my intermittent soapy flavor problem.
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