Soapy Tasting Beer

[Northern_Brewer]

some hops come across as "soapy" to me.... Centennial in particular for some reason....

Centennial is notorious for tasting soapy to some people. I suspect, without any particular evidence, that there's a link to the way that some people find cilantro/coriander leaf "soapy" - there's a lot of similar chemicals in hops - which in part is linked to particular genetic mutants of genes like OR6A2 :
https://www.nature.com/news/soapy-taste-of-coriander-linked-to-genetic-variants-1.11398

 

[passedpawn]

Centennial is notorious for tasting soapy to some people. I suspect, without any particular evidence, that there's a link to the way that some people find cilantro/coriander leaf "soapy" - there's a lot of similar chemicals in hops - which in part is linked to particular genetic mutants of genes like OR6A2 :
https://www.nature.com/news/soapy-taste-of-coriander-linked-to-genetic-variants-1.11398

I've had it a couple of times in beer, and I did come to the conclusion that it was from the dry hops. I believe the flavor wasn't there when I took a hydro when adding the dry hops (though I don't take notes then, so not positive). Both of them had Centennial dry hops. I'm not making any conclusions here, but the evidence agrees with your comments above.

After the most recent soapy batch, I rebrewed the same recipe without the dry hops. No soap. I've made beers with centennial and liked them, so not positive about anything. Could be the age of the hops, a different hop, some combination/reaction of hops and ?.

1. June 29, '13 - Racer 5 IPA

• Notes: "This tastes bad. It has a tropical fruit taste, but the aftertaste is very soapy. Probably will be dumping both kegs"
• 

2. May 3, '18 - Coast IPA

• Notes: "Ended up pouring the keg on the grass. Soapy. I'm pretty sure it's coming from the dry hops (centennial). Need to ONLY use fresh hops when dryhopping from now on."
• 

 

[tat2Pompadore]

I had off flavors that were soapy when I was doing extract kits. When I went all grain it eased up. But I still had a hint of it from time to time.
I have added a small water filter to my set up. And I religiously use 52 ph additive to my strike and sparse water.

I haven’t had an issue since. I associate all of my off flavors to the water I had. That’s my 2 cents.

 

[Cantina De Jefe]

Centennial is notorious for tasting soapy to some people. I suspect, without any particular evidence, that there's a link to the way that some people find cilantro/coriander leaf "soapy" - there's a lot of similar chemicals in hops - which in part is linked to particular genetic mutants of genes like OR6A2 :
https://www.nature.com/news/soapy-taste-of-coriander-linked-to-genetic-variants-1.11398

I stopped using centennial altogther for this very reason. If anything only use it between 30-15 minutes. I am thinking that some bittering and dual purpose hops have a soapy flavor when used in whirlpool. Time should help it mellow out.