Watermelon wheat - smells/tastes nail polish remover

[tim30786]

Hi guys,

Made my second batch of partial extract beer today and it tastes like s&*t. I tried to make a watermelon wheat and it turned out tasting like nail polish remover.

Symptoms:

- Powdery yeast on top of fermenter
- Smell/taste of nail polish


I left it in the primary a bit longer ~4 weeks thinking it would taste better, not sure if that had caused the problem.

Basically, 1.5 weeks in fermenter then added 4 cups of watermelon.

Any thoughts on what not to do next time?

 

[DocScott]

Sounds like either stressed yeast or chlorophenols. What temp did you ferment at? What yeast and what was your pitch rate? Underpitching and fermenting too hot can produce a ton of esters and fusel alcohols.

Chlorophenols happen if you have chlorine or chloramine in your brewing water. The cl reacts with the phenol production of the yeasts during fermentation and makes for a solvent/medicinal like smell an flavor. You can prevent this by using water without chlorine or by treating your water before you brew with campden tablets

Unfortunately, neither of these flavors tend to fade with time.

 

[BigFloyd]

Sounds like either stressed yeast or chlorophenols. What temp did you ferment at? What yeast and what was your pitch rate? Underpitching and fermenting too hot can produce a ton of esters and fusel alcohols.

Chlorophenols happen if you have chlorine or chloramine in your brewing water. The cl reacts with the phenol production of the yeasts during fermentation and makes for a solvent/medicinal like smell an flavor. You can prevent this by using water without chlorine or by treating your water before you brew with campden tablets

Unfortunately, neither of these flavors tend to fade with time.

+1. The most likely culprit being high ferment temps. What were they?

If it's the water issue, Campden tabs are cheap. Used along with carbon filtering (to remove chlorine), it works pretty well. Another option is to use bottled water.

 

[tim30786]

Hi,

I was using wb-06 and fermented at 20c. I only used one packet. Should try at 18c?

 

[duboman]

Hi,

I was using wb-06 and fermented at 20c. I only used one packet. Should try at 18c?

You should find out if your water has chlorine or chloramines in it, This is a more typical cause then the stressed yeast although always fermenting at the lower end is usually better for a cleaner fermentation.

Next batch try using camden tabs or R/O water and see if the issue goes away.

 

[BigFloyd]

Hi,

I was using wb-06 and fermented at 20c. I only used one packet. Should try at 18c?

If that was your beer temp, it's not ideal but not hot enough to produce fusels unless you pitched significantly higher. If you can lower to 17-18*C that would be better. Always try to chill a degree C lower than the target ferment temp before pitching.