Watery taste?

[SudsyPaul]

So my first batch of Pale Ale may be nearing completion. I took my first read on Saturday, and will take another on Tuesday - but with an OG of 1.043 and FG of 1.012, that seems about done.

When I took the beer from the primary to sample for the gravity test, I sampled it with my wife, and we both noticed that it has a watery taste (flavorless) at first, then the deliciousness comes around. Is this because the beer is flat, or young? I'm hoping that all the beer doesn't taste like that.

This is my first batch of homebrew, so I'm pleased with it, regardless of quirks (and wife gave me "carte blanche" to go forward with more), I just want to know what's going on. If it's something that can be fixed, just want to make sure I fix it before bottling.

 

[BrewerBear]

Don't worry about it at this point,once you bottle it and let it carb and condition I bet it taste good.

 

[aiptasia]

First, it's a pale ale so it isn't a high alcohol beer. Second, the complexity in session beers tends to come from the choice of adjunct malts in the grain bill and the hops. Adding small amounts of flavoring malts (biscuit, crystal 20, etc.) can help add depth to your beers. Third, it's not carbonated, so it will have a watery flat taste. Add your priming sugar and bottle/keg the beer, stick it in a warm dark area of the house and forget about it for three weeks while it carbonates and bottle conditions a little.

Then, stick it in the fridge for a full 48 hours to chill and re-absorb that good CO2 gas. I think by then you'll find you have a much different beer on your hands.

 

[SudsyPaul]

I steeped some crystal 20 for my batch, since I wanted somethign with a little character for my first batch.

I've never had flat beer before, so that would explain the wateriness. The rest of the beer was good, was just concerned about the wateriness... but if carbonation gets rid of that, coolio.

I'm gonna bottle this upcoming weekend or the one after. 2 weeks in primary is enough, but it can't hurt to have it in there for 3

 

[beergolf]

I sampled it with my wife, and we both noticed that it has a watery taste (flavorless) at first, then the deliciousness comes around. Is this because the beer is flat, or young? I'm hoping that all the beer doesn't taste like that.

The beer is still young. It will definitely improve with some age. Also carbonation will also change how it tastes a lot. I remember my first brew. I was impatient and bottled it at 2 weeks and tasted it at 2 weeks after that. It did taste a little thin and watery, but after 3 weeks in the bottles it got better and by 4 weeks was pretty darn good beer. Give it time for the flavors to develop.

The hardest thing to learn about brewing is learning the art of patience.

 

[SudsyPaul]

Uh oh. Haven't learned patience in 30yrs,not sure it'll manage to sink in now :/

I think I'll just make a dozen batches at a time, no time to rush things with that, work and life.

But I'm glad it's not something wrong, just a young beer I'll probably bottle at the 2.5 week mark, and taste a bottle every week until 3-4 weeks, when ill serve to friends/family. I wanna taste the progression in bottle as a learning experience. Just need to find smaller bottles for tasters, my 600ml bottles would be a bit much

 

[homebrewdad]

Uncarbed beer in the fermenter often tastes watery - carbonation is required for mouthfeel.

Please don't try to diagnose issues with beer in a fermentor. (A) with no experience to draw on, you are trying to hit a moving target in the dark, and (B) beer in a fermentor often has only a passing resemblance to what actual carbed beer tastes like.

Leave it alone. Quit pulling samples. Quit fussing over it. Once you bottle it, resist the urge to try one after a few days, or after a week and a half... give it a full three weeks at 70 degrees to properly carb up.

You'll have much better beer, and you'll avoid all of the novice fears that something is wrong when the reality is that you have probably made good beer.

 

[SudsyPaul]

Thanks for the heads up, but I'm sampling the bottled product every week to learn about the aging in bottle I want to experience the aging process of my creation at each step. I'm not really concerned about waste or cost.

As for this sampling, I took the sample out to do a gravity reading, and since the beer was in the test tube, I had a taste vs tossing it out

My beer is just a basic pale ale that I made to learn about homebrewing. And I'm not super concerned about the wateriness, just wanted to confirm what was causing it. Since its just carbonation and age that are missing, no biggie, and now I know for the future

 

[dbsmith]

This might just be me, but when I sample my beer from the hydrometer reading, I don't swallow it because of the lack of carbonation will give me a bad idea of what the beer will be like. I swish it around really fast and try and get some air into it, then I spit it down the sink. It leaves a flavor in your mouth and really lets you taste the hops especially (at least, for me) without getting distracted by the warmth and the lack of carbonation.