Why is my beer too dark?

[eddieb33]

Hi everyone - I brewed an IPA this weekend and it came out much darker than I expected it to. My recipe calculator said I should have an SRM of 7.25...a nice light corn color. But once it was all said and done it looked more like an amber or brown ale. It's much darker than expected. Grain bill is below. I mashed the grains together and pulled a very light yellow wort. I then put in the extract before starting boil. I know I've seen some people suggest adding extract after boil. Could that have been the problem? It definitely got a lot darker after adding the extract.

This was for just a 2.5 gallon batch
3 lb Dry Malt Extract - Light
3 lb American - Pale 2-Row
0.25 lb German - Munich Light
0.25 lb Canadian - Honey Malt

 

[jack_a_roe]

i've been having issues with this as well lately and i have no idea why and that's without using extract. very interested in any answers...

 

[Yooper]

Yes, boiling the extract (particularly in a lower volume than 6 gallons) will darken it. The reactions that occur are called maillard reactions- similar to caramelization- and are typically browning type of reactions. There can be some flavor impact as well as darkening- think cooked extract taste. Maillard reactions are what makes bread into toast, as another example of those type of reactions.

Adding the extract late in the boil, or even at flame out, would stop that from occurring.

 

[eddieb33]

Good to know. Thanks Yooper. Frustrating because I was kind of aware of some of this (though not in this much detail) before brewing. I just didn't think of it at the time!

 

[thegreatmaibockaddict]

What Yooper said, but also it may be "light" malt extract, but I have always found it too be a bit darker than I'd want.

Try extra light, or switch to syrup, as I think the light dry comes in darker than the light syrup...

 

[eddieb33]

One more question -- would adding some corn sugar lighten in up or dry it out at all? At this point I'm not as concerned about the color as I am the taste. I don't want it to be too sweet or malty. Should I consider adding some sugar to dry it out?

 

[Yooper]

One more question -- would adding some corn sugar lighten in up or dry it out at all? At this point I'm not as concerned about the color as I am the taste. I don't want it to be too sweet or malty. Should I consider adding some sugar to dry it out?

It's already been brewed, so adding more fermentables now isn't really going to fix it. Normally, corn sugar is added in place of some of the malt or malt extract to keep the same OG. Since it ferments out fully, it will produce a lighter bodied beer than 100% malt.

Adding simple sugars now might make it boozier, but it won't change the beer that much. I'd wait and see how it tastes in the end before trying to fix something that isn't broken!

 

[HollywoodTK]

I've been thinking of starting to do late additions recently to lighten up the beer I brew, but I have some questions that will probably help the original poster as well.

I imagine that if one is doing a partial mash with a decent proportion of base malt, then a late addition of extract would be fine as the wort gravity would be sufficiently high for proper hop utilization early in the boil for bittering.

However, if one is doing an extract/steeping recipe which calls for steeped specialty malts with very little in the way of sugar conversion, then would it not be necessary to at least add a portion of the extract in order to ensure proper/decent hop utilization?

 

[boydster]

Is it still in the fermenter? Based on when you brewed it, I would guess that it is, and it will look much darker through a carboy than it will when it's bottled.

 

[hunter_le five]

Is it still in the fermenter? Based on when you brewed it, I would guess that it is, and it will look much darker through a carboy than it will when it's bottled.

+1 My light lagers/ales always look overly dark going into the fermenter, but the finished product comes out much lighter.

 

[Yooper]

I've been thinking of starting to do late additions recently to lighten up the beer I brew, but I have some questions that will probably help the original poster as well.

I imagine that if one is doing a partial mash with a decent proportion of base malt, then a late addition of extract would be fine as the wort gravity would be sufficiently high for proper hop utilization early in the boil for bittering.

However, if one is doing an extract/steeping recipe which calls for steeped specialty malts with very little in the way of sugar conversion, then would it not be necessary to at least add a portion of the extract in order to ensure proper/decent hop utilization?

No. Hops oils will isomerize even in plain water. You don't need to have a certain amount of maltose in the boil for isomerization to happen. It's common to use about a pound of extract total for each gallon of wort boiled, but it's not necessary. It does have great results, and you're not trying to dissolve 6 pounds of DME at the very end, but it's not required.

 

[eddieb33]

Is it still in the fermenter? Based on when you brewed it, I would guess that it is, and it will look much darker through a carboy than it will when it's bottled.

True. It is in a PET carboy, so I can see into pretty well. I do expect a smaller volume to look lighter. But I mean, this is brown. Hard to imagine it will end up the light corn color, even once it's bottled. But we'll see. I know at least from the gravity sample I took yesterday that it has great aroma

 

[unionrdr]

Dito on the color in the fermenter. You'll get a better idea as to color in the hydrometer sample. And adding most of the extract at flame out will prevent darkening. When I partial mash,I'm mashing 5-6 pounds of grains in 2 gallons of water with 1.5 gallon sparge. So that's 3.5 gallons boil volume. I use that for the boil & add all the extract at flameout.

 

[esabasard]

Sorry to hijack, but this applies to me tonight. We are brewing our first light colored beer and want to try to keep it light. It has 6lb Gold LME, should we do half at the start and half at flame out or just all at the end? Up until now we have always made an amber color or darker so we've done full extract at the start as the instructions said.

 

[unionrdr]

Are you doing a partial boil? Full boil?

 

[esabasard]

Are you doing a partial boil? Full boil?

Partial boil, 5g batch, 2.5g boil

 

[unionrdr]

In a 2.5 gallon boil, I used about 2 lbs of extract for hop additions. Added the remaining extract at flame out. Since the wort's still boiling hot & pasteurization happens in seconds @ 160F,it works great. Stir it in well & cover for a few minutes while you get the chiller or ice bath ready.

 

[gwapogorilla]

Yooper is right...add the extract at flame out. Also, extract beers tend to be darker anyway, you just don't have much control over color with extracts. Doing partial mashes with full volume boils will be a noticeable difference.

 

[unionrdr]

Not quite true. You just have to use less extract in the boil & more at flame out. I also used DME in the boil where possible rather than LME. DME doesn't darken as readily. I've made light colored beers with extract that way. I do like PM though. Using 5-6 lbs of grains allows for using the resulting wort for hop additions, adding the extract at flame out.

 

[esabasard]

We ended up using 3lb for the entire boil and 3lb at flame out. The wort was noticeably lighter colored than our previous beer (pale ale) and seemed to have gotten most of the color from the hops, it was definitely green tinted. Is there any specific time to wait after adding the flame out extract? We want to do a full boil whenever we can, but we need a bigger pot and those aren't cheap.

 

[unionrdr]

After stirring in the flame out addition, I cofer it & steep a few minutes while getting the ice bath ready.