Witbier tastes like bile

[rtstrider]

Hello everyone! I bottled my first batch of homebrew a week ago. Prior to bottling it tasted just like it should with a nice body and everything. So I bottled last Sunday morning, primed with 1/2 cup plus 2 tbsp table sugar in 2 cups of boiling (filtered with a charcoal fridge filter) water. I put the sugar/water mixture in an ice bath until it was cool to the touch. From that point I sanitized all of the bottling equipment, poured the sugar in the bottling bucket, then let the siphon swirl the priming mixture around in the bottling bucket. I did not stir the solution into the beer. Fast forward to the next day. I opened one of the bottles and it was carbed up but VERY bitter like club soda/bile. I figured maybe this is normal and part of the process so no panic here. One thing I have noticed in the past week is the beer seems to have cleared up in the bottles meaning I can see through it. The bottles are the brown/amber colored bottles. I know the rule of thumb is 3 weeks, but, I wanted to kind of get my feet wet and have a better overall understanding of the process and the flavors that the beer puts out until it's considered "ready". I guess my question is this a normal byproduct of the yeast eating the sugar and if so does it settle out of the beer over the 2-3 weeks of bottle conditioning?

Edit: Also wanted to mention there was floating yeast in the bottles at the time I opened one. The yeast seems to have settled down/out so that's why I think it may be related

 

[flars]

The sediment and yeast in naturally carbonated bottles can taste very bitter. Condition your bottled beer for at least three weeks with a temperature of 70° to 75°F. Chill one bottle for a couple of days then open to taste. Pour smoothly without any glugs. Leave all the sediment in the bottle.

If the beer is still bitter and/or foams something else may going on.

 

[Morrey]

The tiny amount of sugar you introduce at the bottling stage is unlikely to produce a bile off flavor while it is carbing your beer. Since you tasted the beer prior to bottling, and it tasted fine, the issue had to be introduced during bottling. I am sure you made sure your bottling equipment was very clean and sanitized. Your bottles were sparkling clean with no sediment or dust from sitting around, and the caps were sanitized too?

If the description of "bile" is quite specific, that is a vomit like flavor I have seen lactobacillus throw off. But club soda is a pretty neutral flavor and I have never thought of that to be similar to bile.

Its obviously too late in the game to do much more than wait it out to see if this flavor goes away with some aging.

Anything else you can think of that you may have missed?

 

[rtstrider]

I made sure there was not any sediment in the bottles and sanitized in the dishwasher overnight using liquid dish detergent. The door wasn't opened until it was bottling time. The best way I can really think of describing it is it was close to an english bitter. I've had one and it had that flavor. Now I didn't cool the bottle and I poured everything (including the yeast at the bottom) into a frozen mug. But like I said the beer has cleared up. Either way I'm going to try another Friday for the FSU game and report back my results on this thread. Hopefully it was just the yeast

 

[Steveg229]

You very well could be tasting the yeast that is now in suspension from the bottle carbing process. Give it time and see what happens. I would pickup some Star-San and use that for sanitizing your equipment and all of your bottles prior to bottling.

 

[flars]

A dish washer is not a very good tool for cleaning or sanitizing beer bottles. Beer bottles have a very narrow mouth. A dishwasher is designed more for cleaning bowls and plates. Soap residue will also contribute off flavors besides killing head retention in the glass.

I don't think the dish washer is the most likely culprit for the bitterness but is a bottle care regime that should be changed.

 

[violinguy]

A dish washer is not a very good tool for cleaning or sanitizing beer bottles. Beer bottles have a very narrow mouth. A dishwasher is designed more for cleaning bowls and plates. Soap residue will also contribute off flavors besides killing head retention in the glass.

I don't think the dish washer is the most likely culprit for the bitterness but is a bottle care regime that should be changed.

Agreed. I wash bottles in dishwasher to at least clean and sanitize the outside, but then I soak them (full) in oxy or 1-step for a few hours. Then they soak in Star-san while bottling. I started this procedure about 3 brews ago and it has helped 1000% in sanitation and smoothness of bottling day.

 

[rtstrider]

Heads up I just tried one of the beers and that flavor has mellowed out big time. The beer tastes very light though but still going to put some in the fridge for the FSU game on Friday. How long would you guys recommend cold crashing (not sure if that's the correct term) these?

 

[user 125772]

In my experience, a minimum of 10 days is required to drink bottle conditioned ale. Let it ride bro.

 

[Sadu]

When you bottle it is possible to have a couple of bottles infected and the rest fine. If you miss a speck of grime during the cleaning that can be enough. I soak all my bottles in sodium percarbonate cleaner and scrub with a bottle brush after soaking. Store upside down to dry and sanitise on bottling day with starsan. Learned this lesson the hard way.

 

[RM-MN]

When you bottle it is possible to have a couple of bottles infected and the rest fine. If you miss a speck of grime during the cleaning that can be enough. I soak all my bottles in sodium percarbonate cleaner and scrub with a bottle brush after soaking. Store upside down to dry and sanitise on bottling day with starsan. Learned this lesson the hard way.

Make sure you rinse well (double rinse) to get all the soap residue off. Any tiny bit of your sodium percarbonate cleaner left in the bottles will kill the heading on the whole batch. Guess how I know this,

 

[rtstrider]

The beers have a decent head and carb right now. The flavors just need to mellow a good bit. I saw a video on the forum of a hefe where they were showing carbonation after so many days. One was 5, 15, and 30 or something like that. Mine looks on par with what they have. Going to let this rest till at least the 3 week mark and try again.

 

[masonsjax]

Bile flavor is often butyric acid, coming from unintended infection. If that's what's happening here, you'll need to be more vigilant with sanitization post boil and keep your nose out of the fermentors until it's done.

 

[rtstrider]

The more I'm reading it sounds like this may just be the "green" beer taste. I'll update everyone in a week or two after trying another

 

[rtstrider]

So I've tried a few beers yesterday and much better! No more bitterness at all. The green apple flavors almost mellowed out too! This was a good start and I'll be brewing a batch of irish red ale this weekend. Going to let this one age until St Patty's day unless there's any reason not to