Home brew gurus?

[Rah]

G day raiders. 

 

Are there any home brew gurus in the house?

After some advice on an undrinkable Mexican cerveza.

Have just kegged a pale ale which is probably the best one that I have ever done and very tasty!!! and a Mexican cerveza that is undrinkable. It tastes watered down and a very strong chemical taste that I can only describe as kinda like sanitizer.
 Now I don't think it is sanitizer I can taste as I made both brews at the same time. Cleaned all the gear at the same time and used Milton tablets that are generally used to sterilize baby bottles etc. 

Had a taste before kegging and I think the taste is getting worse. 

Any ideas? I have extensively googled but can't find an answer. 

They were both kit beers and all instructions were followed correctly. 

Any advice would be awesome. 

Cheers.

[Guest Guest123456789]

The most important part is finding a location that doesn't fluctuate in temperature too much. I've heard guys using old fridges and boxes with foam insulation. I used to use an old fridge. As you know the wert needs to stay between 21 to 28 degrees and most often going outside these ranges wrecks the brew.

the other tip is to get one of those really big hot water kettles (as big as you can get) to sterilise old beer bottles. I found one that used to do about 15 at a time and a single wert would produce about 60 bottles. I don't believe in using plastic bottles and I don't like using chemicals to sterilise as it takes too long and affects taste IMO.

the other tip is to use filtered water. 10 litres of spring water from Coles doesn't cost much and makes a much crisper tasting brew, all the chlorine in tap water does affect taste.

Finally, find a good cool spot to store the brewed bottles and despite how appealing it is don't crack them for at least three months. Sure you can drink it after 6 weeks but after three months it's heaps nicer and the bubbles are so small like Moët champagne.

the home brews I made tasted better than any expensive craft beer you can buy, we did cerveza, stout, pale ale you name it and cost maybe $1 per beer at most. Keep at it you'll be a master in no time. 

[Rah]

Cheers Luke. 

 

No issues with bottles here as I only keg.

 

Yep got the temp stable as can be at 16

Bloke at the brew shop says that's perfect for the lager yeast 

Will give the filter water a go for the pilsner that's waiting to be brewed. 

Cheers

[Croydon]

Hi Rah,

Kegging is the only way to go I reckon.  Hell of a lot less stuffing around and generally full proof......  How are you sealing the wert while it's fermenting?  Is it possible something got into it during the process?  Possibly got a bad can of Cerveza??  I'd just chalk ti up to bad luck and brew another..........  Good luck with it.

Dave

 

[Rah]

51 minutes ago, Croydon said:

Hi Rah,

Kegging is the only way to go I reckon.  Hell of a lot less stuffing around and generally full proof......  How are you sealing the wert while it's fermenting?  Is it possible something got into it during the process?  Possibly got a bad can of Cerveza??  I'd just chalk ti up to bad luck and brew another..........  Good luck with it.

Dave

 

I think you might be right Dave. 

 

I just use the fermenters you get from homebrew shops. 

Might be a weird infection. Will use the one I did the pale in for the pilsner and give the other a very thorough clean and hope for the best. 

Might head to the brew shop and get some extra hops and do a hop bomb. Have heard that can fix some taste issues. Cheers 

[JohnDory]

Rah 

I made my fair share of brews ---  many many good ones. 30+

And out of the blue using all the same techniques I had a bad batch that went feral.

Sometimes shit happens. Did your air lock dry out ?? Did you miss a scrub in that corner of that bucket?

Who knows?

Start again and enjoy the Pale Ale   

Dave

Don't give that bad beer a 2nd chance....... Down the drain.

[bessell1955]

I agree with John Dory, sometimes things just happen.  Try again.

[Rah]

Dam.. Will do.

Hope the pilsner turns out good. nothing worse than a bad brew. 

[big Neil]

G'day Tara. Yeh sometimes the home brew "just goes wrong". Chuck it out and do everything right for the next batch. I used to put an electric blanket round my brew cask and several large towels over that, to maintain the right temp. Didn't have too many failures, but occasionally???

Wanted to tell you that my mate had access to some free honey, so he got me 25 kgs of it. I made up a batch of Dark Ale and put a few kgs of honey in the primary ferment (instead of the usual sugars). The end result was an extremely high alc/vol and a beautiful, creamy ale which had the unique flavours of good honey still apparent. Mate and I had a longneck each and were extremely mellow afterwards. Great at room temp on a cold wintry evening. He keeps asking me to make some more, LOL. Cheers, BN

[Rah]

Thanks Neil,

 

That dark ale with the honey sounds pretty darn good. I would make some more for sure. I might have to invest in a few more kegs for storage. ha ha

 

If anyone has some great recipes that they want to share, feel free.

 

[Wellzy94]

Hey Tara,

If you're doing homebrew and want to try something completely different, try making a mead!

Neil's mention of honey made me think of bringing it up. A mate of mine does homebrew and breaks up the beer with a mead every so often. I'm a huge fan, it's a bit sweeter than beer but also tends to be a bit stronger.

This site here has some cool recipes!

http://www.stormthecastle.com/mead/mead-recipes.htm

Cheers,

Wellzy

[Rah]

4 minutes ago, Wellzy94 said:

Hey Tara,

If you're doing homebrew and want to try something completely different, try making a mead!

Neil's mention of honey made me think of bringing it up. A mate of mine does homebrew and breaks up the beer with a mead every so often. I'm a huge fan, it's a bit sweeter than beer but also tends to be a bit stronger.

This site here has some cool recipes!

http://www.stormthecastle.com/mead/mead-recipes.htm

Cheers,

Wellzy

 

Cheers Mate, will have a bit of a looksee.

 

 

[dogbox]

I used to make home brew, the best I ever made was an Indian pail ale. I stopped because of the effort and I always had people helping me drink it.

I still have 12 bottles of a dark ale I made call Bock, i opened one few years back the taste had changed but it was better than I remember. They would be 14 years old now don't know if there any good now any ideas?

dogbox

 

 

[Rah]

27 minutes ago, dogbox said:

I used to make home brew, the best I ever made was an Indian pail ale. I stopped because of the effort and I always had people helping me drink it.

I still have 12 bottles of a dark ale I made call Bock, i opened one few years back the taste had changed but it was better than I remember. They would be 14 years old now don't know if there any good now any ideas?

dogbox

 

 

I'm not sure on 14 years. Was always my understanding that as there is little to no preservatives, can go off quick. In saying that, the bloke at my local homebrew shop was telling me about someone who has kegged beer that is almost 10 years old and they are planning on drinking it. Also that a keg that has been carbonated can least well over 2 years just being stored.

 

Give it a go, what's the worst that can happen? ha ha

[Guest Guest123456789]

We've kegged brews before. Comes down to personal preference but I like beer that's had a secondary fermentation in a glass bottle with a second dose of priming sugar. It's like champagne, method champagnois will produce much finer bubbles and better taste that method traditionelle. I also like sharing home brew at friends BBQ s etc and bottles are more portable. Is a pain in the rear end though sanitising bottles and always the risk of exploding bottles if you bottle too early!!

[Scratchie]

Can't help you with making it but happy to continually test the product for you!  

[Rah]

13 hours ago, flatheadluke said:

We've kegged brews before. Comes down to personal preference but I like beer that's had a secondary fermentation in a glass bottle with a second dose of priming sugar. It's like champagne, method champagnois will produce much finer bubbles and better taste that method traditionelle. I also like sharing home brew at friends BBQ s etc and bottles are more portable. Is a pain in the rear end though sanitising bottles and always the risk of exploding bottles if you bottle too early!!

Yeah I know what you mean with the secondary fermentation. 

 

I can pour from the keg to bottles if I want to take some with me.

[Rah]

3 hours ago, Scratchie said:

Can't help you with making it but happy to continually test the product for you!  

Any time your around Scratchie. Always happy to share. 

 

The pilsner will be ready to keg on Sunday I hope. 

[Wellzy94]

23 hours ago, Rah said:

Any time your around Scratchie. Always happy to share. 

 

The pilsner will be ready to keg on Sunday I hope. 

I'll be down on Sunday evening for a taster!

Cheers,

Wellzy

[Rah]

1 minute ago, Wellzy94 said:

I'll be down on Sunday evening for a taster!

Cheers,

Wellzy

Haha unfortunately needs to sit for a couple of days to carbonate. Weekend after should be sweet.

[zmk1962]

On 18/06/2017 at 9:30 PM, JohnDory said:

..........  

Dave

Don't give that bad beer a 2nd chance....... Down the drain.

Or if you have the gear and time...and the alcohol content is there... distill it !

Cheers

Zoran

 

[Rah]

On 07/07/2017 at 6:40 PM, zmk1962 said:

Or if you have the gear and time...and the alcohol content is there... distill it !

Cheers

Zoran

 

Don't think I have the gear for that. ? 

[zmk1962]

From personal experience being of European descent - a culture where you do not waste anything!... once you start brewing you also tend to get into distilling - grappa, brandy, rakija, vodka, whiskey, bourbon, moonshine...they're all spirits that have been distilled from some brew. Essentially the distillation process extracts the alcohol from the brew. So whether you have a suspect batch of beer or wine - as long as the fermentation has converted some of the sugars into alcohol - you have he opportunity to extract out some good alcohol as a spirit and leave behind the "crap".

Suggest you Google distillation equipment...distillation processes... you want the ethanol (consumable alcohol) that is extracted at around 87degC... never drink any alcohols that come from the distillation before 87degC (that's essentially methylated spirits)...

If your beer usually has a 5% Alc content - then from your 20L of brew theoretically 1/20th is alcohol - so  you may get 0.8-1L of alcohol finished product...

Cheers

Zoran

[Rah]

32 minutes ago, zmk1962 said:

From personal experience being of European descent - a culture where you do not waste anything!... once you start brewing you also tend to get into distilling - grappa, brandy, rakija, vodka, whiskey, bourbon, moonshine...they're all spirits that have been distilled from some brew. Essentially the distillation process extracts the alcohol from the brew. So whether you have a suspect batch of beer or wine - as long as the fermentation has converted some of the sugars into alcohol - you have he opportunity to extract out some good alcohol as a spirit and leave behind the "crap".

Suggest you Google distillation equipment...distillation processes... you want the ethanol (consumable alcohol) that is extracted at around 87degC... never drink any alcohols that come from the distillation before 87degC (that's essentially methylated spirits)...

If your beer usually has a 5% Alc content - then from your 20L of brew theoretically 1/20th is alcohol - so  you may get 0.8-1L of alcohol finished product...

Cheers

Zoran

Will definitely look into it. Sounds very interesting. 

 

Have just kegged a Czech pilsener that will be good to go by Wednesday night.