Bavarian Hefe gone wrong?

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

mrcej23

Active Member
Joined
Mar 23, 2014
Messages
36
Reaction score
2
So this was my first brew. I followed the one gallon northern brewer extract recipe exactly. I let it sit in the fermenter two weeks and then in the bottles for two weeks, just as instructed, and it was finished yesterday. So I popped open a bottle and poured in a glass. The color and carbonation were PERFECT. But the taste....well it was ok on the first sip but half way through the glass I almost didn't even wanna drink it anymore. There have been beers in the past that I didn't like so much but never any that I didn't even want to finish. It's hard to describe but it has sort of a sour, just nasty flavor. My first impression was maybe this is just how hefeweizen tastes (I've never tried one before). But I don't think so. One of my favorites is blue moon, except I wish it wasn't so sweet, and I like anything with that wheat flavor. And that's what I expected from this. Sort of blue moon-ish except without the orange flavor and sweetness and maybe with that banana flavor I keep hearing about. Am I right about how it SHOULD taste? I could use some help figuring out what went wrong. Here are some possibilities.

I stirred the whole time I was brewing instead of letting it boil( I was afraid of scorching it) but I later saw that most brewers just let it boil.

I may have added too much hops due to the crappy scale I have but I don't think that would make it taste too bad

Sanitization- I sanitized everything with starsan and did not rinse as the instructions said. But I suppose I could have been more thorough with sanitizing.

Also worth mentioning, there was a little bit of gooey white stuff in the bottom of the bottles. I know there's supposed to be some stuff at the bottom of the bottles, but I didn't know it looked like that

Also I went a cheap route and didn't get a bottler. I poured directly from the pot I used to stir in the priming sugar through a funnel into the bottles. My thoughts are maybe that oxidized it or something
 
The gooey stuff in the bottles is yeast. With a hefe the yeast is typically poured into the glass, "mit Hefe" or something like that. Mine are "nein Hefe" for the clove flavor I like.
Two weeks of bottle conditioning time is not enough. The beer is still green. Give them four weeks at 70° to 72°.
Then drink them fast. You oxidised the beer by pouring it into the bottles. Oxidation gets worse as time goes by. Oxidation is described as wet card board.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top