"Hiding" off-flavors

[schmeek]

I just finished brewing a clone of "Bad Santa" a few weeks ago and I'm not too impressed with the hydrometer samples I've tasted thus far. You can see the recipe on BYO's website if you want... It's a 1.075 OG beer and I let it go for 15 days in primary at 65-68, the Irish ale yeast really tore through finishing out at 1.018 in about a week. I racked to secondary on a chopped up vanilla bean and 3 crushed cinnamon sticks about a week ago and I'm getting that flavor contribution... but I feel like it's got some sort of off-flavor going on. I take full responsibility as I had one of those brew days where everything goes wrong. Anyway all I want to know is if anyone has any advice for covering up the weird flavor other than spicing the hell out of it. I think my main issue with it is that it has very little malt flavor coming through. I was hoping for something with a bit more body, would adding brown sugar, or molasses or more maple syrup help that at all? I have the ability to stabilize in order to prevent re-starting fermentation. Should I just let it condition longer? Maybe go ahead and bottle/keg (I do half/half) and let that sit for a month? Thanks so much, any advice will be appreciated.

 

[watermelon83]

IMHO, and I'm a born again noob here so... Adding fermentables will only expand the flavor profile. I do not believe any of the options you listed leave much in the way of body behind after fermenting, unless your beyond the alcohol tolerance of your chosen strain. Now doing that and pitching a strain with higher tolerance might be interesting.

If you want body at this point you need unfermentables. Or just spice the crap out of it.

[\noob]

 

[RM-MN]

Hmm...You brewed a somewhat dark beer with high gravity and the hydrometer sample doesn't taste good after a couple weeks in so you want to cover up the off flavors you detect before it is carbonated. I'd suggest you give it more time in the secondary, then bottle it up and wait for it to carbonate and mature. Sample one at 3 months and if it doesn't taste right, wait another month. Trying to add something now will likely just make it worse.

Dark beers take time to mature, for the flavors to "come together" and the higher the alcohol, the longer it takes.

 

[dnslater]

I agree that it probably needs more time, especially since you added vanilla and cinnamon. I would say age for 6 weeks minimum prior to bottling. It will continue to smooth out. Adding simple sugars may just dry it out, and may not add body... but the opposite. I made a vanilla/rum imperial porter a few years ago and aged it on oak chips. It tasted a little harsh at first but really was good months later. Saved some and had them after 1 year and 2 years and they were great.

 

[schmeek]

Cool, thanks for the feedback. I'm a bit weary of letting things age in the carboy for more than a month or so. I think I'll bottle sometime next week and let those go til Xmas, and hopefully they will be good to go by then. I'm thinking about carbonating with maple syrup to bring out more of that flavor that's already in there... anybody have any experience with that?.

 

[RM-MN]

Cool, thanks for the feedback. I'm a bit weary of letting things age in the carboy for more than a month or so. I think I'll bottle sometime next week and let those go til Xmas, and hopefully they will be good to go by then. I'm thinking about carbonating with maple syrup to bring out more of that flavor that's already in there... anybody have any experience with that?.

Why? You'll be having some of the same yeast settle out in your bottles where the beer will sit and age anyway. If the yeast is going to give you off flavors, it will just as well in the bottles as in the carboy.

 

[k1ngl1ves]

I've let beer age for months in the primary. You'll be fine.

 

[eric19312]

May as well get it into the bottles and hope for the best. Given name I guess this is your holiday beer. Try not to drink them all with Santa... I bet if you set some aside they may improve over the course of 2015. Next year brew your big holiday beer earlier.

 

[eric19312]

Another thing...I'd not use maple syrup due to possible variability in sugar content. You could use turbinado or brown sugar (but brown sugar is really just white sugar + mollassus most of the time).

 

[dnslater]

Maple syrup priming won't give you any maple flavor, just an FYI.

 

[schmeek]

I've let beer age for months in the primary. You'll be fine.

Under some conditions, the yeast will also consume some of the compounds in the trub. The "fermentation" of these compounds can produce several off-flavors. In addition, the dormant yeast on the bottom of the fermentor begin excreting more amino and fatty acids. Leaving the post-primary beer on the trub and yeast cake for too long (more than about three weeks) will tend to result in soapy flavors becoming evident. Further, after very long times the yeast begin to die and break down - autolysis, which produces yeasty or rubbery/fatty/meaty flavors and aromas. For these reasons, it can be important to get the beer off of the trub and dormant yeast during the conditioning phase.
-John Palmer

 

[schmeek]

May as well get it into the bottles and hope for the best. Given name I guess this is your holiday beer. Try not to drink them all with Santa... I bet if you set some aside they may improve over the course of 2015. Next year brew your big holiday beer earlier.

I agree but I thought mid October would be a plenty of time. I had a 8.5% tripel tasting great after a month

 

[schmeek]

Maple syrup priming won't give you any maple flavor, just an FYI.

Have you tried it? I found a nice article from BYO where Mr. Wizard says the opposite.

https://byo.com/stories/item/1694-maple-carbonation--pitching-rates-mr-wizard

 

[k1ngl1ves]

Under some conditions, the yeast will also consume some of the compounds in the trub. The "fermentation" of these compounds can produce several off-flavors. In addition, the dormant yeast on the bottom of the fermentor begin excreting more amino and fatty acids. Leaving the post-primary beer on the trub and yeast cake for too long (more than about three weeks) will tend to result in soapy flavors becoming evident. Further, after very long times the yeast begin to die and break down - autolysis, which produces yeasty or rubbery/fatty/meaty flavors and aromas. For these reasons, it can be important to get the beer off of the trub and dormant yeast during the conditioning phase.
-John Palmer

Lol! No. That's dated material. You can go much longer than 3 weeks. Under the right conditions, you can let it sit for many months in the primary. It's not necessary though.

 

[dnslater]

Have you tried it? I found a nice article from BYO where Mr. Wizard says the opposite.

https://byo.com/stories/item/1694-maple-carbonation--pitching-rates-mr-wizard

I actually have not. I added a pound to flameout once in a brown ale. The brown ale ended up not being very good, and had a weird twang and no maple flavor, so I was basing my assertion on that, although priming is certainly a very different thing.

 

[schmeek]

I ended up letting the secondary go for the 2 weeks called for by the recipe. I just tried a glass of the keg tonight and it tastes great. Thanks for the advice everyone, I'm sure it'll only get better with time. I'll let u all know about the bottles I did with the maple syrup as priming sugar.

 

[Billy-Klubb]

I put all my off flavors in a treasure chest, got super wicked drunk, and buried them somewhere in the Caribbean.

 

[Curtis2010]

Hmm...You brewed a somewhat dark beer with high gravity and the hydrometer sample doesn't taste good after a couple weeks in so you want to cover up the off flavors you detect before it is carbonated. I'd suggest you give it more time in the secondary, then bottle it up and wait for it to carbonate and mature. Sample one at 3 months and if it doesn't taste right, wait another month. Trying to add something now will likely just make it worse.

Dark beers take time to mature, for the flavors to "come together" and the higher the alcohol, the longer it takes.

+1. Big HG brews really need some conditioning time. 2 weeks is optimistic even for a simple light ale. Let it condition for a good long time.

I've just recently tapped into a braggot that I've left conditioning since January....yum.

 

[Curtis2010]

I ended up letting the secondary go for the 2 weeks called for by the recipe. I just tried a glass of the keg tonight and it tastes great. Thanks for the advice everyone, I'm sure it'll only get better with time. I'll let u all know about the bottles I did with the maple syrup as priming sugar.

Cool. Set some aside and let it mellow some more.

 

[Curtis2010]

Lol! No. That's dated material. You can go much longer than 3 weeks. Under the right conditions, you can let it sit for many months in the primary. It's not necessary though.

More recent conventional wisdom seems to be that autolysis is really not an issue at homebrew volumes. Read a bit on that by John Palmer recently.

 

[Billy-Klubb]

I have experienced the autolysis on a home brewing level.

 

[RM-MN]

I have experienced the autolysis on a home brewing level.

Yes it can happen, no it isn't common. Sometimes my loaf of bread molds in a week, sometimes it will be fine for 2 weeks. All biological processes are subject to randomness.

 

[Billy-Klubb]

Yes it can happen, no it isn't common. Sometimes my loaf of bread molds in a week, sometimes it will be fine for 2 weeks. All biological processes are subject to randomness.

ummmm... yep. I was basically saying that it can happen to a home brewer. I've had it happen only once in 15 years. I think that's pretty good odds. but it did happen once. it's a lot like the *shudder* glass vs. plastic crap: just be mindful of what you got going on and chances are that you'll be fine, but there will always be that risk hiding somewhere. happy birthday.