reason for bitter after taste?

[BrewBoy19]

I made a classic american pale ale. left in primary 2 weeks (it called for 1) cold crashed for a little over a week (was sick). bottled and aged 7 days. cracked one to taste it. Carbonation was good, beer tasted good, was very clear. about 10 to 15 seconds after swallowing and thing it was very good, I was suddenly left with a bitter, almost astringant taste. It was weird to me seeing as how it took so long after clearing my mouth before I tasted it. It literally took 15 seconds after swallowing as I was walking out of the kitchen. Any likely reasons for this? I usually filter the hops from my wort when putting in the primary and this time i was in a hurry and forgot and it was left in the primary the whole time; could this have contributed to the problem? I've heard from some that it doesn't matter, since dry hopping doesn't do this. I'm guessing its something I messed up, just don't know what; it was a very smple recipe. I also used DME for carbonation other than that my processes were all the same.

Just weird it taste very good and nice hops flavor and bitterness then after the flaor eaves your mouth bam, nasty after taste.

 

[LiquidLunch5211]

Did you happen to over heat the grains usually I heat the water to 150 then take it off the heat to make sure not to burn the grains so to speak?

 

[davesrose]

about 10 to 15 seconds after swallowing and thing it was very good, I was suddenly left with a bitter, almost astringant taste.

Since you're not using roasted barley in this recipe, one culprit might be your water. What water source are you using?

 

[MidnightShift]

Seven days in a bottle is still a little young. Give a couple of more weeks.

 

[birvine]

Could be the bitterness will diminish as conditioning mellows things out.

B

 

[BrewBoy19]

I used DME no grains. I used water from my fridge line, it is filtered but just by a standard fridge water filter. It is a little hard, I get calcium deposits in shower heads etc....

 

[rayg]

I used DME no grains. I used water from my fridge line, it is filtered but just by a standard fridge water filter. It is a little hard, I get calcium deposits in shower heads etc....

How much malt extract, and how much and what %aa were
the hops?

Ray

 

[BrewBoy19]

4.5 lbs dme and 1.5 oz cascade at 60 and .5 oz williamette at 5, don't remember the hops acid % but it was a recipe from the joy of home brewing book. Its not a hops bitterness flavor. I love high hopped and bitter beers. This is not a normal bitter taste its a nasty after taste. I've had an issue with this in the past once before but it was with a imperial stout. The only thing these two beers have in common is I left the hops in the primary the whole time. The imperial stout the bitter after taste never went away.

It just seems strange that it taste perfect, then after 15 seconds after your palette is clear and flavor is gone then it just hits you out of no where.

 

[mfraier]

I have had several brews that had an odd flavor at a week that went away by letting it sit for another 3.

Buy bottled water to brew with from now on.....its well worth the few extra dollars.

 

[KAMMEE]

I think I know what the culprit is. Could be a couple things, but if you left the hops in the beer during primary ferment the yeast will work on those a little and kick out some pretty bitter compounds. Thats likely what you're tasting. But, it could also be from sulfates in your water. There isn't really any solution, the hop in the wort issue will remain even after aging though it will mellow just slightly.

 

[BrewBoy19]

how come when I dry hop then I haven't had this issue with those?

 

[Nurmey]

It could be your water but I would guess it is because you are drinking really green beer.

 

[Yooper]

I think I know what the culprit is. Could be a couple things, but if you left the hops in the beer during primary ferment the yeast will work on those a little and kick out some pretty bitter compounds. Thats likely what you're tasting. But, it could also be from sulfates in your water. There isn't really any solution, the hop in the wort issue will remain even after aging though it will mellow just slightly.

I've never heard that leaving hop debris during primary will cause some "pretty bitter compounds". That's a new one to me. Can you provide your references for us? Thanks!

 

[rjwhite41]

how come when I dry hop then I haven't had this issue with those?

Normally you would dry hop after fermentation has finished. In this situation the hops were in it while yeast was going crazy. I've had a similar issue a couple of beers back. IIPA exact same recipe as I usually brew and it came out way more bitter with what I would call almost astrigency to it. It was on the tail end of the flavor profile, not as late yours but still there. Anyway, the only difference was that I dumped everything into the fermenter (although I did strain it) instead of siphoning off the break and hop material like I usually do.

 

[BrewBoy19]

ok that makes more sense now

 

[theonetrueruss]

I had that on some of my first brews.. I found that proper pitching rates and temperature of fermentation helped tremendously. just my .02

 

[Joemama474]

+40,000 on the posts saying your beer is too young. It is. Leave it alone for like, 5 more weeks.

But are you certain you didn't scorch your extract?

 

[BrewBoy19]

its possible i guess

 

[KAMMEE]

In response to Yooper's question aboot a source... I should have clarified... its not just the hops, but the break material and trub I was referring too. Leaving hops in the primary will increase the yeast exposure to the compounds and resins in hops that contribute to the extremely bitter off flavors resulting from primary fermentation that are found with the krausen. Typically, you don't dry hop until the krausen has fallen or you move to secondary and its my understanding that its because of yeast metabolizing various lipids and compounds associated with the hops might contribute to some off flavors.

There are lots of references about straining of trub and the way yeast metabolize the compounds in the trub and how that causes off flavors. Mention of this is made in both How to Brew and The Complete Joy of Homebrewing. I also have done some experimentation on this on a non scientific level. After I threw hops and all into my fermentor for a pumpkin ale it had some really bad astringency/bitter tastes I decided to try an experiment. I did a couple one gallon batches of a very lightly hopped ale made from DME and some hop pellets, in one I left the break material and hops, and the other was strained. After tehy fermented I bottled and conditioned them. The one with break material and hops was extremely astringent, the other was quite pleasant though not fancy or exciting in any way. It confirmed my theory that the hops/trub contributed significantly to the flavor. Note, it was a small sample and wasn't repeated.

Sorry for any confusion from my original post, I didn't mean just hops, I meant hop and break material.

 

[thisgoestoeleven]

could be the bitterness will diminish as conditioning mellows things out.

B

+1

 

[Markdark60]

I am in a similar situation, I tried my IPA a few days ago (only a week after bottling). The first taste was great but the after taste was astringent and not a pleasant hop bitterness. I am going to give it more time as I thought that it might just need to mellow out. The other thing I thought it might be was that I used a fair amount of high alpha hops later in the boil and was wondering if that was the cause but based upon your recipe that doesn't seem to be true for you at all. Never had an issue with leaving hops in primary fermentation and was using the same water source, all my previous brews have been fine (given that they were recipes and this was my own creation). I was also wondering if I just used to much hops during the late boil but it seems like after doing a lot of searching that that should not be the reason. Seeing as the bad bitter taste was just aftertaste I don't believe it had to do with my IBU's and they were only at 70 anyways with 12 oz of specialty malt. Ill report back after another week or 2 on whether it mellows out.