Too many hops?

[2005STi]

I just brewed an IPA tripling the typical weight of hops I throw in and 10 days after brew day it has a big unpleasant hot alcohol and phenolic flavor/aroma. I cannot begin to figure out how I'm getting this flavor.

Here's the recipe/process:

All Deer Park water with Gypsum/NaCL added to about 80ppm Ca, 180 SO4 and 60 Cl.

13lb 2 Row
0.5 Honey Malt
0.75 lb Corn Sugar
0.5 oz Chinnok @ 60 min (12.2% Alpha)
3 oz Chinook @ 10 min
3 oz Chinook Whirlpool @180F for 15 min
3 oz Chinook Whirlpool @150F for 10 min
Yeast Nutrient in last 5 min boil

Pitched a 2L, pure O2 aerated, starter of US-05 with 1/8 tsp of Yeast Nutrient added. Pitched @ 68F and aerated for 1 min with pure O2.

Fermented @ 66-68F for 7 days, dropped from 1.066 to 1.010, dry hopped with 5 oz chinook on day 7. Tasted as described on day 7 and the same on day 10 after sitting on the dry hop.

I have no clue what went wrong and I'm extremely disappointed as I thought this high load of hopping late in the process would finally get that commercial hop flavor. I'll also add that I haven't changed anything in my process over 30 brews and this is the first to have this issue. The previous IPAs were 50% lacking IMO on hop flavor and had about 1oz @ 60, 2 oz in the last 10 min of boil and 3 oz dry hop.

 

[joe_four_strings]

Let it mature some more. I did a IIPA hop bomb a while ago, and around 2 weeks after brew day it was really boozy and had that hot alcohol flavor. Mind you, it also finished at 10.6 abv. 2 weeks after bottling it had a really pleasant, hoppy, citrusy presence. Although you can still feel the alcohol, it did mellow a lot.

 

[2005STi]

Let it mature some more. I did a IIPA hop bomb a while ago, and around 2 weeks after brew day it was really boozy and had that hot alcohol flavor. Mind you, it also finished at 10.6 abv. 2 weeks after bottling it had a really pleasant, hoppy, citrusy presence. Although you can still feel the alcohol, it did mellow a lot.

Would you let it mellow in the carboy i.e. sit on the dry hop or get it into the keg and cold condition it? Thanks for the help btw

I typically dry hop for 5 days keg and 2 weeks after brew day.

 

[GHBWNY]

FWIW, Palmer says this:

Alcoholic
A sharp flavor that can be mild and pleasant, or hot and bothersome. When an alcohol taste detracts from a beer's flavor it can usually be traced to one of two causes. The first problem is often too high a fermentation temperature. At temperatures above 80°F, yeast can produce too much of the higher weight fusel alcohols which have lower taste thresholds than ethanol. These alcohols taste harsh to the tongue, not as bad as cheap tequila, but bad nonetheless.

Fusel alcohols can be produced by excessive amounts of yeast, or when the yeast sits too long on the trub. This is one reason to move the beer off of the hot and cold break when the beer is going to be spending a lot of time in the fermentor.

Was your ferm temp amb. or actual?

 

[Sweetwort-Hopkins]

I've experienced this same boozey/hotness in a couple of my DIPAs. I brewed the same recipe a dozen times so I was able to cancel-out the ingredients as a culprit. The fusel flavors are from the US-05 fermenting over 70F.
In what atmosphere are you fermenting?; Room temp? Controlled chamber?

When this happened to me for the second time, I immediately set-out to build a fermentation chamber. It's been the most important piece of brewing equipment in my arsenal!

I've found that setting my controller about 3-4F below my desired fermentation temp will help ensure that the temp inside the vessel doesn't rise above 70F - it is believed that the temperature inside the fermenting wort can be anywhere from 5-10F above the temperature of its surroundings (room, chamber).

 

[2005STi]

I've experienced this same boozey/hotness in a couple of my DIPAs. I brewed the same recipe a dozen times so I was able to cancel-out the ingredients as a culprit. The fusel flavors are from the US-05 fermenting over 70F.
In what atmosphere are you fermenting?; Room temp? Controlled chamber?

When this happened to me for the second time, I immediately set-out to build a fermentation chamber. It's been the most important piece of brewing equipment in my arsenal!

I've found that setting my controller about 3-4F below my desired fermentation temp will help ensure that the temp inside the vessel doesn't rise above 70F - it is believed that the temperature inside the fermenting wort can be anywhere from 5-10F above the temperature of its surroundings (room, chamber).

I'm ferementing in a Sanyo Dorm fridge with an analog Johnson controller and a Fermometer to measure the ferm temp. I've used this system and ferm temp for at least 10 beers using US-05.

The only time I was at a temp over 70 was 72-74 right when I pitched. I pulled the carboy out of my keezer (how I get to pitching temp) and the fermometer read 68.

Once I pitched/aerated I looked and it actually read 74 but I got it into the ferm chamber and it was down to 66 in less than 8-10 hours. This small window in the adaptive stage couldn't have thrown these fusel alcohols right??

 

[Sweetwort-Hopkins]

Hmm.. I'm not sure if the fusels would be created that early. In my experience, my temps got out of control a couple days into fermentation. I came home from work on one occasion and the fermenter read 74F, It smelled like banana whiskey lol. One sip was enough for me to dump the entire batch. It was wicked harsh!!

I did indeed do a lot of research about potentially 'saving' the beer but I couldn't find enough info to sway me to wait-it-out and hope for it to mellow-out.

 

[joe_four_strings]

Would you let it mellow in the carboy i.e. sit on the dry hop or get it into the keg and cold condition it? Thanks for the help btw

I typically dry hop for 5 days keg and 2 weeks after brew day.

I would just leave in the carboy for a few more days.

 

[Calder]

Have you used honey malt before. I find a half pound to be too much, giving an unpleasant flavor.

 

[2005STi]

Have you used honey malt before. I find a half pound to be too much, giving an unpleasant flavor.

I have but never had any problems. I'm going to keg it on Saturday and hopefully by the time it gets carbed and the gelatin drops it clear, it'll have mellowed out.

 

[pharaohpierre]

The only time I was at a temp over 70 was 72-74 right when I pitched. I pulled the carboy out of my keezer (how I get to pitching temp) and the fermometer read 68.

Once I pitched/aerated I looked and it actually read 74 but I got it into the ferm chamber and it was down to 66 in less than 8-10 hours. This small window in the adaptive stage couldn't have thrown these fusel alcohols right??

This could possibly be your problem. According to the book Yeast by Chris White and Jamil Zainasheff, "During the lag phase of fermentation, yeast begin to form fusel alcohols either from pyruvate and acetyl-CoA during amino acid synthesis or from the uptake of amino acids (nitrogen).

Basically, the fact that you pitched at 74 degrees but brought it down to 66 after 10 hours could have caused fusel alcohols to form.

I generally always pitch ~5 degrees lower than my temp for this reason. Plus, for example if the outside of the carboy reads 68F the core could be 5 degrees higher than the beer sitting up against the carboy. I'm not saying this caused your alcohol flavor problem but it is a thought.

 

[2005STi]

I'm not sure if this could be an infection from the carboy either. I'll be using my other better bottle for this brew.

As I said, I'm brewing again tomorrow. This time I'll be using WLP001 to rule out the yeast FWIW, positvely pitching low around 63/64, sticking with the same Deer Park water/salts and I'm reducing the hopping almost 50%.

2L Starter of WLP001
8 lbs 2-Row
5 lbs Pils
0.25 Summit @ 60
1 oz Summit @ 5min
1 oz Summit @ 4min
1 oz Summit @ 3min
1 oz Summit @ 2min
1 oz Summit @ 1min
No hop stand, begin cooling at flameout.

Dry hop 4-5 oz depending on how the beer tastes when it's a few points from terminal.

I'll post results.