What's wrong with my beer?

The Homebrew Forum

Help Support The Homebrew Forum:

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

MagnusTS

Member
Joined
Oct 4, 2016
Messages
560
Reaction score
176
Location
Leeds
This is my GF brew #3. The expensive official BrewDog Punk IPA kit.

It's had 2 weeks carbonating at room temperature and about 3 weeks conditioning. It's gone very dark brown. I'm sure it was a heck of a lot lighter when I bottled it.

Also the sediment in the bottle is almost black. I tried to show this in the photo, but not sure it came out. In the photo I gave the dregs a bit of a shake, and you can maybe see it has turned the froth a purplish colour.

Also, but possibly not related, the carbonation is weird. It was really fizzy like a turbo cider and the head did not dissipate, just kept growing and growing. If you've ever been to Redcar, it looked like one of the special pints of John Smith's that they serve in the Pig and Whistle. I did put a fair bit of sugar in for carbonation, about 140g in 23L, but I've used the same in other beers and they've not looked like this.

So is this something bad like oxidation or infection. I must admit that I have been a little blasé with my sterile technique and maybe not so gentle with transfer to bottling bucket and mixing in the sugar solution.

It doesn't taste too bad though. Not much like Punk, but fairly pleasant.

IMG_3023.JPG


IMG_3026.JPG


IMG_3025.JPG
 
Good advice folks. I'm drinking one now and it's alright.
Not the awesome Punk I was hoping for, but OK.
 
Could you put up your recipe so we can see what might be giving you that color?
 
Punk_IPA_resepti.jpg


This is the DIY Dog punk IPA recipe, is it the same as you used? Look at those hop additions... blimey.
 
That is A LOT! But hey, tastes like an IPA. I've been to light on my bittering lately and it's affecting my beer. I think it's the penny pinching side of me! I just wish I could get a lot of those hops. Here in Japan all we have are fuggles, cascade, nugget and a few German noble hops. No galaxy, no simcoe... sad.
 
Thick dark sedement + over-carbonation usually equals an infection. Sometime they can kick off and produce lots and lots of CO2 but take a while to affect the taste, especially in hoppy beers.

Keep an eye on the bottles and open one of them regularly. If it's producing that much CO2 after a few weeks then you could end up with gushers or exploding bottles, especially if they're kept somewhere warm in this weather.
 
If you are bottling in clear bottles, you are keeping the bottles in a dark place or in a box, aren't you?

Errrmm, now that you mention it I realise that I have had the blinds on my shed window open for the last few weeks.
 
Thanks for the replies folks.

So, probably oxidation or infection then. It definitely doesn't taste right. I had such high hopes for this beer, it tasted awesome at bottling, but it looks like I've gone and stuffed it up.

I must admit I have been less than fastidious with my sanitation recently, and maybe over vigorous mixing in the priming sugar, and yes, I am storing them in clear bottles in the shed with blinds open. So basically I've done pretty much everything wrong that I could.

Feeling a bit downhearted about the whole brewing lark at the moment. I've got 2 crates of this brown Punk in the shed, and another crate of Hop Fiction that is not clearing.
 
Thanks for the replies folks.

So, probably oxidation or infection then. It definitely doesn't taste right. I had such high hopes for this beer, it tasted awesome at bottling, but it looks like I've gone and stuffed it up.

I must admit I have been less than fastidious with my sanitation recently, and maybe over vigorous mixing in the priming sugar, and yes, I am storing them in clear bottles in the shed with blinds open. So basically I've done pretty much everything wrong that I could.

Feeling a bit downhearted about the whole brewing lark at the moment. I've got 2 crates of this brown Punk in the shed, and another crate of Hop Fiction that is not clearing.
How does it taste to you?
Have you ever done this before?
Would anyone else drink it IF a label were attached?
Don't kick yourself down like that as what you have created is your own doing and if you didn't get it first time round try again if it bothers you that much as it does so take it positively and learn from your mistakes, otherwise it's beer and first and foremost there only was one from which the rest have evolved.[emoji481]

Sent from my ALE-L21 using Tapatalk
 
Back
Top