A Little Help

[Pennywise]

I'm after a bit of help with a partial mash recipe I have for a dunkelweizen. It's a pretty simple one, 2kg munich 2, 1kg LDME & 1.5kg LME (added after boil). Only spec grain is Carafa 3 special. Single addition of tett @ 60 mins to about 15 IBU. Fermented with either WB-06 (used once), and twice with 3068
The problem I keep having is a slight sourness, but I'm not convinced it's an infection as I've used the same fermenter, keg & bottles with other brews in them and not a hint of this twang. I've brewed the recipe 3 times and all 3 have had the same hint of sourness. It doesn't get worse over time, and I find it hard to believe that my sanitation has slipped with just this recipe over the last 3 months.
At first I though it was the spec malt in the first lot as I had used choc malt and though that may be a bit much for a DW, so now I use the Carafa
To be honest I didn't even pick the flaw up untill I got the judging sheets back from Vicbrew, luckily I had a few bottles left over from that batch and sure enough when I tasted it it was there.
I've used my newish MT with copper manifold for all 3 brews, and have used it once for another recipe (which again didn't have this twand, so I don't think it's a problem with the MT either).
I'm at my wits end with this problem, anyone got any ideas as to what it could be. Or anyone that judged it a Vicbrew remember it.

 

[apd]

It might be the extract you're using. Liquid extract goes off faster than dry extract. Maybe try using all dry extract and see if you get the twang.

And when I say "off" I don't mean it's unsafe. I just mean that the quality is reduced. Poor quality extract will more likely give you that "kit twang".

Andrew

 

[Pennywise]

Hmmm, possibly. Although it's always quite fresh extract, and from a decent HBS. Still, a possibility though I guess, something to try anyway

 

[RetsamHsam]

I'm after a bit of help with a partial mash recipe I have for a dunkelweizen. It's a pretty simple one, 2kg munich 2, 1kg LDME & 1.5kg LME (added after boil). Only spec grain is Carafa 3 special. Single addition of tett @ 60 mins to about 15 IBU. Fermented with either WB-06 (used once), and twice with 3068

Where is the wheat?

 

[Adamt]

Yeeeeah, where's the wheat mate? Old extract can result in a twang, was there any further suggestions on your judging sheet? "twang" is a fairly uniform but informal descriptor for old extract. Te low bitterness probably only accentuates it which may not otherwise be noticeable.

 

[Pennywise]

Sorry, the LME was 1.5kg Coopers wheat , my bad. The extract was as fresh as your gonna get really, from memory it's use by was like 2 years away. Twang wasn't the term used on the sheet, but slight sourness was uniform among all 3 of them. I know leaving a mash for long periods can result in souring, but this wa only 1 hour. Are there any other factors that can sour a mash which I'm not aware of?

 

[HoppingMad]

WB-06 as a yeast can be quite phenolic I've found. Particularly when the beer you use it with is aged a bit.

When I used this yeast the beer I made was good for the first 4-5 weeks, then went south into a grapefruity sharpness that I guess you could describe as sour. I used it in a AG wheat beer, that turned into a sharp witbier in the space of a month.

The issue could be at the yeast/fermentation control end, not the sanitation. Something to consider. However, 3068 is generally a pretty stable yeast I have found though and can handle a good range in temp - so that part has got me beat if you're still getting sourness with that one. Maybe the type of sanitiser you're using? Maybe not rinsing the sanitiser off properly? If you use bleach and it's not rinsed thoroughly it can cause some unwanted flavours.

Hopper.

 

[Bribie G]

My very first all extract beer, that I made on 4 November, is now being drunk. I was about to run out of beer so I knocked up an extract quickly - a sort of APA. After AG brewing for a year, the brew struck me as 'chemically' and sour although that sourness is now mellowing a bit to 'fruityness', although I had used US-05 at 19 degrees so you wouldn't expect the yeast to push any esters.

I'd put it down to the malt extract. It was fresh tasting from the tin, but I reckon it's just the old extract 'twang'. As I mentioned in my thread re 'my first ever extract brew' when I racked it to cold-crash and had a taste I was suddenly 7 or 8 years old again because it tasted just like the stuff my old man used to crank out in the UK in the 1950s in a plastic garbage bin using some 7 pound paint tins of malt extract and probably some manky old Fuggles and Tandaco yeast. :huh:

 

[Pennywise]

The first batch (fermented with WB-06) was deffinatly the worst IMO, and this is the one that went into Vicbrew, it was also about 2 months old so you might be on the money there Hopper, I haven't had much experience with this yeast so I never would have picked that. The other 2 fermented with 3068 the sourness is only just there in one of them, and the other I can't detect it but SWMBO swears it there, she even reckons it's worse that the WB-06 one :unsure: . She's pretty good at picking flaws/attributes in my beers. I do ferment my wheaties on the high side, so I'm giving this one another crack and will be keeping it at 18 instead 21.

Edit: Missed BribieG's post, I think I'll also get rid of the tin, so I can eliminate it or point the finger at it. Will keep what I can't mash to dry extracts