Beer And Ageing

[sah]

I find the following to be fairly consistant.

A hoppy beer, in the keg, is really hoppy to start with. After a few weeks it is far more maltier. Still very nice but very different. The same batch but in the bottle after a few weeks is very hoppy. Perhaps similar to day 3 for the keg, although I'm not certain.

What do you think is going on here? Oxidation?

I use a very small amount of sodium metabisulphite when I keg apparently for its anti-oxidative properties.

Comments?

Cheers
Scott

 

[Keifer]

Maybe what your tasting is the difference in bulk aging?

Kegs mature a lot quicker than bottles because there is 25 times the amount of beer in them. Why? i don't know. Could i be wrong? almost certainly. It's a starter anyways. Lets see if between all the god-like brewers here there is an answer?

 

[tangent]

2 weeks in stainless at 0-2C makes undrinkable beers almost drinkable and ordinary beers extra-drinkable. It's called cold conditioning. That's why i always brew enough for 2 kegs. One to drink during the 2 week wait, and one to drink when it's f#<king fantastic!

For some reason it doesn't work with bottles, just s/s.

 

[Zwickel]

from my experience: the yeast itself tastes bitter and has its own flavor. As long as the yeast is floating in the beer, the beer tastes obversely.

After maturing the yeast has settled down, the flavor of the beer has changed as well.

You may notice the change of taste after you have filtered your beer. Try out the beer before filtering and afterward.

It depends on the yeast, some yeast strains produce a very nice flavor, others not.

 

[albrews]

I find the following to be fairly consistant.

A hoppy beer, in the keg, is really hoppy to start with. After a few weeks it is far more maltier. Still very nice but very different. The same batch but in the bottle after a few weeks is very hoppy. Perhaps similar to day 3 for the keg, although I'm not certain.

What do you think is going on here? Oxidation?

I use a very small amount of sodium metabisulphite when I keg apparently for its anti-oxidative properties.

Comments?

Cheers
Scott

hi, this is interesting, and all we are doing is confirming dr george fix ,refer (principles of brewing science)
section on beer aging. he says there are 3 stages. stage 1 is fresh beer ,straight from the finish of fermentation, and this is beer at its best. and i have experienced this.
stage 2 is case where the beer may be undrinkable because of the hop bittering taste on the tongue and
there may be no sweetness at all.
stage 3 is the case of a sweetness develops in the beer, and the hop flavour becoming more palatable.

he does not have a time scale on the beer passing through the stages, so unless we can drink it quick in stage 1, it is best to let it age into stage 3 (say 3 weeks) where it is a good beer and good in the future.

i hope this helps, as some very good beers in stage 3 are a shocking beer in the dreaded stage 2.

cheers alan

 

[razz]

I'm with Tangent on this one. Double batches allow me to drink 1 keg at 4 weeks and then the other keg when it suits me. So far the second keg always tastes better, I usually leave it for approx 12 weeks.

 

[sah]

For hoppy beers I prefer the flavour when they're young rather than when they've aged.

Scott

 

[newguy]

Hoppy kegged beer lose their hoppy character over time because of the CO2. Sort of.

Take a bottle of homebrew. Air doesn't get in (not much anyway) and the hop oils etc sure don't get out until you open it. It tends to keep its hoppy character for a long period of time.

With a keg you start with it being nice and hoppy. Then you pour a few pints. The few pints of beer that leave the keg are replaced with CO2. This CO2 doesn't have any hop oils in it at all, so the beer outgasses some of the hop oils in the beer into the new headspace. Same as a bottle of perfume in a large room. Leave the bottle open and eventually the room will smell of perfume because the high concentration of perfume in the bottle as opposed to the low concentration in the room's air drives the diffusion of the perfume.

The more you drain the keg, the more pronounced this loss of hop character becomes. It starts to appear malty because as far as I know sugars (ie malt) can't readily vaporize and do the same thing as the hop oils. Once enough hop oils have evaporated from the beer, they can no longer mask the malt.

 

[randyrob]

Hoppy kegged beer lose their hoppy character over time because of the CO2. Sort of.

Take a bottle of homebrew. Air doesn't get in (not much anyway) and the hop oils etc sure don't get out until you open it. It tends to keep its hoppy character for a long period of time.

With a keg you start with it being nice and hoppy. Then you pour a few pints. The few pints of beer that leave the keg are replaced with CO2. This CO2 doesn't have any hop oils in it at all, so the beer outgasses some of the hop oils in the beer into the new headspace. Same as a bottle of perfume in a large room. Leave the bottle open and eventually the room will smell of perfume because the high concentration of perfume in the bottle as opposed to the low concentration in the room's air drives the diffusion of the perfume.

The more you drain the keg, the more pronounced this loss of hop character becomes. It starts to appear malty because as far as I know sugars (ie malt) can't readily vaporize and do the same thing as the hop oils. Once enough hop oils have evaporated from the beer, they can no longer mask the malt.

thanks for the info newguy, so is there anyone filling CO2 cylinders that have been dry hopped to combat this problem?

 

[sah]

Newguy, thanks for the excellent post.

regards
Scott

 

[Wortgames]

Newguy's point is spot on.

The keg vs bottle debate has been around a long time though, and I think to get to the bottom of it it is important to specify whether you are priming the kegs or not - I think trapped fermentation byproducts in the bottle have a lot to do with the apparent 'slow' maturation, and these may play off against hop character and other aromatics. Obviously this doesn't occur in force carbed kegs and it may be totally different in primed kegs too for reasons of bulk.

Another factor to take into consideration - when I was bottling I found that bottles which had been stored refrigerated for an extended period were far better than those just put in the fridge for a day or two before drinking. I directly compared bottles from the same batch many times. I doubt many bottlers have fridge space to keep their bottles chilled for 3 or 4 weeks between carbonation and drinking - but a lot more keggers will be equipped to keep their kegs chilled for that amount of time.

So I agree that there is a difference between bottled and kegged beers, but I think there are other variables to rule out before deciding whether it's a simple matter of stainless vs glass.

 

[tangent]

i also think bottling sucks arse

 

[redbeard]

i also think bottling sucks arse

Are you sure your doing it the right way ??? h34r:

 

[Coodgee]

bottling sucks arse and that's all there is to say.

anyway.. aged beer mellows, that's for sure. a beer straight from the fermenter is rough and ready... you get ALL the flavour. alot of them may be deemed undesirable, but then again the longer you let the beer age, the more flavour you are missing out on.

it's a bit zen...

 

[sqyre]

What about settling within the keg???

By my thinkin, (oww my head hurts.) wouldn,t alot of denser, heavier particles sink to the bottom of the keg? Once you pour that first beer your removing those particles.so if you then don't touch it for a while you may have a different flavor than if you didn't pour that first beer.???

Also

When i do my bulk K+K around 110 litres, leaving it in the secondary for as long as it takes to drink (yes i know. All Graining soon) i often leave them for up to a month before i touch them as when i have filled a keg before that time it will be a very different flavor. After that initial month the flavor stays consistant (and a lot better) for many months.. Albrews 3rd stage possibly?

Once i get my AG gear up and running i may have to do a bulk Partial and see how that goes after a month..

All in the name of science.

Sqyre...