Beer Salvage

[captian black beer]

Hey All,

I've got myself into a bit of a bind and need some advice on fixing the situation. Some mates of mine asked me to brew them a keg for a party about 3 weeks ago, and being egar to show off my skills and the craft, I said yes. Problem is the brew isn't right, I think used some Chinook too late in the boil and it's given a bit of a funky flavor. That is the hop flavour is not right and tends towards a slight but signifcant astringency. (The aim was a Rogers clone and I'd never used Chinook before - shoulda stuck to good old POR)

Anyway, the party is on Thursday, is there any way I could possibly salvage the brew? Normally I'd just throw a replacement keg the way of the party and no one would be the wiser, but due to other circumstances I don't think thats gonna be possible.

How could you correct/mask an astringency? Any Ideas would be great.

Thanks

Dave

 

[wimbymoonshine]

Hey Captain,

I have never tried this, but i beileve that the use of finings can help to reduce astringent flavours. From what i can gather, specifically the removed compounds may be sulfides, proteins, polyphenols, benzenoids, or copper ions. Seeing though you think u over-hopped im not really too sure where the astringency comes from as i believe the prime bittering quality of hops is from alpha acids which isomerise during boiling. The 'normal' astringency comes mainly from tannins (phenols).

Less aggressive protein finings (i.e. isinglass) tend to reduce astringent flavors. More aggressive protein finings (e.g. gelatin) tend to reduce bitterness.

I know that in winemaking protein finings are added to reduce the astringency, one of the main ones is a substabnce called 'POLYCLAR' which is an artificial compound. The problem with this is that is produces a very fine sediment as it is and picks up very fine compounds so u will have to rack off carefully.

I've used finings before for beer clarity and not had any taste problems with the actual fining additon (i used gelatin).

I dont see how adding the finings could hurt? Let me know how it goes if you decide to try is.

Cheers

 

[leeboy]

as a last resort take your keg to a local micro ie mountain goat etc and see if you can pay to have it filled. Who knows your mates may be none the wiser