Extreme Bitterness, Have I Created Poison?

[eamonnfoley]

Does it mess up your palate for hours afterwards? Sounds like leeched plastic.

You mentioned your syphoning to your cube. What hose are you using? Check your using 100C rated food grade hose with boiling wort. I had a non-infection problem that turned out to be unsuitable hot side hosing. Silicon is your best bet.

 

[jiesu]

Yeah I couldn't taste a thing other then the bitterness for 3 or 4 hours. The hose in not silicon but a clear style plastic, I assumed it was food grade seeing as i asked for some food grade hosing from my LHBS for siphoning and he gave me this one.

By the time I had siphoned out of the pot the wort was probably around 75 C.
I'm about to go have another taste. I can't help myself.

 

[Pennywise]

Just because a hose is food grade doesn't mean it's temp rated, I'd ask the bloke at the HBS about that. I have food grade hose that I use to transfer fermented wort but I wouldn't be putting anything hot throught it. Just something to consider

 

[NickB]

+1

If you can, get some silicone hose for hot transfers. I use a short piece of this to transfer to the cube. I also use the reinforced clear water hose for my HERMS plumbing, and have had no issues. Vinyl may leech flavours etc however.


Cheers

 

[jiesu]

Well I gave it another taste. Still So bitter it could kill a horse, but may be slightly better.
In an attempt to confirm the source of the problem, I decided to use the siphoning hose to transfer some boiling water into a glass.
I siphoned and no potent off taste to the water. I figured I may as well taste a hop pellet while I am at it to determine if it is indeed my lack of
a developed pallet.
I can certainly tell you it wasn't pleasant. It also had a similar characteristic to the wort but it was not as obvious and as strong a hit as the wort.
Well I will certainly stand by the unwritten code of brewers etiquette by not dumping it until I've aged it.
I'm still not 100% convinced it is purely hops.

Maybe I will take a small sample over to the trusting taste buds of Barlz and see what he has to say.

 

[bcp]

If you suspect the plastic, why not run some boiling water through it and see what you get? Good to eliminate from your list of suspects.

Unless you've 'cleaned' it with your wort!

 

[chappo1970]

I'm still not 100% convinced it is purely hops.

Maybe I will take a small sample over to the trusting taste buds of Barlz and see what he has to say.

I would trust Barls opinion.

Seriously thou I suspect it is the hops, hop break/powder, lack of a hop sock and no chilling. When you dropped into the cube it was still hot like over 70C? If so your hops that you added plus hop break/powder would still be isomerizing until it was under the 70C mark. I used to really struggle with no-chill because of this factor. No matter how late you hop if your wort takes 2 to 3 hrs to drop to under 70C you have the same effect as boiling for the equilivant time. Greater isomerization equals greater bitterness.

 

[jiesu]

I used to really struggle with no-chill because of this factor. No matter how late you hop if your wort takes 2 to 3 hrs to drop to under 70C you have the same effect as boiling for the equilivant time. Greater isomerization equals greater bitterness.

O Shit, really? I had just assumed that it was only isomerizing while it was boiling. I didn't realise it would continue until under 70C. Because as I stated before I probably left the pot for around 30 minutes even before it went into the cube, it would have certainly been above 70 that entire time also in contact with the entire hop material. So I could potentially be looking at an hour boil time for my first hops and closer to 45mins for the others?

Shit that is going to be one bitter muther trucker.
Any tips for reducing the bitterness post boil?

.. I just ran it through the spreadsheet and I am looking at an IBU of around 80 for a 5% beer That is also not factoring in the time it spent in the cube.

That sucker is going to burn.

 

[chappo1970]

Unfortunately bitterness is one of those elements in brewing that can't be easily solved. It's not like a cup of coffee where you can add more sugar. IMHO you either lump it, drink it and learn from your mistakes (Chap Chap style) or blend it with another beer. If you keg you can blend the beer once fermented with a less bitter beer to cut the bitterness down and or do another beer with much less IBU's and try to balance it up. I'm no expert on this and maybe some more experienced brewers can give some better advice on how to correct it?

Cheers

Chap Chap

 

[manticle]

or blend it with another beer. If you keg you can blend the beer once fermented with a less bitter beer to cut the bitterness down and or do another beer with much less IBU's and try to balance it up. I'm no expert on this and maybe some more experienced brewers can give some better advice on how to correct it?

Certainly not more experienced than you T but I have done exactly this (my first AG no less) and you tasted the results.

Ferment it out. If it's really bitter still and you've narrowed it down to hops, just make another wort which is underhopped. Ferment it out and blend the two. You will need some extra fermentation vesssels obviously. I would wait till you hit FG with the second, then blend then cold condition the lot.

By the way - I don't keg so it can be done with either.

 

[chappo1970]

Certainly not more experienced than you T but I have done exactly this (my first AG no less) and you tasted the results.

:wub: Loved that beer M. I remember it well because I cracked with SWMBO on river fire night.

 

[jiesu]

Yeah I don't have kegging gear either so i guess I will need to find another 2 vessels, 1 for another brew and 1 for mixing.

Bugger I will try and work out how to fix the problem once I know exactly what the factors are behind the problem.

 

[manticle]

Glad to have contributed to the romance, Chappo. I've made it a couple of times since but never been able to quite hit the spot that a 'woops I spilled half of it but added all the hops now what do I do Oh I know I'll blend it' beer did.

When I crack it I'll send another your way for appraisal.

That's the main problem with rectifying mistakes - repeatability is damn near impossible.

 

[bum]

Unfortunately bitterness is one of those elements in brewing that can't be easily solved. It's not like a cup of coffee where you can add more sugar.

Not entirely sure I agree here. Surely banging in a shed-load of LDME and some chewy specs will lower the perceived bitterness? Sure, it would be hard for DT to work out how much he needs (and probably just as hard to tell him) but this would make it more palatable for him, wouldn't it?

 

[eamonnfoley]

I would trust Barls opinion.

Seriously thou I suspect it is the hops, hop break/powder, lack of a hop sock and no chilling. When you dropped into the cube it was still hot like over 70C? If so your hops that you added plus hop break/powder would still be isomerizing until it was under the 70C mark. I used to really struggle with no-chill because of this factor. No matter how late you hop if your wort takes 2 to 3 hrs to drop to under 70C you have the same effect as boiling for the equilivant time. Greater isomerization equals greater bitterness.

The isomerisation rate drops dramatically once you get to about 90C and below. A whirlpool will get you most of the way down to 90C. Theres a good technical paper on it attached somewhere in this forum. Commercial breweries leave their wort for a fair while (maybe an hour or so) before chilling sometimes.

I doubt your getting what your getting from bitterness alone. I've done no chill and only noticed marginal increases in bitterness. Especially when I added my late hops at 90C instead of flameout. I quit no-chill for other reasons.

 

[bum]

Unless he just doesn't like bitter beer.

 

[Bizier]

And I will chime in again.. add more fermentables, more dry hops (and potentially more yeast) to make use of those IBU in an even bigger beer. If you use DME, there will definitely be some residual sugar to counteract the bitterness. It won't be the beer that you aimed for, but it might be something that you will enjoy, especially with a hint of age to meld it all together.

 

[jiesu]

Theres a good technical paper on it attached somewhere in this forum. Commercial breweries leave their wort for a fair while (maybe an hour or so) before chilling sometimes.

Any hints where? I am interested to read more on this.

 

[jiesu]

So I took a sample over to Barls. He claims it tasted fine and to quick worrying, So i Did, I also had a Homebrew Tasty.

Turns out it is also a 1.078 OG So it looks as though I have accidently created a monster. I am not sure how I got 1.078 though as I used the same quantities as suggested in the recipe (except DME rather then LME[compensated]) I suppose that would aslo explain the much darker then expected appearance of the wort?

Any chance I could have a more potent DME then the average, Is that even possible? any Idea how It came out 30 points higher then intended?

 

[manticle]

When did you measure it? Was the tap cleared of malt? What was the temperature of the sample?