Kegging hoppy beers - driving me insane

[slash22000]

You mean there is a huge amount of foam sitting above your wort before you pitch?

This foam will eventually drop down into your wort and might be part of your problem. At least something I'd look at changing and see if it makes a difference.

I know I'm not comfortable with any unnecessary amount of star san entering my wort or beer.

Not a huge amount of foam, and it's gone by the time I pitch the yeast, but yes a good amount.

I have been lead to believe Star San foam does not harm wort/beer? Not that I would intentionally pour massive amounts of Star San into my beer or anything. :unsure:

 

[anthonyUK]

Have you checked the water you use or made any adjustments to suit the style?

 

[manticle]

I have a wort chiller, but being Darwin, the coolest I can get the wort is about 30ºC so I let it cool in my freezer overnight before I pitch yeast. I'm actually looking in to some sort of ice-water pump situation for the future (because obviously I don't have enough expensive brewing equipment).

Before anybody freaks out about leaving cool wort into a container overnight, I nuke the whole container with Starsan for hours before I put any wort into it, and there is a huge amount of foam that fills all the empty space. Never had an infection doing this, but I know it's a risk.


Now you mention it, yes, I do. I basically pour the entire contents of the urn into the fermentor. I've never been able to get a proper "whirlpool" etc going, I'd lose about 5 litres of wort if I left all the break in the urn.

I don't really worry about splashing too much, but the wort is 30-ish degrees when I'm transferring, still hot enough to have an effect?

Firstly, until you can organise your chilling to chill and pitch on same day, I'd be looking at no chilling.

Secondly I think bum might be onto something. While there seems debate among HBers as to the effect of hot break, it is considered a major contributor to staling reactions by many brewing science texts. What you are experiencing might be staling, accentuated by splashing above 30 (supposed level for safe splashing is somewhere in the in the mid/high 20s from memory).

Try reducing the amount of hot trub in your next one and don't splash it until it is at pitching temp and see if that makes a difference.

 

[eamonnfoley]

It may be more to do with brewing a flavour stable beer. Check that your mash and final beer pH are within expected ranges? Final beer pH for example should be around 4.2-4.4. Also sounds consistent with a wild yeast problem. Wild yeast can easily mask hop flavour.

 

[givemeamash]

make a second cheap chiller, connect them one after the other with a meyer of hose beyween then run the first through an ice bucket then into the wort, should get the temp down

I have a wort chiller, but being Darwin, the coolest I can get the wort is about 30ºC so I let it cool in my freezer overnight before I pitch yeast. I'm actually looking in to some sort of ice-water pump situation for the future (because obviously I don't have enough expensive brewing equipment).

Before anybody freaks out about leaving cool wort into a container overnight, I nuke the whole container with Starsan for hours before I put any wort into it, and there is a huge amount of foam that fills all the empty space. Never had an infection doing this, but I know it's a risk.



Now you mention it, yes, I do. I basically pour the entire contents of the urn into the fermentor. I've never been able to get a proper "whirlpool" etc going, I'd lose about 5 litres of wort if I left all the break in the urn.

I don't really worry about splashing too much, but the wort is 30-ish degrees when I'm transferring, still hot enough to have an effect?



I might do this with my next batch, I was really hoping with this batch I had solved the problem. Which I did .. for a few days ..



No, I use an autosiphon.



I will give this a go next drink, hoping it's not necessary forever!

 

[pcmfisher]

Isn't it just the stripping effect of the ever increasing volume of co2 on top of your keg of beer?

I have had commercial tap beers taste more and less hoppy at different times so maybe it happens there too.

 

[RdeVjun]

I'm with foles, potentially a wild yeast problem which does indeed nuke the hops character. Have had similar problems myself, but they only started when I moved to a crappy downstairs flat, I'm now quite sure it is loaded with wild yeasts (slants lost due to contamination, pedicles in scrupulously prepared starters and FVs, including all new equipment etc., dust and mould appearing on many surfaces).
However, that the bottled beer behaves differently is not altogether consistent with that diagnosis, so perhaps there's a stability issue as well.
What I do know is that it is disheartening and frustrating, just don't give up! :icon_cheers:

 

[browndog]

Something that nobody has mentioned is the fact that it's taking 4 weeks to ferment an ale, that is an exessive amount of time even for an IPA and could be stripping flavour and aroma. Combine this with tasting a new beer then palette fatigue (so to speak) and it could be your problem. FWIW my IPAs go from 1066 to under 1010 and crash chilled for 4-5days in under 2 weeks. No loss of hoppiness issues.

 

[Parks]

So RdeVjun and browndog - are you saying your APA/AIPA hops don't fade in the keg over say 2 months?

I'm not 100% that what I experienced is the same as the OP but I have tasted a kegged and bottled (half a batch kegged, half bottled) after a few months and the kegged version had nothing on the bottled version.

 

[browndog]

Two months, yes there is degredation there, its due to a lack of long term beer stability due to oxidisation, very hard for the Home Brewer to avoid. Slash 220000 is talking about a matter of a week though. I can appreciate aroma dissipating into the kegspace but have a hard time understanding how flavour would too.

 

[Parks]

Ah, all good. I guess the aroma is the main thing (should try holding my nose closed and doing a side-by-side).

-- less than a week is horrible, no wonder slash2200 is fuming

I hope you work it out mate!

 

[Nick JD]

Put some more hops in your keg when it fades, in a little baggie tied up so it's removable if it starts to grass up.

Or is that too simple a solution?

 

[doon]

Or get a little french coffee press or whatever they are called and make a hop tea to chuck in keg. i did that with an american amber and some cascade hops. took a few days for it to make more aroma but once it did it was awesome, although seemed to add some bitterness.

 

[Nick JD]

If using a hose from the tap, simply crimp the hose, open the tap till it fills up to the crimp and then let it go.

BTW - when I said crimp, I didn't mean this, although I'm not ever suggesting that crimping while brewing is a bad thing per se.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNgL0E2BFEM

 

[McFeast]

Isn't it just the stripping effect of the ever increasing volume of co2 on top of your keg of beer?

I have had commercial tap beers taste more and less hoppy at different times so maybe it happens there too.

Really? You can taste hops in Megaswill? Or are you paying 8 bucks for a James Squire etc...?

 

[pcmfisher]

Really? You can taste hops in Megaswill? Or are you paying 8 bucks for a James Squire etc...?

No not megaswill. I'd rather pay 8 bucks for James Squire than 6 or 7 for West End Draught