Removing Dextrose and LME

[Major Arcana]

G'day Fellas,

I have brewed a total of 4 batches and after trying my first couple of brews i have noticed a very distinct "home brew twang" to it which i am sure most of you are familiar with. I believe a lot of it has to do with the LME and also Dextrose. I was wondering will a lot of this slightly cidery tasting "twang" be removed if i cancel out the dextrose and use minimal amounts of LME and just stick to dry malt extract and steeping cracked grains etc?
I have noticed huge improvements with playing around with hops etc also, but i really would love to remove a lot of that slightly cidery homebrew twang.

Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers,

Dan

 

[dammag]

Remember that cleaning and sanitation, proper amount of quality yeast and maintaining the correct temperature during fermentation are all critical to making good beer.

In my experience, LME that is fresh is ok and I never got twang out of it.

 

[Major Arcana]

Remember that cleaning and sanitation, proper amount of quality yeast and maintaining the correct temperature during fermentation are all critical to making good beer.

In my experience, LME that is fresh is ok and I never got twang out of it.

dammag thanks for your response i totally agree, those first few batches i did, i used the under the lid yeast, i know now absolutely never again! I have learnt a lot since then thankfully.

cheers,

 

[Drewski]

It seems to come from the Kit in my opinion, you can mask it with hops, more malt etc More so using spec grains. Cant say i notice a difference between DME and LME.

I have used Dextrose in all grain beer and get no "twang"

 

[warra48]

Twang comes from aged canned extract.
It doesn't come from Dextrose or DLME, and provided your brewing practices are OK, then try to brew with the freshest cans you can find, and you will have done your best to minimise or eliminate twang.

 

[verysupple]

Since you've already played around with hops before, why not try an all extract (i.e. no kit) brew? If your LHBS stocks a bit of a variety of extracts then you can actually get a fair bit of malt character into your brews (I liked Briess FWIW). I mostly used dry extract and I didn't seem to get any twang. Liquid may be fine too but I don't have much experience with it so I can't comment.

I'd try all extract before moving to steeping grains. This way you get a feel for what the extract tastes like first and then later you can start to add grains to complement/boost the extract if desired.

 

[HBHB]

Depends on the source of the "twang" . By that i mean you could put a number of different compounds into the beer and put that in turn in front of different guys with different tastes and get a similar response from each.

If we assume for just a moment that the "twang" is acetaldehyde ( like biting into a green granny smith apple) then the source could be from any one of a number of sources.

It can be caused by temp at yeast pitching being too high.
Sluggish fermentation due to incorrect temp & thus less than optimal yeast performance - causes incomplete conversion to ethanol
Underpitching yeast (not enough)
Too much simple sugars
Some bacteria can also cause acetaldehyde.

I'd suggest the following steps:
Get some temperature control going with a fridge and digital controller
Use the right amount of a good quality yeast and treat it well. (Generic Kit yeasts are OK, but not enough of it IMHO) premium yeasts are better
Use an acid based or iodine based sanitiser
Toss the dextrose or at least limit it for those beers that need a lighter body/drier finish
Use a good quality malt extract from a place that turns their stock over pretty quickly

Even better still, do your taste buds a favour and jump in to either extract brewing with fresh ingredients or take a swim in the deep end with grain.

 

[waggastew]

Ditto above with emphasis on switching to using DME which definitely is less susceptible to oxidation.

 

[verysupple]

In my previous post I overlooked some basic principles, so I totally agree with every you wrote exept the following quote.

<snip>
Too much simple sugars
<snip>

Can you please explain how an excess of simple sugars leads to higher than normal levels of acetaldehyde in the finished beer? Is it because the yeast get accustomed to not metabolising more complex molecules in the same way that people claim they will not ferment as much of the more complex sugars if too many simple sugars are present?

 

[HBHB]

VS, my understanding (and it's probably a lot more complex than this) is that the reduction of the % of malt, along with all of the various important nutrients it provides to the yeast is the biggest problem. Concentrations of things like a-amino nitrogen are reduced significantly once you get up into the 20+% range of the available fermentables in the wort. The yeast become sluggish, especially when under-pitched and conversion to ethanol isn't completed along.

Yeast are like kids at a party, they'll consume simple sugars by the fistful but leave the tasty nutritious stuff until last, by which time, they've exhausted themselves.

Back to he wort. There's plenty of resources out there that explain the processes involved in bigger words than i tend to use.

Generally speaking, a small amount of cane sugar ie. (less than about 15-20% of the total fermentable) dextrose, honey, rice or whatever simple sugars is OK and the yeast will still manage the malt without issues IF you pitch enough yeast to do the job AND ferment it at the right temperature range AND avoid oxidation of the beer AND rest the beer on the yeast long enough for conversion to be complete.

Worth while read:
http://pubs.ub.ro/dwnl.php?id=CSCC6201011V03S01A0006 check out V1 with 90% malt & only 10% sugar (fermented cold)

https://pureapps2.hw.ac.uk/portal/files/660151/Lekkas_Stewart_Hill_Taidi_and_Hodgson_MBAA_2005.pdf

Don't get me wrong here, there's a role for simple sugars in beer. Just not at high concentrations if you want clean flavours.
Adding a little simple sugar to a beer can be used to lighten the body and add a little more alcohol etc.

I dare say someone with more intact neurons than me will be able to elaborate further.

Martin

 

[JaseH]

The best extract brews I did were with LDME + steeped grains and a full volume boil with hop additions. I'm not sure why but I believe the full volume boil made a big difference over previous batches that were similar partial boils.

 

[Bribie G]

Most kits have that twang.

Nescafe has a twang that you don't get with ground coffee, espresso etc.
Nestle condensed milk does not taste much like full cream fresh milk.

It's all in the processing and concentration using prolonged heating.

The lightest kits such as Cerveza or Canadian have less of the twang and it can be covered up with the use of hops or grains. As posted above, light dried malt extract is a pretty good ingredient as it is flash-dried rather than being slowly cooked to death as with liquid malt extract. If you want to really taste the twang, waste five dollars and get a tin of Saunders Malt extract and try a spoonful. That sour vegetable flavour is something I'll never forget, we used to be dosed on the stuff when I was a kid in the UK. For some reason known only to my parents.

 

[shacked]

I'm not sure if this helps but I've recently moved to making active yeast starters the day before a brew and I think it's had a positive impact on the taste of my kits & bits and extract brews. It's a bit more work and kit but I think it's worth it.

 

[pcmfisher]

Depends on the source of the "twang" . By that i mean you could put a number of different compounds into the beer and put that in turn in front of different guys with different tastes and get a similar response from each.

If we assume for just a moment that the "twang" is acetaldehyde ( like biting into a green granny smith apple) then the source could be from any one of a number of sources.

It can be caused by temp at yeast pitching being too high.
Sluggish fermentation due to incorrect temp & thus less than optimal yeast performance - causes incomplete conversion to ethanol
Underpitching yeast (not enough)
Too much simple sugars
Some bacteria can also cause acetaldehyde.

I'd suggest the following steps:
Get some temperature control going with a fridge and digital controller
Use the right amount of a good quality yeast and treat it well. (Generic Kit yeasts are OK, but not enough of it IMHO) premium yeasts are better
Use an acid based or iodine based sanitiser
Toss the dextrose or at least limit it for those beers that need a lighter body/drier finish
Use a good quality malt extract from a place that turns their stock over pretty quickly

Even better still, do your taste buds a favour and jump in to either extract brewing with fresh ingredients or take a swim in the deep end with grain.

All of this may be so, but I think there is more to the story.

I may not be much of a brewer but whenever I do a kit brew it tastes like, well, a kit brew. It doesn't matter what I do in regards to ingredients including using a decent yeast.
I have temp control for my ferment and I think my sanitation and process is up to scratch.
You could argue that hopping the bejezuz out of a kit brew will cover the taste, but to me there is still an underlying taste there.
I don't know if it is acetaldehyde or what it is.

What I do know is that when I use unhopped extract doing a small 60 min boil, the difference in quality is huge. No more kit taste.

I usually use a combination of liquid malt, dry malt and dextrose, varying the ration of dex to dry malt to adjust the body/sweetness.
For a standard 4.5% 30 IBU brew I would use 20% dextrose. I have no trouble upping the dex to 30 % for lower IBU beers using this method and still get no kit twang or green apple taste.

I think maybe the isohop in kits has something to do with it.

 

[manticle]

But there's isohop in commercial beer that is 'twangless'.

 

[Major Arcana]

Thanks for all your views and opinions fellas,

I think in the end, i will just stick to steeping specialty grains, fresh hop additions and the freshest quality kits or cans of LME (if i do need them). I do notice that using a fair bit of Dextrose does give the beer quite a dry taste which i am not fond off, so i do lean more to the DME.
My Sanitation practices in my opinion are pretty good i tend to over clean if anything which can't hurt, and from now on i will be doing active yeast starters and also picking up a 2nd hand fridge relatively soon to control those temps. I think all up this will dramatically improve my beers, until i do make that switch to ALL Grain.

Cheers again,

Dan :icon_cheers:

 

[fletcher]

Thanks for all your views and opinions fellas,

I think in the end, i will just stick to steeping specialty grains, fresh hop additions and the freshest quality kits or cans of LME (if i do need them). I do notice that using a fair bit of Dextrose does give the beer quite a dry taste which i am not fond off, so i do lean more to the DME.
My Sanitation practices in my opinion are pretty good i tend to over clean if anything which can't hurt, and from now on i will be doing active yeast starters and also picking up a 2nd hand fridge relatively soon to control those temps. I think all up this will dramatically improve my beers, until i do make that switch to ALL Grain.

Cheers again,

Dan :icon_cheers:

it's a very small switch into all grain. you're basically doing it on a smaller scale with steeping. even extract brews (no kits) will give you no twang. well worth the small investment.

 

[Major Arcana]

G'day Fletcher,

True that mate, i just want to get this part of extract brewing down packed or is it "down pat" **** whatever, so i can move into all grain with a bit of knowledge under the belt, gives me time to get all the necessary equipment as well.

cheers

 

[pcmfisher]

But there's isohop in commercial beer that is 'twangless'.

Yes that is true.
But I would like to think most mega swill uses fresh hops as a majority and then just an isohop adjustment.
And then again you have the beer in clear bottles that apparently use an isohop to avoid skunking.

Beats me.

 

[i-a-n]

Isn't TWANG a great word?
Useful for Robin Hood and home brewers!