Hi, I'd like to share my failed experience with you all; perhaps this may have happened to you too.
I've brewed my second 4.5 gal. batch some time ago: an American Pale Ale. The whole brewing process was fine. I didn't make any big mistakes, except for not soaking the dry yeast in water before putting it into the fermenter with the wort. I did this way with my first batch, a Düsseldorf Altbier, and it turned out great, so I thought I wouldn't have any problems repeating the process, but I was wrong.
Many hours after tossing the yeast directly into the wort in the fermenter, there was no airlock activity whatsoever. After a couple of days of apparent inactivity, I added some half of a sachet of another yeast I had in my fridge (again, just threw it directly in the fermenter). Nothing happened. Then I bought a bread and pizza dough yeast, but this time I let it hydrate for about 15 min before putting it in the fermenter. Still nothing. Then I bought another beer dry yeast sachet, hydrated it and added in the fermenter. Still no activity, but during all these actions I was tasting the beer, and realized some attenuation.
I bought a refractometer and noticed that after almost a month of "fermenting", the scale read 7 Brix.
I decided to open the fermenter and give it a stir, and found a layer of mold. That white, bubbly, silky one.
On bottling day I simply avoided passing the mold to the bottle, and got rid of some beer.
The fact is: after 10 days of carbonation I opened one bottle and poured it in a glass. The head had a great creamy look, but it didn't last long, fading completely after a minute or two. Regarding the taste, it was watery (maybe a little bit like the Belgian Kwak), and tasted a lot like yeast - maybe because I used 3.5 times more yeast than needed.
Things to consider:
- the fermenting temperature varied a bit, from 40 to 64°F
- fermenter lid was not totally sealed (I had to use silver tape)
What could have caused the poor results?
Thanx, and sorry for the long post.
I've brewed my second 4.5 gal. batch some time ago: an American Pale Ale. The whole brewing process was fine. I didn't make any big mistakes, except for not soaking the dry yeast in water before putting it into the fermenter with the wort. I did this way with my first batch, a Düsseldorf Altbier, and it turned out great, so I thought I wouldn't have any problems repeating the process, but I was wrong.
Many hours after tossing the yeast directly into the wort in the fermenter, there was no airlock activity whatsoever. After a couple of days of apparent inactivity, I added some half of a sachet of another yeast I had in my fridge (again, just threw it directly in the fermenter). Nothing happened. Then I bought a bread and pizza dough yeast, but this time I let it hydrate for about 15 min before putting it in the fermenter. Still nothing. Then I bought another beer dry yeast sachet, hydrated it and added in the fermenter. Still no activity, but during all these actions I was tasting the beer, and realized some attenuation.
I bought a refractometer and noticed that after almost a month of "fermenting", the scale read 7 Brix.
I decided to open the fermenter and give it a stir, and found a layer of mold. That white, bubbly, silky one.
On bottling day I simply avoided passing the mold to the bottle, and got rid of some beer.
The fact is: after 10 days of carbonation I opened one bottle and poured it in a glass. The head had a great creamy look, but it didn't last long, fading completely after a minute or two. Regarding the taste, it was watery (maybe a little bit like the Belgian Kwak), and tasted a lot like yeast - maybe because I used 3.5 times more yeast than needed.
Things to consider:
- the fermenting temperature varied a bit, from 40 to 64°F
- fermenter lid was not totally sealed (I had to use silver tape)
What could have caused the poor results?
Thanx, and sorry for the long post.