Problem with Festival Golden Ale

[midnight rider]

I brewed a batch of this on 24th January, adding the hop pellets on 31st January. I bottled it on 14th February (old romantic that I am). Everything by the book except I left it in the FV for 3 weeks and not the recommended 2 (I always do this; in my experience it improves the brew).

The problem: It is still very cloudy. It doesn't look like it will ever clear. All the same I tried a bottle and it tastes incredibly hoppy - the citrus/grapefruit flavour is overpowering. In addition, the sediment had not fully settled out: on tipping the bottle the sediment shifted with the beer.

Something has gone wrong here and I wondered if I could do anything to recover it. I've previously taken the view that time solves most things, but three months in this really should have cleared and the taste settled down a bit.

Thank you for any suggestions.

MR.

 

[Edindie]

Time is the only thing that will fix this. Just leave it somewhere cold for a couple of weeks and it will solidify on the bottom of the bottle.

Next time you do a brew, leave it somewhere cold for a few days / week after it's finished fermenting (in the FV) and much of this will drop out then. The rest will drop out after carbonation in the bottle. The hops will also mellow with time and the beer will mature.

 

[midnight rider]

Thank you for the reply. When you say "Next time you do a brew, leave it somewhere cold for a few days / week after it's finished fermenting (in the FV)"
I usually leave it somewhere warm for about 2 weeks before shifting it to a cooler place (usually the garage). Do you have better results by cooling it straight away?

 

[Edindie]

My process is:

1. Ferment in FV for 2-3 weeks, whatever is convenient for me and the FG drops within range.
2. Cool the brew in the FV (I leave it in my garage for a few days). This allows some of the flotsam to drop to the bottom of the FV so it never gets into your bottles.
3. Rack to another FV, add the bottling sugar and then bottle.
4. Put the bottles somewhere warm for a week or two.
5. Put the bottles somewhere cold for 2+ weeks. Two weeks will allow the yeast etc to solidify on the bottom of the bottle, but additional time is needed for the beer to mature.

 

[Maffa]

Using a secondary FV for a week will greatly reduce the amount of sediment in bottles.

So in the case of the Golden Ale, in primary for 3 weeks, then siphon to secondary using the bag Festival provide, then a week later siphon again with the bag to bottles.

You'd be amazed how much crud you still leave in the bottom of the secondary.