Yeast again, sorry. Help!

[John Holgreaves]

I brewed a best bitter 4 weeks ago, loosely based on a TT Landlord recipe. I have ended up with a slightly sweetish taste, which spoils the beer.
OG 1.046
FG 1.008
Fermentation time 23 days
Ferment temp. 17.5C
Yeast West Yorkshire Ale- Wyeast

Do any of you experts know what might have gone wrong?
Can I do a hop tea to increase IBU's to mask the sweetness?

Any help would be much appreciated.
Thanks John

 

[GerritT]

It finished quite dry, so that's the first thing to dismiss. Got a recipe?

 

[John Holgreaves]

46 litre

9kg Golden Promise
60gm Black Malt
Mash 60 min @66C

Batch sparge to collect 60 lts.

75gm E.K Goldings 60 mins
60gm Styrian Goldings 60 mins
40gm Styrian Goldings 10 mins
200gm Styrian Goldings Hop Back @98C

Yeast Nutrient & Servomyces

!st gen Wyeast West Yorkshire Ale 400 billion cells
Ferment @ 17.5C
23 days to ferment. Temperature controlled.

Hope this will help GerriT

 

[GerritT]

46 litre

9kg Golden Promise
60gm Black Malt
Mash 60 min @66C

Batch sparge to collect 60 lts.

75gm E.K Goldings 60 mins
60gm Styrian Goldings 60 mins
40gm Styrian Goldings 10 mins
200gm Styrian Goldings Hop Back @98C

Yeast Nutrient & Servomyces

!st gen Wyeast West Yorkshire Ale 400 billion cells
Ferment @ 17.5C
23 days to ferment. Temperature controlled.

Hope this will help GerriT

._. can't find anything wrong with it (to be honest: I copied the recipe to try it out myself! )

Only thing that could add a taste that I'm inexperienced with, is the yeast. But those specs are fine too, even the esters should not give it a sweet taste.

I leave it to the resident experts here...

 

[John Holgreaves]

Thanks GerriT. I thought it would be OK. That just leaves an infection, but what infection gives a sweet taste? I generally overdo cleanliness and sterilising due to past experiences.
I boil the plate cooler along with the hop back.
Enjoy the recipe

 

[GerritT]

Having said that: you used 4 packs of yeast? Or 1 big one? Pitch calculator comes out at 390 billion cells required, fresh.

Reason why: at the brewers guild we had a tripel competition, and one of the competitors had underpitched, and it tasted more like apple juice. Maybe that could be perceived as sweetness.

 

[An Ankoù]

Is it in bottles? Did you use priming sugar? If so, how long has it been in the bottles and how much sugar did you use?

 

[Sadfield]

Looking at the grist and FG, I'd wager the issue is that there isn't enough bitterness to balance out the residual sugars. What was the predicted bitterness?

There could be a number of reasons for not getting enough bitterness. Old hops, lover alpha acids than used by the recipe originator, lower isomerisation due to boil vigour or wort chemistry.

Making a Bitter hop tea could help, or getting some isomerised hop extract.

 

[JonBrew]

If not an OG/IBU balance issue as @Sadfield suggests, the only other thing i can think of would be oxidation which is known to impart a sweetness. However, this seems unlikely given the beer is fairly young (albeit not improbable). What is your racking/packaging process? Have you noticed any darkening in the colour of the beer at all?

Either way, I doubt the issue is yeast derived.

 

[John Holgreaves]

I used 1 packet of yeast and multiplied it up.

Not in bottles, in corni keg,

Brewers Friend calculates the IBU's to be 60. All 2017 harvest. I must admit it did does not taste as hoppy as that. I boiled for 60 mins.
Come to think of it my beer has for a while now been less bitter than anticipated, I thought it was my taste getting used to more and more bitterness.
I stopped using my hop spider and reverted back to a muslin bag for this brew.

 

[John Holgreaves]

Hi Jonbrew,
All containers and siphon tubes are treated to a blast of CO2 before coming into contact with the beer.
Colour seemed to be as expected.

Does anyone think that a 23 day fermentation has anything to do with it. I normally ferment most beers in 2 weeks?

 

[JonBrew]

Hi Jonbrew,
All containers and siphon tubes are treated to a blast of CO2 before coming into contact with the beer.
Colour seemed to be as expected.

Does anyone think that a 23 day fermentation has anything to do with it. I normally ferment most beers in 2 weeks?

Estimated 60 IBU in a 1046 OG beer should be bitter as flip , even if you feel a bit short for whatever reason.

What do you ferment in? How good is the seal on the vessel? Did you cold crash at all?

 

[John Holgreaves]

I ferment in a plastic 70litr bucket which sits in a tank of water which is heated to give the beer a temp of 17.5C
The seal is tight. I don't cold crash anymore, fridge/cooler went **** up! Not replaced it yet.

 

[Sadfield]

Agree with @JonBrew. 60 IBUs is high for a Bitter/Golden Ale. Yet, it's still too sweet.

How vigorous is your boil?

 

[John Holgreaves]

A good rolling boil for 60 min.

 

[Sadfield]

How big is your bag of hops? And have you always done 60L boils, or smaller batches. I'm presuming these are leaf hops, not pellets. Either way, theres a degree of agitation of hops required in order extract the alpha acids into the wort. It may be worth doing brew with the hops loose in the kettle to see if this makes a difference.

Yeast can play a part in bitterness, some absorb bitterness more than others, however you are using one appropriate to the style so this shouldn't be an issue.

 

[John Holgreaves]

I cut a sleeve of muslin off a roll and tie the end together. Perhaps I don't make the bags large enough for the hops to give maximum extraction. I use pellets, less wasted wort.

 

[Sandimas]

I brewed a best bitter 4 weeks ago,

Is that 4 weeks bottled / kegged, or 2 weeks to ferment and then 2 weeks bottled / kegged? I think it needs more time to condition, the sweetness should subside then.

I've had this with a few beers, in particular a clone of St Austell Proper Job - way too sweet initially but after 6-8 weeks in the bottle the sweetness disappeared and the hops came through.

Oh, and there's something wrong with your calculations - I thought that didn't look like enough hops for 60 IBU so plugged the figures and it came out at 33 IBU.

 

[John Holgreaves]

I will leave the 2nd keg another few weeks before I try it. I had to drink the first keg as I had run out of beer, but having said it is far sweeter than it should be.
I re calculated the IBu's and it still comes up with 60 IBU on brewers friend.
I am brewing tomorrow and I am going to make some changes to my hopping, I think this will sort out the problem.

 

[Zephyr259]

I get 45 IBU before adding the hopback addition which I have no idea how to model in the GF calc.

That's a good yeast, I've used it a lot and it's attenuated well for you given you kept it quite cool, I ferment at 20c for my bitters, kept it at 18c for me recent pale ale as I wanted it a bit more subdued to let the hops shine. Wonder if the large amount of Styrian Goldings have left a sweet flavour? Do you commonly add that much via hopback?

I'm thinking it'll probably condition out, or if not I'm with Sadfield that something affected your isomerisation.