Homebrew Funeral

Oh, yeah. I've had a few drain pours. First was a spruce beer (batch #4). An infection or two, also, last of which was a pils I brewed last year. I've also kept on drinking an infected batch of two. Just depends on supply and demand.

 

I have half a case of my first homebrew chillin in the basement that tastes like shiitty mineral water. I need to dump it soon for the bottles. Lol.

Edit, after thinking about it I have. Decided its more like vitamin and mineral fortified vodka.

 

Boo. Sorry to hear. Keep truckin though. Work on your process. Just listened to the latest brew strong podcast and Palmers 3 keys to successful brewing were 1. Sanitation. 2.Yeast health 3. Fermentation temp. Sound like an issue with número UNO. If bottling get a bottling tree.

 

So...wait...is it just too sour? And that acidity is giving you heartburn? If that's the case, brew another of the base beer, don't sour it...then blend em...

EDIT: stupidly assumed this was MEANT to be a sour...if not, you can still do what I described above...but if it's sour and wasn't meant to be, that's a different sorta bummer

 

Funny you should bring that up. For the longest time I thought going all grain would be my next step. I wound up getting a 30 gallonstorage tub and a submersable aquarium heater to control my ferm teps instead. Now I can go from the low 60's up to 90 no problem.

 

i put a couple pounds of diced cucumbers on a saison. i tasted said saison seven days later. immediately drain poured gross DMS-laden saison without hesitation.

 

(past the edit timer or i would have edited)

the thing that really sucked about this was that before adding the cucumbers, it was actually a pretty good saison.

 

I had a DIPA that the fermentation temp went out of control as well as better than expected efficiency, lower ending volume, and higher than anticipated attenuation. It came out to 12.5%. I drank the first 2/3 as it was really freakin good when the hops were present, but once they faded it became the equivalent of paint thinner. I dumped 1/3 of the keg.

 

I recently had 1/2 of a split batch of mild go sour/wild on me (Package of yeast smelt lactic, and was infected), so I pitched some roselare dregs in it. Also had some extra english barley wine on hand I wasn't super fond of ( http://beeradvocate.com/community/t...-beer-adulterating-a-failed-barleywine.77391/ ), so racked 2 gallons of barleywine onto the souring 3 gallons of mild. Hopefully it ends up as something resembling an oude brune, if not, it'll just get sour cherries or cherries and end up with a sour brown ale with cherries.

Drain pour wise, my only drain poured batch was a saison I brewed last year (My first Saison). Had some clear candi sugar and pilsner extract on hand, along with some East Coast Yeast and thought I'd do a saison. Wasn't sure how fermentable the pilsner extract was, so I added 2 lbs of Clear Candi to the batch, Saison went from 1.068 to 0.990. I thought it would be fun to make it slightly hoppy, but because the beer was so damn dry, it was just overly bitter, almost tasted like a spicy, tart, orange rind (pith included). Down the drain it went.

 

Besides my first batch which just sucked, nothing went wrong it was just shitty. Thank you Alton Brown. I have only had one bad batch and that was due to trying to make an Imperial EIPA when it was 90 degrees ambient and no temp control. That batch tasted like someone poured Isopropyl Alcohol into it. Well, to me it did. Friends said it was great but I knew better. Another reason friends who aren’t brewers are the worst critics.

I would advise to not drain pour just yet. The reason I say this is I made a Dark Mild with some input from Ron Pattinson and others that for maybe the first 2 months after bottling really tasted like watered down coffee infused light beer. Then magically it all came together, in bottle, and was one of the best batches I have ever brewed. Being in Army and having had limited funds, brewing beer is too much of a commitment both monetarily and time wise to fuck anything up so I have always (except that one instance) been a stickler for attention to detail and sanitation.

You mention heartburn. From what? Someone mentioned sour, but if I remember your other posts correctly it wasn’t a sour. Maybe from the hops? I have had this happen to me from time to time, but that’s not the beers fault. A good friend and the person I started brewing with cannot drink anything even close to an IPA because of the heartburn he gets. If I were you I would hook up with some other homebrewers, not the crusty dude behind the counter at the homebrew shop, and get their regarding this batch you feel is bad. Join a club and pick their brains. You are in DC there are a few great clubs in that area and I’m sure someone could tell you right off the bat if there was a problem and point you in the right direction.

 

I have had the same thing happen. I did not let the beer finish out before bottling. Additional fermentation plus the sugar for carbing created a burp machine. Gave me a terrible knot in my stomach.

 

I had to dump a pumpkin porter where I used old yeast. Two bottles of autolysis and it was gone!

 

I was not smart enough to toss some of my early brews and just start over. I suffered through several cidery and infected batches and quit homebrewing for over a decade because I thought that no one could brew good beer at home. Now I realize I can brew some good beer, and if for some reason I brew a batch that's crap, there is no need to suffer through it because there something much better waiting in the wings. In the last 5 years, I've tossed a small number of batches:

1. A cider that was watery and flavorless; never bothered to bottle it.
2. An oxidized pale ale; never bothered to bottle it
3. A half of a batch of mead that gave me headaches (but I suffered through 20 or so head aches before tossing --> stupid!)
4. A half of a batch of stout that had bottle infections (but I cleaned the mess off the kitchen floor about 20 or so times before tossing--> same kind of stupid.)

One lesson I learned (examples 1 and 2 above) is not to bottle your beer and hope for the best if it tastes like crap after bottling time. Bottling is too much work to start with some sub-standard product and hope that what comes out the other end is carbonated liquid gold. Although I do more kegging than bottling now, the principle still applies.

 

Edited

 

There has been a few in the last 4 years or so. One more recent (last year) was a Maibock recipe that we were doing for a second year (the first year was great, we entered in a comp). Sad as that puppy lagers for 3-4 months. I was never entirely sure what happened - this was a pic before we kegged. Yes, that is the same beer. I thought the taste might be classified as some extreme diacetyl, and it only got worse as time went on. I even took it out of the fridge to warm it up and see if cleaned up, no dice.

Seems like it's always a difficult decision. I let that one I mentioned above hang around for another few months.

 

A beer that turned sour is not necessarily a drain pour. I reserve that fate for beers that turn funky. (or the rare beer that starts out funky).
I'm almost finished with a dry stout that turned almost vinegary a couple years ago. I guess it's still drinkable, but I don't care for this change. I use it in virtually every batch of Chili, Pot Roast, Stew, and most of the soups I make. It completely replaces any broth or water that I would otherwise have used. I also reduce the amount of acidic ingredients - various vinegars, for example. One of the beauties of this batch is that, as the bugs continue to work, more CO2 is produced, so it pushes itself out of the keg - I took it off the gas years ago.

 

First, my condolences on your loss...I've never drainpoured one myself...mostly due to my Scotch-Irish genes.

 

Me neither. Again, mostly due to my Scotch, Irish AND Bohemian genes...

Beer in my Blood