I went to bottle a brown ale this past weekend, and my first step is always to open up a home-brew that is ready to drink. This happened to be a Red Ale that I brewed on St Pattys day. This was my first tasting of it and when I poured it, I was surprised to find it much darker than I had planned, then I smelled it and it was off. The taste was stale, papery and a harsh woody bitter that wasn't pleasant. I had also noticed a ring around the water mark before this, when they were done conditioning and before I put them into the fridge. When I researched this, after looking up possible causes I came to the conclusion that it may be bottle krauzen (now I am not sure). Everything I have found so far points to Oxidation. However is there an infection out there that may be to blame for this? Also the brown ale had the same off flavor before bottling. I have made 10 or so other batches of various styles, including this same red (although that was an extract and this was an allgrain) since I started last year and no others have had this issue. If anyone has any ideas about what it could be?
The symptoms you're describing certainly sound like oxidation. However, the ring around the "water mark" (you mean the part of the neck where the beer meets the bottle's headspace?) is probably not related to the oxidation problem. I've had rings in that part of the bottle several times, and the beer wasn't oxidized (or at least, not more so than any other beer I've brewed). By contrast, in my one batch that was heavily oxidized, there were no rings. It's hard to give you much more advice based on the limited information we have. If I were you I would walk through my process and look for weaknesses in terms of preventing oxidation. Based on the fact that your brown ale tasted oxidized before you bottled it, I would concentrate on your processes from the end of boil up to bottling day.
Below is something I found via a web search: "One of the best and simplest ways to recognize whether or not your beer is contaminated with bacteria is to take a look at your bottles of beer. Look at the surface of the beer where it contacts the sides of the bottle. Is there a deposit ringing the neck? Every gusher, hazy beer, sour-smelling and sour-tasting beer I've had the pleasure of evaluating invariably has a "ring around the neck"- a sure sign that there is bacterial or wild yeast contamination." -Charlie Papazian (Joy of Home Brewing) Are there any other symptoms listed above evident in your beer? Cheers!
Keg man. It solved a lot of my questions in bottling, especially when it came to hoppy style beers. Just one more small investment into this hobby, but it will pay off!
Is it just the one bottle? Or the whole batch? I’ve run into the occasional skunky bottle. Happens with commercial brews too. FWIW
Unfortunately its the whole batch, or the first 3 out of 12 anyway. I may have solved the problem. I was checking my tubing. I always run boiling water though it after I brew or bottle to sanitize, also I submerge in starsan before. However I saw some discoloration on the inside and realized there is gunk inside. ill buy new tubing before I brew this weekend and we will see if that was the issue.
Clean with PBW. It’s some of the best stuff out there for the cleaning process, commercial and home brewing. I highly recommend it. You can find it easily online or hopefully at your local homebrew store.
If you're using silicone tubing (translucent), okay. If you're using vinyl (clear) tubing, you should not be running boiling water through it, that is probably the reason for the gunk. Vinyl can't handle that level of heat. A little warm water to wash out the wort should be fine. Remember, you're not trying to sanitize the tubing after using it, you're just trying to get it clean. For what it's worth, even PBW would be overkill for me. I always pump some warm water through my vinyl tubing, make sure it's drained of water (a few droplets are fine), and then set it aside. Of course I sanitize it before using it.
