New to kegging - Having flavor issues

There's a lot of discussion on various forums and Internet sites about how to pressurize your kegs. Generally, pressurizing it to 35 PSI, rocking it for 90 seconds, relieving the pressure, setting it at 10 psi and drinking it all within an hour or so just doesn't do it. Optimally, the standard best way is to attach the CO2 at the serving pressure, leave it attached for 2 or 3 weeks, and then serving. Shorter ways have been proposed, which include rocking the keg for several minutes at a time over a period of days, starting with a high pressure and reducing it over days, a combination of high pressure and rocking, etc., but you may not end up with the right pressure. It's difficult to de-pressurize it if you go over the optimal pressure for your style of beer. Even the shorter ways might take 3-5 days at minimum.

Since the best way to pressurize a keg is very controversial, I'll leave you to research the various ways and try for yourself.

Just realize that it generally takes days, not just an hour or so to pressurize a keg to a certain degree of satisfaction. Of course there are also those who claim that they have satisfactorily pressurized their keg in a day or two.

 

There could be many reasons, and others might be able to provide a better answer than me. One thought that occurred to me is that there might still have been sediment mixed in the beer, and after it sat in the keg for a day, some of that sediment might have dropped to the bottom where the end of the beverage tube picked it up. If so, it should clear after a few glasses. Was it a little hazy?

 

What was the beer that you kegged? My guess is that you had hop particles and other crap settle in the keg over night, and your pour in the am was loaded with it. After it's done settling, your beer should clear up in a few pours.

 

If you have the ability with a chest freezer, what I recommend doing is:

Racking enough nearly 5 gallons into corny keg, but not full.

Force carb through dip tube to about 30 psi when beer is cold

Lay keg on its side at cold temps in chest freezer and rock back and forth daily.


The laying on its side is important because this will create more surface area contact of beer:gas and will allow the CO2 to absorb more readily into liquid, at a faster rate than if the keg were standing up vertically with less surface area of beer:gas.

 

Usually if I want a fresh pour, I'll pour the first few ounces from the tap into a separate glass, then begin filling a new glass. I've noticed that the beer that's been sitting in the beer line for a day or more begins to taste like the vinyl tubing. It's not terrible, but it's definitely noticeable compared to the beer that's coming straight from the keg.

But, if you're saying that all 3 glasses had that harsh taste, then it can't just be the beer sitting in the lines.. how long has it been in the keg? Maybe giving it time to equilibriate may be just what it needs.

 

You can, but I'd keep a towel around just in case. Just pull it off quickly and there should hardly be any beer that comes out.

You may already know this, but I'm speaking from previous mistakes.. when you connect the beer line back to the keg, MAKE SURE your tap handle is in the closed position. Last time I reconnected mine to the keg my tap handle was open, and I lost about a pint of BIPA from the tap before I could close it. Huge mess and waste of beer

 

Does this harsh bitter taste have a bit of metal taste?

 

I could think of a couple things, but first would be the synthetic taste which may still be from the new lines, but that's usually a more rubbery smell, taste. Having the beer sit in the lines overnight may have extracted some more junk out of the lines...
Second, the beer. Is this a tested recipe that you've felt good about in the past? I'm thinking you may just want to try to extract a sample by other means than through the system to to see if it is possibly the beer and not the system to eliminate that possibility.
Finally, there was nothing like a medication or some other change in your body that may have effected your palate?

 

Are you sure you rinsed Co2 tube?

 

if you are using beverage line for the beer there is no reason it needs to be cleaned prior to installation.
same for the CO2 line. If it is beverage line, or the more typical dual wall red outer jacket line made for gas distribution it is good to go right out of the box.

if you did not use beverage line, well, don't do that. regular old vinyl line is a bad idea.
Cheers.

 

I think @invertalon had some bad flavor issues with the silver tubing. Chances are whatever tubing you have says what brand it is on the tubing. I wouldn't blame the tubing at this point.