I'm fairly new to homebrewing, and have learned the benefit (ahem, the absolute necessity ) of cleanliness, but my recent all grain batches have been coming out wrong, like cardboard general nasty taste wrong. I'm religious in my sanitation now, about the only thing I can think that's going wrong is oxidation? I noticed that after racking to the secondary, I have about 1/4 gallon headspace in a one gallon jug (for what is starting out as a one gallon batch), I'm pegging that as the culprit, but can that much room really make a good beer go bad? I'm thinking of upping my batch size to 1.5 gallons, can't think of what else to do? Anyway, I'm getting pretty frustrated any inputs would be helpful. Thanks!
+1 to what HerbMeowing stated: eliminate the transfer to a secondary. Please report back whether this helps for your next batch(es). Cheers!
You could also be associating chorine/chloramine in the water, to this off flavor, although it comes off to me more plasticy. Treating all water in your brew day with Camden Tablets 1/4 per 5 gallons. I could be way off base, but it is worth mentioning.
As said above, you can just use a primary. You can dry hop in primary with great results too. I also wonder if you transfer into a bottling bucket and what kind of timeframe the beer was sitting in your secondary with the headspace. Also, oxidation is probably more noticable in a lighter style, and especially a hoppier beer. If you want to build your confidence next round, a dry stout or a porter should be next on your list.
I'm starting to wonder why beginners take all the advice on these threads and then ignore the conventional wisdom here that secondaries are just not necessary unless bulk conditioning bigger beers/sours for months/years.
Thanks for the input inchrisin, I'll find a good dry stout recipe to make next round. GreenKrusty101, oldish habits die hard I guess. I experimented with just keeping the brew in the primary, but this last batch came out at 1.080 OG, so I wasn't sure if it needed more time than a month to finish conditioning. What's the rule of thumb for secondaries as a function of OG? At any rate, I'm definitely going to be skipping secondaries from now on, until I'm more confident to move into the big boys arena.
the majority of the kits out there suggest a secondary, as do most of the books that we all suggest as reading material. I still use a secondary and have had no problems. I popped open my second homebrew ever last night, a wheat beer I brewed last summer, and there was still no signs of oxidation.
I never tranfer beer into a container unless I have taken measures to greatly reduce exposure to o2. If you have any chem lab training, use it. We often use co2 to displace oxygen. If handled properly, you have no need to fear as many transfers as you feel are necessary.
"If handled properly" That's a big "if" for a rookie and even for the cavalier types like myself. I guess I'm just lazy, but when I rack, I drain to a purged keg 99% of the time.
