Odd Beer Question

[Ozwald]

Never discount anything that gives good head... even if other attributes may not be as pleasant.

[spiderwrangler]

Never discount anything that gives good head... even if other attributes may not be as pleasant.

I'll leave this one for someone else...

[GilesTH]

So I just heard from the brewer and they said the beer finished at 1.016. I don't know what it started at, but that's still a LOOOONG way away from 1.005.

[spiderwrangler]

So I just heard from the brewer and they said the beer finished at 1.016. I don't know what it started at, but that's still a LOOOONG way away from 1.005.

1.016 is still within style, but on the upper end. Other aspects of the beer (hops, yeast, etc) could also contribute to what you perceive as sweetness... http://www.bjcp.org/2008styles/style18.php#1d

[Ozwald]

1.016 is on the upper end of the style, as Spider noted, but that's not to say if it ended up at 1.016 it's right. There's other attributes involved. The style still needs to finish 'dry' (by perception, not necessarily by numbers) and depending on the recipe & it's execution, that can be done with a 1.016 FG but it still will not be perceived as sweet.

[spiderwrangler]

1.016 is on the upper end of the style, as Spider noted, but that's not to say if it ended up at 1.016 it's right. There's other attributes involved.

Exactly... any given beer could be within style for all the parameters, but still be quite a bit out of balance, and not a good example of the style.

[Ozwald]

Exactly. You can have 2 beers that end at 1.016 and one can be perceived as dry & the other as very full. It all depends on the types of malt in the grist, the ratio, mash temps, etc.

Let's say beer #1 has an abundance of crystal malts & was mashed at 158 for 60 minutes & then kicked up to 168 before running off. Beer #2 has less crystal & more simple sugars with more modified malts, mashed at 148, ramped to 152 before kicking it up to 168. Even if those 2 beers finish with the same FG, they're going to be very different in how dry they're perceived. Those are just a couple of the factors. Every step of the process is going to have an effect on the final process from initial water treatment to the volumes of CO2 dissolved for carbonation.

All in all, if a golden strong tastes sweet what-so-ever, there was a problem somewhere along the way.