First Post! - All Grain Fermentation with Temperature Issues

[WillTriathlonforBeer]

Hey guys! This is my first post in this forum. So, Hi! My name is Steve and I've been brewing for 2 years (about 10 brews, more on that in a second), I'm all grain, and I'm having a blast. I started listening to the brewing network about 2 weeks ago and am obsessed. Heard the forum was the best so here's my question....

I live in New York City so brewing space is at a premium, my wort seems good enough for now and I have a great yeast starter but my fermentation is a HUGE problem. I've brewed with a variety of yeasts, grain bills and hops and all my beers have had this off-flavor, I would describe it as yeasty-musty-mediciny. I'm a big hop-head looking to brew some IPA/Imperial Red Ales and as much as I bitter/aroma/dry-hop it's almost entirely overpowered by this off-flavor. From all the reading/listening I've done I'm thinking it's my fermentation, which has been done wrapped in several dark t-shirts for light-stoppage. I've put my money on the off-flavor being high-FG/fusel alcohols due to warm fermentation. Up until recently I've been fermenting on top of my cabinets but I've moved to a window sill (still wrapped in black tees) with those sticky carboy thermometers. My current APA has been in the mid-60s for the entirety of the fermentation and is about 2 weeks from drinking.

Until that's ready, here's my question. Do you agree? Does this sound like a temperature problem to you?

Thanks guys! I can't wait to learn from the best!

[dmtaylor]

You say "mediciny". Since temperature does NOT appear to be your issue, I am wondering if you've got chlorophenol. Do you Campden your water before mashing? If not, you really need to do that. Any chlorine in your water will turn into something that tastes like a medicine chest or band-aids after fermentation. Campden, luckily, can eliminate all chlorine from your water instantly. All you need is about 1/8 tablet of Campden, crushed and added per 5 gallons of brew water. If using a little more than 5 gallons, well, I guess you could add 1/4 tablet. The effect is instant and permanent -- chlorine is gone after that. One other consideration: Don't ever use chlorine bleach to sanitize your equipment. Use One-Step or Starsan, which do not contain any chlorine.

I'm betting that's it. If not, read up more at the BJCP website on off-flavors, and you should be able to narrow it down some more for us.

[WillTriathlonforBeer]

Thanks for the response Dave. I do not currently us Campden tablets so that's definitely a thought. Next time I'm in my LHBS I'll ask what they suggest for the local water supply.

I also don't think I was clear in my original post. Up until my latest batch I had simply assumed that my ambient temperature was OK for fermentation but I wasn't controlling/monitoring this in anyway. So I went out and bought some fermemoters and sure enough it looks like the temps were in the mid-70s. My latest batch I have now installed next to an open window and it looks like the fermentation stayed in the mid 60s (although it did fluctuate sometimes as much as 7 degrees in a day due to day/night cycles, but it never went north of 68 during fermentation) I'm planning on bottling it this coming weekend and if it still tastes off I'll try the Campden. Either way I'll pop another bottle of my a recent beer and try and write up a good review of it and see if I can describe the flavors better.

Would mid-70s for a typical California Ale yeast be enough to throw a lot of off flavors into the beer?

Thanks for your time!

[pfooti]

Would mid-70s for a typical California Ale yeast be enough to throw a lot of off flavors into the beer?

I don't have much to say about chlorophenol, but I do know that most of the calale type yeasts (WL-001, WY-1056, US-05) tend to throw esters for me whenever the fermentation temp gets into the 70s. It's kind of funny, really, looking at older brew notebooks from when I lived in Delaware and brewed in the summer (my AC wasn't all that great, so my ambient temps were regularly in the 70s). "Ever so slight hint of ass", "somewhat assertive donkeybutt flavor". I'm glad I thought to write that down, so young-me could amuse current-me. I'm so funny.

Moving to the pacific, where temps rarely break 68 in my garage has done heaps for my beer quality, I can tell you. Getting a freezer for better temp control soon.

[maxwell]

Yes, mid-70s Cal Ale beers will have off-flavors, especially if high temperatures are allowed in the first couple of days of the fermentation.

Listen to the latest session from Downtown Joe's and take their advice seriously. Saying ''my wort seems good enough" doesn't really make sense. How do you know that your wort is good if the beer is flawed? Start with the end product and work your way backwards through the process systematically until you have nailed down every aspect of the process, ending with the recipe (which you should not change from batch to batch). In your case it sounds like fermentation temperature control is the first problem to address, since all of the beer is equally flawed, indicating that it is less likely a problem in the packaging step. The next steps would be oxygenation of the wort and pitching rate, which both of which significantly affect the flavors produced by yeast.

I'm not trying to be an asshole about this and sorry if it comes off that way. I've been there, done that as far as off flavors and less-than-satisfactory beer.

Max

[spiderwrangler]

Does your window get direct sunlight? I'd generally avoid putting my fermentor in the window as it can result in uneven and fluctuating heating of a portion of the wort. If you want to do cheap temp control, put it in some sort of pan or tray and wet down your tshirts. This can get you down a fair amount, but it does require monitoring. As for the water, do you detect any funny flavors in it when you drink it? If so, those are going to come through in your beer, or get worse (in the case of the chlorophenols mentioned).