What's this in my bottle?

[JackA]

Here's my first AG, bottled almost 3 weeks ago now. I've tasted some from the cornie and it's definitely not right (my second AG, the same recipe, tastes a lot better). It's dropped fairly bright, but I noticed this (see images bellow) in several of the bottles. They look kind of yeasty, but appeared after most of the yeast settled to the bottom of the bottle. Most pieces are firmly attached to the inside of the bottle, but a few are also floating lose. I'm concerned it may be an infection. The off flavour of my beer is makes it quite sweet and there is little bitterness or malty character that the second brew possesses. I will be keeping it another week and then chucking it, since it isn't drinkable, but I'd like to get to the bottom of the problem first!

1.jpg (127.73 KiB) Viewed 1651 times

Zoomed in:

2.jpg (185.58 KiB) Viewed 1651 times

Notice also the scummy stuff as the beer meets air.

Any suggestions?

Cheers,

Jack

[simple one]

I have had this before on my bottles when there was too much yeast in solution and I had granulated sugar stuck on the neck. It seemed to occur on only one or two bottles, out of a 50 bottle batch. I stuck it in the fridge, poured it in to a jug sniffed it, poured a little, tasted it. It was fine. It had been kept in this condition for a few months with no significant change from the ones which were perfect looking. Looked exactly the same a yours. Its strange you report a bad taste, did it always taste bad?

[Garth]

I've seen that on a few of my bottles in the past, looks like yeast, if you twirl the bottle round do they not loosen and drop?

You also seem to have far too much yeast in the bottom of that bottle, maybe it's just the photo but it looks a good 5mm layer at the bottom, maybe transferring it to secondary for another week or so would lower the yeast count a bit. What sort of carbonation does it have?

[booldawg]

What did you prime with? It does look like yeast thats stuck to the sides of the bottle. The stuff where the beer meets the air could be a protein ring, this usually is more likely to happen if you've primed with a malt based ingredient such as spraymalt.

[JackA]

I didn't prime with anything

It's not quite 5mm of yeast at the bottom, more like 1mm tops. I had a lot of problems with this batch - a stuck mash (which had dropped down to about 58 degrees) and a stuck hop filter. It has always had this odd taste from the time I first tried it in the FV.

Could it simply be too much yeast giving it this flavour? A friend reckons it's a yeasty flavour, but I don't think there has been any difference in this flavour's power from when it was cloudy to when it was clear.

[simple one]

Then if the taste hasn't changed over time, its less likely to be an infection, and more likely to be bad brewing practice/crap recipe. What ever that stuff is, I would leave it in a nice cool place and wait for a month before commiting it to the gutter. Sometimes even the worse beer has a habit of coming good.

[JackA]

After tasting it again I'm almost sure it's a yeasty taste. It tastes similar to the smell yeast gives off as you rehydrate it. It's been 3 weeks in the cornie and it comes out crystal clear... could there still be yeast in suspension causing this falvour and is it likely to settle?

[simple one]

Just leave it. I have some forming around a neck of a bottle of bitter.... (so much for bad practice!). The yeast was SO5, was yours a top cropper?

[JackA]

Just leave it. I have some forming around a neck of a bottle of bitter.... (so much for bad practice!). The yeast was SO5, was yours a top cropper?

Trust me, this brew was the definition of bad practice... I'm amazed it doesn't taste like vinegar! The yeast was Munton's Gervin English Ale yeast (which I've read is just Nottingham, a top fermenter right?).

I wont be doing any more brews in the near future, so I'll leave it for a few weeks and see if it improves at all

[simple one]

Did you use granulated sugar to prime?

[JackA]

I didn't prime with anything

[simple one]

Thats nothing to be embarassed about. Just takes a fair while longer to carbonate.