puckering mouthfeel in english bitter

[James Lawson]

Hi all,

I'm just trying my latest out of the fermenter, it's hoppy english bitter. About 30IBU, made with golden promise, about 7% medium crystal S-04 and 20g of goldings at 20min, 10min and 20g of fuggles at flameout.

I'm getting this sour puckering mouthfeel off it. I was aiming for something really nice and smooth, and while its tasty, this puckering feeling is just hanging around for ages.

I didn't strain my wort before I chucked it in the fermenter, so it has all sorts of hops and crap in it. I've done this plenty of times and it has never turned out to be an issue like this.

Funnily enough, this has happened before, with a similar style of beer I made quite a while using extract, goldings, and S-04. In fact it's the only other time I've used that yeast.

Any idea what's going on? From some research I've done, it seems that my beer is either infected with an acetobacter, or I've extracted tannins from my grains.

Kind of a bummer really, I had high hopes for this beer. I'm thinking about steeping another 100g or so of crystal and chucking it in the fermenter (still bubbling away at about 3-4/min) to balance out the acidity.

Cheers,
James

[Christian]

It it acidic or bitter? When there's still a large amount of yeast in suspension, you may be getting 'yeast bite'. The yeast pick up some of the harsh, more bitter hop resins. My fermenter samples are always very bitter - a couple of days in the bottle and I usually get a huge improvement in drinkability.

[James Lawson]

No i'm pretty sure it's sour. I can still feel it and I drank some about 10 minutes ago.

[martin w]

puckering as in an overbrewed cup of tea or a young red wine? it could be astringency caused by extracting tannins from the grain, i think oversparging,incorrect ph and too much husk shredding can cause this,maybe theres other reasons as well which i can't remember

[James Lawson]

I can't decide if it's tannins or acidity. Or tannic acidity...

Thing is, why might this have happened with an extract batch as well if it's mainly caused by the mash?

[Christian]

Maybe it's your haircut?

[martin w]

hmm, i don't really have an answer for that, i'd give it time,and hopefully it'll come right. i don't think its acetobacter though, i had that infection once and theres no mistaking it, its like drinking vinegar!

[Barry]

Get someone else to taste it. Do that before considering a drain pour.

[James Lawson]

After drinking some pretty heavily hopped beers last night... And not being ultra experienced in the ways of using lots and lots of hops, I am thinking that maybe my issue has something to do with not straining the hops out of the wort before they go into the fermenter. I tend to get my wort cool pretty quick (less than 20min) but next time I think I'll do a whirlpool.

Hopefully the beer will mellow out after a couple of months in the bottle.

Thanks everyone.

[jt]

Could be, or tannins, it's hard to imagine SO4 with huge bitterness.

But what was your OG? You may just have a beer balanced at the bitter end of the scale

Any what stage of ferment is the wort at, and what did you taste ?
If you copped a hydromter sample full of the wrong stuff it could be pretty bitey