So i went to keg my oatmeal stout today. There are small fuzzy bubbles on the top. Does it need to be tossed?
I doubt it. It may just be CO2 being release out of solution, especially if you just moved it. Did you give it a taste?
I have not tasted it…i was afraid to!!
no need to be afraid. can you take a picture and post it? not sure what you mean by fuzzy.
i cannot figure out how to post the pic
CO2. RDWHAHB
following the link it appears that there may be some contamination. It’s hard to tell for sure but that could be a pellicle. good news is that it’s perfectly safe to taste. bad news is it might not taste good. Then again it might!
If it is indeed souring there are a few ways to go. You could dump it outright and brew your next batch being more careful with sanitation. You could let it ride and see what it turns into; Sometimes these accidentally infected batches turn out amazing. If it tastes okay now you could drink it up quickly and enjoy it while it lasts.
tell us a bit about your process and let’s see if we can pin down where the contamination (if there is any) might have come from.
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Well,it smells OK…from what i can ascertain through the valve! LOL. My process is simple… bring 2 gal water to 165, steep my specialty grains for aprx 20 min. add the LME boil for an hour with hop additions at their respective intervals… meanwhile using StarSan on all my equipment. In this batch i had some old dark roast oak chips which i used in a secondary fermenter. I steamed them for about 20 minutes… this may be where it came from… i dunno. I’m always a stickler for sanitation…
Oak chips could be the vector. try soaking in vodka next time. Or maybe nothing is wrong with it at a all. The only reason I think there might be is what appears to be a waxy sort of layer on the top but that could be the photo.
no, you are correct there is a film on the top. I will taste it in the morning and see what’s up…being a night owl i have no more time to mess with it today…gotta work tonight!! Thanks for the input… i will keep you posted. A fellow hombrewer of mine said to rack all but like the last gallon off & it should be fine…we shall soon see.
It looks infected.
You can’t post the pic because your sharing settings are restricted.
It looks like yeast colonies to me. Perfectly normal. Did you happen to use WY1728 Scottish? If so, that wouldn’t be the first time I’ve seen that with that yeast.
As far as safe to drink goes, what is the ph?
Ive not checked the PH yet, as for the yeast i used Wyeast 1084.
It’s infected but it might still taste ok. It will not kill you.
If it tastes ok then your best option is to bottle/keg now and drink until you run out or it stops tasting ok. Then dump it. No reason to drink unpleasant beer. Others may tell you to dump it now. Entirely up to you.
So i tasted it today & decided to go ahead and keg. I left approx the top gallon in the carboy. Its acually a mighty fine tasting ale! I hope it stays that way!! I was unable to test for PH. Turns out the strips i bought YEARS ago…the scale only gives me up to 4.4! What the hale kind of brew store sells ya useless strips?!
Quit saying it’s infected! It’s not infected! Those are yeast colonies!
could be. it’s the way it looks like there are little cracks in the surface that makes me suspect something other.