Ok I need some help from some experts here! I bought the BACON! Beer kit from this website. Followed the instructions to the letter. When I made it it smelled amazing, but when I tried it, it taste like carbonated water. It’s a little yeasty in smell and taste too. Fermentation had stopped wheni bottled it. I let it carbonate for two weeks then condition for two weeks before I tried the first bottle. It was bad so I let it sit longer before conditioning and still nothing. What did I do wrong? I was expecting a huge punch of flavor being that it’s a smoked darker beer but shoot it’s got less flavor than bud light. Any ideas?? Thanks for your help!!
hmm sorry to hear. I was about to give the typical answer of give it time. But you were patient and gave it plenty of time. The only thing that comes to mind is some sort of contamination. There are wild yeasts and other contaminates all around us that if given a chance can ferment a beer down to nothing/ carbonated water. That MAY be what happened or maybe its just a crappy kit, hopefully someone who brewed it can chime in. Also are you sure you ended up with 5 gallons and didn’t add too much water? What was your OG and FG?
Thanks for the reply! I was right at 5 gallons when I finished, actually just under. It might have been sometype of contamination. I was very careful to sanitize everything really good but it may have been contaminated. I don’t remember now what the OG or FG was but I know it was inline with the recipe. It has a great head on it when I pour it into a glass and looks awesome, it just lacks flavor. Hopefully the next one will turn out better. I’ve never had this happen before so I’m at a lost.
Is there a chance the recipe kit was missing part of the malt extract? I had this happen once some time ago (in NB’s defense, they had the missing item on the way posthaste). If you were missing either the amber DME or the dark LME you would wind up with pretty weak beer. Just a thought.
So, you believe the OG & FG were in line with the recipe, you added all the ingredients (presumably), as you claimed it smelled great (then) and looks like the picture (now).
The only thing that comes to mind is oxidation. Lots of splashing when you transferred the cold, unfermented wort, and/or transferred the fermented beer, and/or bottled the fermented beer. It’d make the beer taste like wet cardboard, which I’d imagine is not too different a flavor from plain carbonated water.
