After a lot of trouble trying to get my first homebrew tried at the Maryland Homebrew Warehouse (the picture is from their site) I finally had the time to take it there myself. I went on a Thursday when people gathered to try each others homebrews and get advice on what we had made. So, excited I took a bottle of our first homebrew, the red ale, and our second, the German style weizen beer.
Now you might think that I was a little nervous to have people who know a lot about homebrewing trying our brews right in front of me. To be honest I was, but I was also extremely excited to see what they had to say. I was introduced to who I believe was a beer judge as well as to a handful of homebrewers. The caps came off and the tasting began.
The Red Ale
First we started off with the red ale. The first person who tried it said they believe the off flavor was from oxidation. A second opinion discounted that theory and pointed towards too many phenols. On a positive note, other than the phenols I was told that the ale was pretty good. Apparently phenols can be created through chlorine contamination. This meant that the most likely source of the off flavor was either a lack of a long enough boil time for the water used in the cooking of the wort or from the no rinse sanitizer we used on the equipment and bottles. Water could have been an issue because I am on city water. In order to get rid of the chlorine I was told to run it through a filter (we used my fridge) and then boil it for a while. Its quite possible that we did not boil the water long enough. On the other hand it is also quite possible that we did not let the equipment and/or bottles drip dry long enough.
Luckily I was provided solutions for both possibilities. For the water I could run it through a charcoal filter such as a Brita. Boiling it a bit longer also would not hurt. I am thinking about buying a faucet attached Brita as it would likely be a bit easier than the pitcher variety. When using such a device I was told to make sure to run the water through slowly. Running the water through too quickly could allow some chlorine to get through the charcoal filter. As for the no rinse sanitizer I could just let it dry longer.
The German Weizen
Next I broke out the weizen beer. I was really hoping that they would like this one after the pseudo flop of our first beer. They smelled the aroma of the beer and said it had a good strong wheat smell and then took a sip. Both tasters said that it was a good wheat beer. The only question I had about this beer was why I could taste a similar taste to the off flavor of the red ale. It turns out that the yeast create phenols when fermenting wheat but that these phenols are somehow good as opposed to the bad phenols of the chlorine contamination. All of the tasters had good things to say about the wheat beer which made me proud since it was not a kit beer like the first. The two people who I spent most of my time there talking about my beer both even asked for a second cup of beer!
