Thu May 19, 2011 10:01 am
While I do use brett and bugs from time to time, I am careful to separate the plastic and rubber components and not use them in my clean beers. I can't rule out a wild brett infection. I am sure there is some hanging about on the orange zest that goes in at the end of the boil. I know brett have a reputation for being tough but it is a boil after all. Yes, this is the only recipe I ever do with orange zest so I am allowing that it might be a possibility. I just think it is a small one.
If this is the result of infection it seems odd that all my other beers come out clean (when I am not intentionally adding brett and bugs that is).
After the feedback I have gotten here, my tentative theory is that the 'rubbery' perception is the combination of the following two factors. I am one of those people that are particularly sensitive to this compound and that this same compound might be produced at higher levels in the WLP400 strain.
I think I might take an approach that is normally frowned upon. Instead of changing one thing at a time until I eliminate the rubber taste I am going to change everything I find the slightest bit suspect. Then I will work backwards changing one thing at a time back to the original process/recipe until I find the one that produced the rubber taste. The rational is that I risk dumping less beer this way. If I only change the yeast and that turned out not to be the problem, more beer gets dumped down the drain. If instead, I switch to WYeast, ferment cooler, use dried orange peel then I would have a better chance at a drinkable beer first time out.
If it does actually fix the problem, I will set about returning items one at a time to the original recipe each time I rebrew it in the future. I will either get one bad batch (and know that was added to cause it) or by process of elimination, I get to the last item on the list. If it is the latter, then no beer would have to be poured out in the name of science.
