white film on beer

[gorymorph]

hi
just come back of 1 weeks hol to turkey. Put a Bards dry brew kit on 3 days before i went so it would be ready to bottle when i got back. but there,s a white film on top was wondering if this was normal for these dry kits it's the Old English ale. It smells ok, in fact it smell bl**dy beutiful

here,s a pic

[steve_flack]

It's probably infected - my money's on Brettanomyces which is a wild yeast. It won't kill you but I'd drink it quickly whilst it still tastes like you want it to. I'd be careful bottling it as Brett is a superattenuating yeast that can eat dextrins that normal yeast can't.

Brett is a major flavor contributor to old English aged ales (I doubt it's intentional in a beer kit) and also some Belgian sour beers. It is deliberately added to bottles of Orval. The flavour and aroma has been described as 'horse blanket'

[prolix]

don't stir it! if you have a tap on the fermenter take 3/4 and dump the rest these yeasts are top dwellers and should not contaminate the rest of the beer (hopefully). but this brew is best not left to age as wild yeasts can make very strange tastes and flavours

[chopperswookie]

so glad i didn't do the same. i've been on holiday and was going to leave a beer ferming! so chuffed i didn't now!