There is nothing worse than pouring a pint from the keg you tapped last week and finding that the pint has an “off” mouthfeel. In the evaluation of beer, texture can be a neglected category, especially in the era of super-hopped IPAs and adjunct-heavy stouts and porters. If a peanut butter and jelly porter is a bit flat, or a 7000 IBU Triple Imperial, Double Dry-Hopped IPA has a bit too much bite from carbonation, it may be overshadowed by the fact that you’re drinking sandwich filling or having all the enamel stripped off your teeth.

You may be nodding your head in agreement as you sip on a teku full of your favorite $140-a-sixtel beer, but wonder, “What can I do? I didn’t brew the beer. If the mouthfeel is off, then it is one hundred percent the fault of the brewer.”

But carbonation is something that YOU–yes, you the beertender–have control over. How do you know if you have something wrong? There are, indeed, telltale signs.