Probably the dumbest brew question ever

So it occurred to me tonight. Every now and then I put in too much "brew water" in the pot while brewing and by the time I get to dump in my specialty grain water I'm at the edge of the pot with no more room for the remaining water I soaked the grains in. It seems like a waste to toss it.

Anyways, my question is this. I suppose I could boil for 10-20 minutes and dump in the residual grain water in after I boil off that excess H20 but how will that affect the 60 minute hop boil? Do you have to start the clock all over again? Is it even worth it?

From a chemistry perspective I would imagine (especially for darker brews) it is better to get as much of the soaked grain water into the brew as you can since it will dilute the ratio of the colored water to my clear brew water.

Should I spend more time worring about something else?

steep your grains in your brew water from the get-go and you won't have that problem. why are they separate right now?

PintOfBitter said:

steep your grains in your brew water from the get-go and you won't have that problem. why are they separate right now?

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Grains steeping in one pot for about 20-30 min. Extract and brew water boiling in the other. Combining the both trhough a strainer at about 35-40 min. This time I had extra.

I just boiled it off and dumped the rest in. Next time I'll just start out with less water in the extract pot. so I don't run out of room.

If you find yourself with excess volume by the time you're ready to start the boil, delay adding the hops until you've boiled off enough to add back anything you don't want to toss. Then start the timer and begin adding hops.

I hope that's clear enough.

I always steep my grains first and that water, with top off, becomes the brew water for my extract and hop additions. I suppose your method could be a time saver, but I do a partial boil. I start with 3 gallons, total after topping off the steeping grain water, and add half my extract up front to create a wort that is similar in composition to a five to six gallon boil so that the hop utilization is correct then add the last of my extract in the last couple of minutes. Trying to add my steeping water in the middle of that would throw my "calculated" method all out of whack!!!

Shooter said:

I always steep my grains first and that water, with top off, becomes the brew water for my extract and hop additions. I suppose your method could be a time saver, but I do a partial boil. I start with 3 gallons, total after topping off the steeping grain water, and add half my extract up front to create a wort that is similar in composition to a five to six gallon boil so that the hop utilization is correct then add the last of my extract in the last couple of minutes. Trying to add my steeping water in the middle of that would throw my "calculated" method all out of whack!!!

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Thank you both for the posts....makes much more sense to me now.

I steep in a gallon than bring it up to 2.5 for a partial boil.