Pitched Yeast Too Hot, Potential Contamination

I'm really worried about my second batch of beer. The brewing took longer than expected. While I tried to cool the wort as fast as possible before pitching the yeast, I was late for something and ended up pitching it too hot (I think).

Fermentation took off quickly, and it started overflowing out the airlock. I googled a solution, and ended up attaching a hose to the thing inside the airlock. Soon after, this got clogged, and the overflow was getting through the tube but only after a really high pressure pushed it. I figured if I went to bed and left it that way it would blow the airlock off and make a huge mess in my room. So I took off the airlock and began scooping all the overflow into a bucket. After trying to figure out what to do for a while it was about 2AM and I had no tube big enough to make a proper blow off tube without the airlock. I ended up covering the top with foil and carrying it outback to finish its overflow out there while I got some sleep.

The next morning i went outside to check on it and the foil was on the ground and the carboy was still gushing stuff out of it. i put new foil on it, and when it finally stopped, i washed the airlock good and put it back. After that the krausen became very small, and two days after it began, the fermantation had almost slowed to a stop. Now, its 5 days later and the airlock is bubbling about once every 5 minutes and there is almost zero stuff floating on the top.

I dont know what to do. Is the beer ruined/contaminated from sitting outside with no lid? It was gushing the whole time so I hoped this prevented anything getting in there, but how do I know? Also, it seems like the fermentation got too slow too fast. Should I add more yeast? Should I cut my losses and try again? Or should I let it sit another 10 days and then try to bottle it? Thanks in advance for help and sorry about the long post.

Ur probably good pitching hot is not good but I've done it. Their was co2 blowing out when it.was uncovered to keep out the nasties if it was me I would take a gravity reading and see where ur at on sg and taste if it taste good push on with pride Chopps

JoeyChopps said:

Ur probably good pitching hot is not good but I've done it. Their was co2 blowing out when it.was uncovered to keep out the nasties if it was me I would take a gravity reading and see where ur at on sg and taste if it taste good push on with pride Chopps

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+1. With that much blowoff, I would thing you would be ok. I make starters all the time with nothing but foil and have never had a contamination issue. It MAY have let some air in but again I doubt it and even if it did it is no big deal. Take a gravity reading and sample it. That will answer all your questions.

I bet your ok. If its bubbling you have fermentation happening. I agree with the other 2 before me. Check your gravity, Taste the brew and hope for the best. You may be ok.

Two things: the first is that pitching while it's too hot didnt hurt your beer, the reason I say this is because pitching too hot can kill the yeast you pitch causing delayed or prolonged fermentation. That your brew took off on schedule is a good thing.

There is no known pathogen that can survive in fermented beer beer, as far as contamination is concerned, the way it was explained to me is that your goal in sanitation is to kill as many of the bacteria as possible (you cant do sterility at home) and this isnt an issue because given a head-start the yeast will multiply fast enough to out-compete the bacteria. That your brew bubbled so vigorously it pushed off the top means that your yeast are thriving and even if a few bacteria got in the yeast would still eat all the sugar before they became an issue.

Quickest way to tell if bacteria are an issue is that you'll have a really strange smell coming from your beer and it'll probably be discolored.

Wow, Thanks a bunch for the fast responses. Its even more awesome they seemed to be positive ones. Unfortunately, in the mess of brew day, I forgot to take an original gravity reading. So, I don't know if that makes taking one now useless or not.

Anyways, the current gravity is 1.030. I'm not sure what that tells us, but I'll read up on it. I tasted the beer used for the reading and it seems all is well. It has a strong bitter taste (I think i put too strong of bittering hops) and boiled them for a full hour. It definitely tastes and smells like alcohol. The malt flavor is more subtle than I was shooting for but overall it seems good. Very strong, I think. I guess I let it go ten more days and then bottle?

Thanks for all the (really fast) help, I'm stoked there probably isn't an issue!

Let it sit for a week and finish fermenting. Then take 2 readings a day apart and if it's exactly the same it's done. Then le it sit more to clean up. Maybe another week. Then it will be great! Good job!

you will get a beer out of that carboy but if you had a hot fermentation you may have some hot fusel alcohol flavors. you didn't say what the temp of the fermenting beer was so maybe you just had a vigorous fermentation.

I don't know the temperature when I pitched the yeast exactly, but it was warm to the touch. Warmer than my hand but not much. I guess that would make it around 98-100 degrees?

andForMore said:

I don't know the temperature when I pitched the yeast exactly, but it was warm to the touch. Warmer than my hand but not much. I guess that would make it around 98-100 degrees?

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that's pretty hot. oh well, nothing can be done about it at this point but next time you are better off putting an airlock on and putting the fermentor in a water bath, then pitching later into cool wort. those hot flavors have not gone away in my experience but you might get lucky.

Hmm...I would probably bottle this after another week and put it way back in a box in my closet, and brew something else as soon as possible. Then, maybe 6 months later I would try putting some in the fridge to sample.

I had a batch a while ago that when I hooked up my temp controller, I put it on the wrong setting. So, it turned the heat on and never went off. 24 hours later, I had a vigorous fermentation and it had hit 95 degrees. I cooled it down immediately and then I let it finish. A month after i bottled, the beer still had a fusel taste. 3 months later, it had a little less. 6 months later a lot less. I had one tonight because of this post. It's been 8 months now and it's a pretty good brown ale now. I would say its about 70% better than 8 months ago. I still have most of this batch left and I will open another on labor day. I read a post that said never throw a beer away (unless it's contaminated) just give it time. I'm a believer now but it has taken quite a while and a lot of patience. Good thing I brewed another batch right after I figured out I f****ed up lol

Well depending on the style of beer a little fusel wont hurt too much, though if you sat down and drank 6 of them you'd probably get a headache. (it happened to me my first batch)

Old bump, but just curious. What if you were to pitch to hot, and then get the beer cooled down in a swamp cooler and kept at 65-70 degrees before fermentation kicks off, would it matter?

I have read negative results of pitching too hot and letting it cool. The questions how hot are you pitching? I have pitched as high as 85 and then cooled with no noticed problem.

I'm thinking a 2.5 gallon hot wort, with 2 gallons of cold water added. Whatever that temp would be, wouldn't seem very hot, only a tad warm if your finger were to touch it. 75 - 80 maybe ??........

everything you described about the fermentation itself sounded normal to me..... Beer blows off sometimes regardless of pitchinf temps and thats just how it goes. As far as contamination +1 to all that say your good, as co2 is pushing out nothing else gets in period.Fwiw there is a method called open fermentation that leaves the beer open once it starts bubbling and the english are famous for this method. don't be worried it is much harder to ruin a beer than you realize.

JoeyChopps said:

I have read negative results of pitching too hot and letting it cool. The questions how hot are you pitching? I have pitched as high as 85 and then cooled with no noticed problem.

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dstranger99 said:

I'm thinking a 2.5 gallon hot wort, with 2 gallons of cold water added. Whatever that temp would be, wouldn't seem very hot, only a tad warm if your finger were to touch it. 75 - 80 maybe ??........

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Ok, gonna bump this, lol........So, what's the verdict ??.......

dstranger99 said:

Ok, gonna bump this, lol........So, what's the verdict ??.......

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There really is no 'verdict'. It's ideal to pitch your yeast at fermentation temps, but as long as the wort isn't hot enough to kill the yeast, it won't kill the yeast. Yeast get active pretty much as soon as you pitch, they begin absorbing o2 and reproducing shortly after. This is when yeast produce most of the precursors to off flavors (esters, phenols, diacetyl, etc.). Yeast also tend to produce excessive amounts of these things when stressed. Yeast can become stressed from temps that aren't ideal, or especially from big temp swings. See where this is going? If you pitch at say 85, and then let the swamp cooler cool to fermentation temps, the yeast are not only stressed due to the high temp, but further stressed from the change in temp as well, all of this during the phase where they're likely to kick unwanted flavor compounds in excessive amounts if they're stressed.
To answer your question, Yes, you can get away with pitching that warm and then cooling the wort further, and it's not guaranteed to cause problems, but it's definitely less than ideal.

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Wonderful answer.....Explains it all !! Thanks.........(Not that I pitched hot recently, (But I have done it)...; Just like to bump and learn from old threads)..........