Priming necessary?

If after fermentation, the end product is pretty sweet, does it need to be primed before bottling? I had a batch that I bottled without adding sugar and that turned out to be carbonated really nicely, but I don't know if that was just a coincidence. Anyone?
Thanks

It would depend if fermentation was really finished or not. If it's still got sugar in it and it's fermenting actively, you might get some bottle bombs if you added priming sugar.

Lorena

if it's done fermenting would I need to add some more yeast to carbonate it?

Nope. There should still be enough yeast there. By adding extra sugar , or whatever , as your priming agent , you will start a new fermentation using the original yeast.

thanks, but the sweetness would be lowered after bottling right?

No, actually the only thing that will change your sweet beer to a more balanced beer is more bittering hops.

You can buy a bottle of liquid bittering hops and add 2-3 drops to a glass and it'll improve some. I think it has an off flavor, but at least it'l be more bitter.

Prey...

I assume this is some of your prison hooch.

If you went overboard tying to make it high octane, you might have created a 'beverage' high enough in alcohol to KILL your yeast outright. If that happened, adding more sugar will only sweeten it more. It'll still be flat. Adding more yeast will result in more yeast being killed. It'll still be flat.

homebrewer_99 said:

No, actually the only thing that will change your sweet beer to a more balanced beer is more bittering hops.

You can buy a bottle of liquid bittering hops and add 2-3 drops to a glass and it'll improve some. I think it has an off flavor, but at least it'l be more bitter.

Click to expand...

This isn't even beer he's talking about. It's in the cider section, but I doubt that it's really even cider.

-walker

It's about 4% ABV, from the OG/FG method. Trust me, my prison hooch making days are over. Now I just want something that tastes good and the reason why I asked about the sugar was because I wanted a semi sweet product and not a dry cider, which I was afraid would be the end product because when I racked it, there was only a bit of sweetness left and I was wondering if I had to put sugar in to compensate for the fermentation in the bottles. My second batch of cider turned out very well, it had lots of carbonation and just enough sweetness to suit my taste

Nothing like a good steak with some ice cold homebrew