Fairly newbie question

I just recently started brewing and went to a friend's last night to hang out and drink while he made a batch.

He uses plastic buckets instead of glass and I thought of a question last night while I was at his place. (this may be a stupid question, or it could be the beer that we drank last night while brewing that is making my mind fuzzy)

After we finished boiling, he had the cold water sitting in his bucket to add the wort to. Did he need to cool the wort before mixing? My thought at the time was adding it to the cold water would bring the temperature down considerably, but obviously not enough to pitch.
So I basically talked him into cooling it a lot before mixing (my thinking was demonstrating my chiller as he does not have one AND getting the wort closer to 100 degrees so that when he added it to the 60 degree cold water, it would work nicely.
We got the wort down to about 110, mixed it and lo and behold it was exactly 70 degrees, so we pitched right away, covered and airlocked.

Another question was he had extra priming sugar that he does not use and we were wondering if adding it to the wort was a good idea. The discussion was it would increase sugar content, thereby increasing OG. (Make the beer better?)
Would he have needed to pitch 2 packages of yeast?

Enough questions for now I guess, sorry if this is long (I told ya we drank last night)

He didn't "need" to cool it before mixing, but as you pointed out, it's an effective way to go about it. Adding the priming sugar to the wort will boost your OG a couple points and dry out your finished beer. You should consider the beer style before doing this, some styles should ferment out drier and some, not so much.

This was a Canadian Ale that he was brewing. Explain why it would "dry it out"?

For cooling - either way is fine as long as it is cooled to pitching temperatures before adding the yeast.

Adding the sugar will increase the ABV but could also thin out the mouthfeel of the beer, dry it out, (less sweet - more alcohol bite) and throw off the hop balance of the recipe unless adjusted for.

How much yeast needed depends on the gravity of the beer, the type of yeast and the volume of beer.

When using liquid yeast you should almost always make a starter or pitch multiple packages.

Mrmalty.com and yeastcalc.com have good information on starters and pitch rates.

Soooo..... hypothetically speaking. Would adding 2 different kinds of yeast to the wort (Muntons something or other that came with the kit and a package of Safale 05 have been a bad idea not knowing the OG?

Adding chilled water to a partial boil batch is a great way to get the temp down quickly.

Adding 5 oz of sugar is not going to amke a very big difference so it is not much of an issue. Adding a lot of sugar to a brew will change the BU:GU ratio and change the balance of malt to hops.

Using two yeasts is not a problem. Now just sit back, keep the fermenter in the proper temp range and let the yeast make beer.

"Soooo..... hypothetically speaking. Would adding 2 different kinds of yeast to the wort (Muntons something or other that came with the kit and a package of Safale 05 have been a bad idea not knowing the OG?"

Well, it won't cause explosions, and, in general, you can mix yeasts. However, it is a good idea to use quality yeast vs whatever happens to be in the kit.

Which is why I hypothetically convinced him to add the Safale, cuz I did not trust the Muntons.

Here's a handy calculator to help figure how to balance hot and cold to get to a desired temperature.

http://www.onlineconversion.com/mixing_water.htm

bosco

brewkinger said:

Which is why I hypothetically convinced him to add the Safale, cuz I did not trust the Muntons.

Click to expand...

Good call. S-05 is a great yeast.

Regarding the question of adding the priming sugar to the wort: "gravity math" can be tricky, but round numbers are fine: Adding a POUND of sugar to a 5-gal batch will raise the ABV by about 1% point. So a 5 ounce pack of sugar will increase it about 0.3 points.

Not much of an effect BUT - I would discouraged the attitude of throwing something into the pot just because you have it. Having a plan in mind is one thing; making willy-nilly recipe modifications is another. And I speak from experience. In my youth - OK, last year - I had a tendency to do this. But the results were unpredictable, unrepeatable, and generally not good. If tossing the kitchen sink into a recipe was good, it would become part of the recipe.

So, stick to the plan. No worries!

Edit:

Totally unnecessary post. Sorry for the misunderstanding.

OP, in short, there's actually a debate about what "drying out" means. But to summarize, in practice, Vinny at Russian River uses sugar in his Pliny recipe, but not in his porter. If it's a beer that's intended to finish lighter bodied, or showcase the hops, sugar will boost the ABV a bit and help to that end. If it's a beer that's intended to be full bodied with a thick mouthfeel (like a porter or stout) sugar is usually best substituted with DME or Malt in the mash to increase ABV.