Forgot to grind grains

I've brewed a few all grain batches but I've always had the grain crushed by LHBS or the website from which I ordered. This time I ordered the grains uncrushed. I was so excited to brew I got all the way through sparging before I realized I forgot to crush the grains. Is there anything I can do now to save the batch? I'm thinking I'll probably have to get some more grain and start over.

What is/was the gravity after sparging? If there's any sugars in there, boil it down to a suitable OG and rack it. Don't completely waste it!

tre9er said:

What is/was the gravity after sparging? If there's any sugars in there, boil it down to a suitable OG and rack it. Don't completely waste it!

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12 pounds of grain
now 6.5 gallons
OG measured 1.010 @ 70^F

I'll play taps while you give it a proper burial.

I wouldn't try to save this one. That's about 15% efficiency. You would have to boil a ton of it off, which would probably throw off your hop utilitization and carmalize the heck out of it. You could do a small batch of it as an experiment if you wanted to but I wouldn't expect 5 gallons to come out well. Maybe you could boil it down enough to get it in the starter wort range.

I would save and use it as Strike and sparge water if you can get it into a container and into a fridge. Then get new grains, crushed and brew with it. Get a real high gravity wort and pitch double the yeast. I sometimes get extra wort from my sparge (1.5 to 2 quarts) I put in a growler with a cap and put in fridge the use as starters.

Add extract or dump I guess. Bummer.

I would not throw the wort or the grain out just yet. Keep boiling the wort down, if you can get it to around 1.035 you could fill freezer bags and freeze the for wort starters.

As far as the grain, I wonder what would happen if you dried it out in the oven and then crushed it and make more bags of wort starter food.

BrewerinBR said:

I would save and use it as Strike and sparge water if you can get it into a container and into a fridge. Then get new grains, crushed and brew with it. Get a real high gravity wort and pitch double the yeast. I sometimes get extra wort from my sparge (1.5 to 2 quarts) I put in a growler with a cap and put in fridge the use as starters.

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I think you might be on to some thing here... if I got new grains crushed could I use this batch in place of water for the mash?

Yeast starters or strike and sparge water. Good ideas

A decoction mash may break it down enough to get extraction.

We all make mistakes like this at some point. Chalk it up to experience and be happy you didnt waste the hops on a bad batch.