Did I just ruin my beer??

Well...I started at 730pm. It's now 11:15 and my beer is in the fermenter in my mini fridge turned fermentation chamber....but I think I made a horrible rookie mistake at the very end. Finished my boil..cooled the wort...took a specific gravity reading (1.040) and then pitched yeast. I put the cover on the bucket, and when I pushed the airlock into the stopper, the stopper pushed through the lid and fell into the bucket!!

I quickly sanitized my hand and arm, and went fishing. I found the stopper and put it back in the lid and made sure the airlock went in right this time. Did I infect my beer by putting my arm into it? I'm so bummed...was so careful about everything right up until the end! Any thoughts?

Happens to almost everyone once. Don't worry about it.

If it ever happens again, just leave it there rather than fishing for it. It won't hurt anything.

Good luck!

But is my beer ruined?

You're fine.

Beer is hardy.

Don't give it another thought.

RDWHAHB, if you sanitized your arm and the stopper, you're probably fine.

I guess I didn't specify in my earlier post... No, don't worry about it, it'll be just fine.

Whew. Glad to hear it! I hope I made something decent for my first batch.

What did you brew?

wow, you sanitized your arm? most of us just dive right in when that happens!

you'll be fine! post back with how good the brew tastes!

It's a nut brown ale recipe from keystone homebrew in Bethlehem, PA. I hope I wasn't too ambitious doing partial grain for my first recipe.

You're beer is fine. I remember my first rookie mistake. I used iodophor in my brew kettle to sanitize it. For some reason I didn't realize that boil would have done that....

First time I took a hydro reading I forgot to rinse the bleach solution out of the bulb of my turkey baster. About 2oz of that stuff went right into my beer. I freaked out but decided to let it ride....turned out to be pretty good stuff.

I sure hope everybody is right. I'd be so disappointed if I had to dump my whole first batch. One other question....the OG of this recipe is supposed to be 1.052 and I measured 1.042. Does that seem very far off?

I usually recommend a quick fermenting and young drinkable wheat beer for a first brew because you will drink it early. We all do on the first batch.

If you are still worried about you brew you can send it to me for sampling when its ready. I will thoroughly test it to make sure it is alright. Sorry to say for such testing there typically isn't much brew left.

Hm. Is human sweat fermentable? :cross: