Dry Irish Stout OG

I just boiled my second batch tonight, a Dry Irish Stout. The kit suggested OG was 1.042, and I've seen it as high as 1.056 on other recipes. I followed all of the directions and had a pretty mistake-free (relatively, of course, to my first batch) brew session. At the end I took a SG reading from the carboy before I locked it up and it read 1.024...

Pretty low...

Any thoughts on why? And is it a cause for concern? My only though is that the wort was poured in first, and then filled to 5 gallons... perhaps the wort hasn't completely mixed through the carboy yet - I did shake it up well to aerate, but the bottom is still warmer (from the wort) than the top is (from the tap water).

Kaerous said:

perhaps the wort hasn't completely mixed through the carboy yet

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bingo. as long as you added the right amount of extract and right amount of water, it is pretty much impossible to mess up an Extract recipe

Alright, I'll sleep easy tonight now. Thanks!

This brewing business is stressful on my nerves!

Yep. Just did the same thing with an APA. My OG was low and I realized that I didn't mix the water in well enough.
It's in the bottle now (for about a week and a half) so we'll see what happens.

And just for the record: I'm completely relaxed about it