I put a brick in my brew

I got me some Coopers Australian Pale Ale beer concentrate and the "brew enhancer 2" which is the fermentable dextrose stuff. Funny thing is that the bag of dextrose was a solid block , like a brick of sugar. My supplier knocked 40% of the price but didn't bother asking me if I would mind a brick instead of powder.

So the question is this: will this brick affect my brew or does it not really matter? The yeasty boys are going at it hammer and tongs right now so they ain't complaining.

Also, since I'm already firing away ...

When I took a gravity reading (1040 at 22d) the wort was very thin / watery , I like strong beers with a bit of grunt in them so I was wonderin if there is anything I can do between now and bottling to boost up the alcohol content without blowing up bottles?

What if I chuck in some brown sugar dissolved in hot water with some more yeast after initial fermentation has completed?

Brick of Sugar: I understand the product that you describe (sugar will solidify if it gets wet and isn't stored properly) but I'm not clear about your process. Did you do anything to break the brick up before you put it into solution? Is there a solid brick of sugar just hanging out in your fermenter?

If you broke the brick up, either during the boil or with a hammer or what have you, then you're fine.

If there's just a solid brick of sugar, then you have a problem. Over time, the yeast and liquids will dissolve the brick, but it may take longer than you want. In the meantime, the yeast will only consume the sugar that's on the surface of the brick, so you'll get dramatically lower attentuation than you want. Worse still, the process of bottling will agitate the wort, pulling additional unfermented sugars into solution and risking bottle bombs. If you DO have a brick of sugar, I would sanitize a metal rod, stick it into the fermenter, and break up the brick.

Watery beer: No, adding brown sugar will not help boost the mouthfeel of your beer. On the contrary, the brown sugar will be (basically) completely fermented, which will be like adding pure alcohol to your final product; because alcohol has a lower density than water, you'll actually be thinning out your beer.

Instead, consider adding maltodextrine, which is unfermentable. That will thicken your beer without changing the flavor (much.) Or, add lactose, which will thicken and sweeten the beer.

Neither addition, however, is particularly appropriate for the style. Instead, my suggestion is that you let the fermentation finish, and then carbonate. Carbonation adds a lot of mouthfeel that you don't get from the wort, and will probably get you closer to the style you're used to.

Gravity: If I understand your post, your gravity is 1.040 after more than three weeks of fermenting? That's. . . too high for a Pale Ale that's been fermenting for twenty-two days. It's actually pretty close to what your starting gravity should be. What was your starting gravity? Did you remember to add yeast?

Regardless, my suggestion is that you consider rehydrating some dry yeast, and add it to your fermenter. At a minimum, I would rouse the fermenter by carefully rocking it from side to side - this will get some of the yeast back into solution and chewing through sugars again.

I am pretty much agreeing with Pericles. Thin/Watery is not from alack of alcohol. How many batches have you done? I ask as I am curious as to your experience with tasting wort. It takes a while to learn what the beer is going to taste like after carbonation and conditioning. "Grunt" comes from big malts with left over sugars, not high alcohol.

Did I read correctly that you are only at 1.040 SG after 22 days? Though it does sound like the yeast is still going active with the whole "hammer and tongs" line.

So yes, please clarify a few points for us so we can answer you better.

It looks like my post was as clear as mud, sorry 'bout that.

AT first I threw the brick into the cooking pot thinking the hot water would dissolve it pretty quickly, I was wrong. So I went fishing and dumped her onto a cutting board and took to her with a bread knife/saw thing, boy she was hard as nails. Chopped her up into bread-like slices and threw her bits and pieces back into the pot, after about 10 minutes it had dissolved.

But I am wondering if I will have a poor result using such an old bag of dextrose?

The "22d" refers to 22 degrees Celsius. Sorry 'bout that .

Thanks for the reply, I'll see if I can find some maltodextrine to boost up the body and flavor.

Mr. Bean, I also got a brick of sugar (I ordered from makebeer.net) with a Coopers kit. When I complained, the rep was nice enough to send me another package of Brew Enhancer II free and a Coopers hat for my troubles.... It's hard enough to get sugars to dissolve without burning, I felt that the brick would be a real PITA. I agree with Pericles, try and rouse those yeasts awake, 1.04 is too high to be an FG.

The "22d" refers to 22 degrees Celsius. Sorry 'bout that .

Mr.Bean, if you use ALT 248 you'll get the degree symbol °. So, 1.04 isn't so high for an OG. What was it suppossed to be? The BEII might not be that old, it just might not have been sealed as good as it should have, or was a little moist when it was sealed. Also, if some of the sugar were still on the bottom of the pot and not mixed well, that could also account for the low OG. Pete

As long as the sugar completely dissolved in solution, you won't run into an issue. Sugar doesn't go bad.

If you mean that your STARTING gravity is 1.040, that's a little low for a pale ale, but definitely in the zone. Let us know how it turns out - it sounds like you're fine.

Hello again gentlemen!

It has settled right down now and reached gravity of 1011 (it has been 8 days in the tank so maybe time to bottle if I get 1011 again tomorrow?), when I did the gravity check I , of course, drank the small amount from the hydrometer , and it was really weak and watery.

I'm very disappointed and surprised because the other coopers I did (lager) was even better than this and does taste good and has full body.

I wonder if I have done something wrong and if there is anything I can do the fix it at this stage? Pericles, do you think I should use some maltodextrine and if so how do I go about adding and dissolving it?

Thanks guys (girls don't make beer, right?) !

At this point there is not much to be done. Adding anything risks oxidation, and adding anything fermentable will make it even lighter.

Bottle it as is, carbonation and conditioning will do a lot for body and flavor. My suggestion is for next brew to get away from the cooper's kit SMS get a real extract and steep kit. They tend to be better quality as far as materials and thus beer goes.

Don't mess with it, just bottle and condition it!

I'm with Yotie on this as well. It is difficult to know exactly what went into a product that has been processed and of course the more processed it is the more difficult it is to troubleshoot any issues.

I am not saying that makers of concentrates make poor quality products but as brewers, I think we should know exactly what goes into our wort and how it was processed (times, temps, gravity, etc).

I know we all cannot do all-grain where you know exactly what went in and how it was processed but steeping grains and using extract can eliminate some of the "unknown" aspects and help troubleshoot any issues!

Just my two cents!

mrbean said:

(girls don't make beer, right?) !

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Don't let Yooper (or many of the other female brewers around here) see this!! I love a girl who loves good beer (drinking or making).

Alright there, mate.

Good to see another Osaka Gaijin on board

Dunno if you've already known about and used some of the links, or not, from this url but it's pretty handy.

I've used brewland a couple of times. Based up near Nagoya and they're really prompt about shipping your stuff.

Anyway, cheers and have fun

Cheers, Ogri! I shall use that one too. I wonder if we have already met , it's a small gaijin world in Osaka.

I just took a gravity reading again, and this is a bit funny, that gravity jumped up 2 points from 1010 to 1013 ... WTF? What the heck have I done to my booze? I want more alcohol not less! I wonder if I buggered it up leaving the tank out in the open without a T-shirt. No direct sunlight but it has been exposed to every other kind of light. I have been reading that beer and vampires have something in common...

Gravity never goes up. The only way that could happen would be if more particulate matter was dissolved into solution.

Nevertheless, a lot of people have experienced the phenomenon you have described, and there are a couple of explanations for it. The first is temperature: if the temperature of your wort has gone down - which should happen after fermentation has ended - then your gravity reading will go up. You should take a thermometer and check the temperature of your wort, and then adjust using a correction calculator or table. Many are available online, just do a google search.

Unfortunately, checking the temperature NOW won't tell you what the temperature was when you took your previous, lower, reading. That means that you can't confirm that your actual gravity has been consistent. It's a good idea to check temperature every time you pull a gravity sample, otherwise you end up in this predicament. As things stand, you'll just have to go by rule of thumb: if there's no activity in the airlock and it's been about ten days or two weeks, then it's time to package.

Another possibility is that your wort's temperature has gone UP, and CO2 that was dissolved in solution is beginning to off-gas. The pressure of the CO2 forcing its way out of solution could push your hydrometer up, giving you an artificially high gravity reading. You can control for this by leaving your sample out overnight to completely degas but, again, you have no way of knowing how the CO2 affected previous samples, and therefore can't really compare.

The bottom line, for me, is this: if your gravity has started going up, then any fermentation that is still going on is so minescule that it's being completely overshadowed by temperature swings and CO2 offgassing. That's close enough to done to be ready to package and drink.

The light issue is just sunlight, and only if your container is clear. Certain parts of the hops will start an unpleasant chemical reaction when exposed to sunlight; that's what causes the "skunky" off-flavors in beer.

Holy Cow, Pericle, you really know your stuff!

Well, the previous check was 1011 at 22 degrees, and this one is at 1013 at 20 degrees, that might explain it then, thanks.

I have been watching the wort very closely and I can still see the odd tiny little bubble floating up the surface. It has been in the tank for 10 days and tomorrow is my day off so I reckon I'm gunna bottle her up and hope for the best.

I have a choice of 4 different types of sugar for the bottling , dark brown natural sugar, ordinary brown table sugar, ordinary white sugar, and sugar pellets similar to those provided by Coopers . ANy tips on what mightr be best? Im leaning towards the dark brown boiled sugar. Cheers.

Thanks, Dr. Martin. My tank is now wearing a Beer Singha T-SHirt , and it will do so forever after. I wouldn't mind making a Beer Singha at home...

The sugar that you add will be completely fermented and, if it's pure sugar, will not contribute any flavor to your beer, just carbonation and a VERY small amount of alcohol.

If you add something that is not pure simple sugars, (like brown sugar) you will be adding some flavor compounds. But, like the alcohol boost, the flavor addition will be negligible because of the small amount you are adding. My rule of thumb is to use whatever sugar is cheapest.

Also: a hydrometer reading of 1.011 at 22°C is a corrected gravity of 1.010. A hydrometer reading of 1.013 at 20°C is a corrected gravity of 1.012.

The change is still in the wrong direction, so the issue seems not to be with temperature; given that you've mentioned seeing bubbles, I believe it is probably caused by offgassing of CO2. Additionally and alternatively, the change is so small that it's probably a significant figures issue as much as anything else.

If it were off gassing there would be farts in the air lock, right? There are none. I'mm going to bottle it now before I lose any more gravity. Thanks for the help, I'll let you know the result in a week, then two weeks, then ...

There's no guarantee that offgassing would result in visible airlock activity; if it's slow enough, it might not have enough force to break through the liquid in the airlock. Nevertheless, I agree that it's time to package. Good luck!

Thanks for you help, but I have yet another problem now: For most of my bottles I used sugar ice crystals. They look like pieces of rock candy, I saw them at the supermarket and thought they would be perfect for bottling as they vary in size and so I can use the correct amount depending on the bottle size. The problem is there is no obvious carbonation happening as the PET bottles that I used with the Ice Crystal Sugar Drops have not hardened at all whilst the other PETS I used with dark brown regular sugar have hardened up nicely. The crystals have completely dissolved but it took a few hours for that to happen. I wonder if I will need to pop them all open and spoon feed them some regular sugar?

How long has the beer been in the bottle

I don't know what an "Ice Crystal Sugar Drop" is. Could you give us a link to a description of the product?

The reason I ask is that, although all sugar is going to be just about equal in terms of potential for carbonation, not every product that looks like sugar is, in fact, sugar. If your "Ice Crystal Sugar Drops" are made out of lactose, for instance - which is a sugar - then the yeast won't be able to consume it, and it won't aid in carbonation. Alternatively, if it's made out of aspertame or truvia or some other sugar substitute, then it also cannot be consumed by yeast, and won't aid in carbonation.

The three other factors that affect natural carbonation are yeast health, time in the bottle, and temperature. You claim that other bottles have carbed up nicely, so yeast health is probably not an issue. How long has the beer been in the bottle, and at what temperature?

I am not trying to sound insulting, but have you read up much info regarding bottling? Putting a chunk of sugar in each bottle individually is not a very good way to go about this, VERY inconsistent and hard to measure.

Also, it has only been a couple days since you bottled, yes? That is way too little time to know if anything is carbing up.

Read up on bottling and priming sugar. It is cheap to buy corn sugar and you can even use cane sugar.

Tall_Yotie said:

I am not trying to sound insulting, but have you read up much info regarding bottling? Putting a chunk of sugar in each bottle individually is not a very good way to go about this, VERY inconsistent and hard to measure.Also, it has only been a couple days since you bottled, yes? That is way too little time to know if anything is carbing up.Read up on bottling and priming sugar. It is cheap to buy corn sugar and you can even use cane sugar.

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Yes, I have read a little on bottling on forums, the conclusion I came to was that the type of priming sugar is of rather low importance as almost any kind of fermentable sugar will do the trick. I also read that the exact amount isn't a big deal (and it also depends on the type) and that near enough is good enough (5 to 7 grams per litre) but too much will make bottles explode, so I wasn't overly concerned with the type of or exact amount of sugar. I was careful to approximate using my last Coopers Carbonation Drop as the yardstick to measure against. I would say I was within 10%, but as you said it's a bit too inconsistent.

I don't mean to be ungrateful but isn't this forum for beginners? Is my question so absurd that it doesn't even belong here? I have searched for this specific problem using the search function but couldn't find anything.

As I said before some of my bottles hardened up very quickly (on the same day) so I wouldn't agree that too little time has passed to make a judgement. But I will wait a few more days before a reopen them and spoon feed them some regular brown granulated sugar (but I really hope I don't need to because then I'll probably end up with too much in total and blow the house up). It has been 3 days now and they are still soft whilst the others have become even harder.



Pericles, I checked that it was made from cane sugar and often used for making plumb sour liquor, but other than that there are no details unless I call up the maker and ask them (???????? ????).

I apologize if I came off as harsh or judgmental. Thus the "not trying to sound insulting", as tone is difficult to portray online. I was merely asking, as other than using the tablets specifically meant to carb a single bottle I have read many times other members warning others against attempting to individually carbonate bottles rather than just racking onto the measured amount of sugar. Never said the question did not deserve to be here. I just didn't want my reply to just be links to other threads with similar issues.

There is no harm waiting to see if they carb up on their own and just take longer, it isn't going to hurt the beer. I always think it is best to wait and see for a day or two, and then make adjustments. As long as you can measure the sugar accurately then you are probably good to go.

I also would highly suggest always using the same type of sugar, be it brown, white cane, or corn, so you know how much you need every time. Consistency is key in my opinion.

I apologize if I came off as harsh or judgmental. Thus the "not trying to sound insulting", as tone is difficult to portray online.

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Yes, I know what you mean, no worries!

Thanks for the advice, I will be sure to just do the priming in the primary (don't have a secondary) next time, no headaches at all, in fact I did it that way last time and it was simple and effective (if not slightly on the low side of carbonation). But I have heard that the chances of spoiling your brew are greater if you add the priming sugar straight into the primary due to exposing the wort and stirring it around introducing oxygen.

So I think I'll call it a failed experiment at this stage. Hey guys, don't bother using rock sugar unless it's Coopers Carb. Drops.

So I just cracked one open to test , well it does have some carbonation but not really enough , and it tasted rather sweet , so I'll leave it a few more days and test another small bottle, the other bottles are as hard as diamonds (where have i heard that before???).

Hey guys, here's an update: The bottles in which I used sugar drops have finally carbed up decently enough, it took quite a while but hey the longer the better in the brewing world, right? I probably won't be using them again, except for morning coffee. I guess they are formulated for slow sugar release, slow dissolving, specifically for making plumb liquor.

As for the beer itself , at first I thought I had made very thin weak beer, but now that bottle conditioning has finished it doesn't seem too bad afterall, yes it is kind of watery but the mouth-feel is very nice, the carbonation is perfect, very drinkable , light crispy with just a little bitterness. I don't think I'll make it again but I will drink them all over the holidays. Cheers, happy holidays, drink up!

mrbean said:

Hey guys, here's an update: The bottles in which I used sugar drops have finally carbed up decently enough, it took quite a while but hey the longer the better in the brewing world, right? I probably won't be using them again, except for morning coffee. I guess they are formulated for slow sugar release, slow dissolving, specifically for making plumb liquor.

As for the beer itself , at first I thought I had made very thin weak beer, but now that bottle conditioning has finished it doesn't seem too bad afterall, yes it is kind of watery but the mouth-feel is very nice, the carbonation is perfect, very drinkable , light crispy with just a little bitterness. I don't think I'll make it again but I will drink them all over the holidays. Cheers, happy holidays, drink up!

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That's great to hear!!!!!!

(From a girl who makes beer).

So girls do make beer! Will you marry me?

mrbean said:

So girls do make beer! Will you marry me?

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My husband won't let me.

BUT I'm not the only girl around here, that's for sure! Since our "names" and avatars (if we have one) aren't "girlish", you'd be surprised to find out how many women brewers there are around here. One of the great things about this forum is that we're all brewers, and the talk all centers around brewing for the most part. Gender doesn't really matter much in the brewing world!

Yooper said:

Gender doesn't really matter much in the brewing world!

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+1

Men or Women, we all know our way around the kitchen.