Short 1-1.5 gallons on recipe -- chalk one to experience.

I brewed my second extract recipe. I calculated the exact amount of extract need to make 5 gallons. I ended up short 1-1.5 gallons. Its going to be a small batch (may be a little bitter.)

Here is are the two dominate reasons.
1) Lost of wart to trub -- I did not want to pour that awful green mess into the fermenter (would you have?) I did not calculate for this.

2) I tossed out the trub filled wort when it was still high gravity, i.e., before the addition of pre-boiled water. I should have added the water then let the trub settle. then poured off.

Lesson to you people who are even newer than me.

You have a few options. You can pour everything into the fermenter; it all just settles to the bottom and turns into a firm layer on the bottom anyway. When you bottle you just leave it behind when transferring to the bottling bucket.

You could also pour the wort through a strainer when moving it from the brew pot to the fermenter, this would cut back on the amount of trub.

Some people create whirlpools and leave behind the trub that way.

Also, you can add clean water at the end to get your volume up to 5 gallons; this is what most people do when brewing extract or partial boils.

Whirlpooling in conjunction with a strainer works wonders! You can check it out here!