airlock problem

I was just moving my Ale Pail and it slipped out of my hand. The lid didn't come off, but some of the water I had in the airlock slipped into the wort. It was distilled water that I used in the brewing process anyway, but could this ruin the beer?

Rdwhahb!

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try starsan if you have some. it is stellar in there!

No worries on a little water in your beer. Many things much worse have fallen into fermenters and those beers came out fine too.

Your beer is ruined. Please bottle it and mail me all the bottles so I can dispose of it properly.What kind was it???

AABassMaster said:

It was distilled water that I used in the brewing process anyway, but could this ruin the beer?

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Don't worry about it. For all the focus on sanitation, it's really much harder to ruin a beer than it seems. I've dropped a nasty piece of plastic into my bottling bucket when it was filled with beer. It sunk to the bottom and then instinctively stuck my hand in the beer to retrieve it. The piece of plastic went in filthy looking and came out clean. The beer turned out just fine.

People have been brewing beer successfully before they had any concept of sanitation. So just sit back, relax, and don't fret about it.

you could use a little vodka in the airlock.....

As stated before, it is pretty hard to ruin a beer. Next time just be more careful and remove the airlock any time you are transferring the wort.

Also seconded on the vodka in the airlock.

Vodka FTW or Star San.

I did something similar on my 1st batch - I was inspecting the airlock and pressed down on the lid of the pail and when I let go, the air returning to the pail sucked the water into the pail.

I switched to a diluted mixture of star san after that, but the batch turned out good!

I think it would be *possible* to introduce some contamination in that method, but unlikely. I would recommend using star san or vodka in the future, just to eliminate the concern.

+1 on vodka!

I'm switching the water to Vodka when I get home from work!