Tips for my first brew session please...

Well...one month to the day and I decided to poke about. The brew had calmed down recently and over the past few days the kreusen had dropped significantly.
Heres two pix...one from the 25th which looked similar just the other day and one picture from tonight:








Gravity clocked in about 1.020.
Thats a bit high lol and I guess it is do to the mistakes I made.

The upside is I chilled my sample and its drinkable beer!









So..any thoughts?
...do I wait it out and take a few more readings though its been a month now? Do I rouse the yeast or such? Do I just call it a beer and move on?
TIA!

you can surley try...what was your starting gravity?

I should have consolidated that info...oooops....



OG target was 1.058
FG target was 1.012


Actual OG: 1.054
Current Grav after 1 month: 1.020

Maybe I missed it, but what is the ambient temperature it is sitting at?

Rhoobarb said:

Maybe I missed it, but what is the ambient temperature it is sitting at?

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Right now its been averaging 66/67 for the past couple weeks.

you could rouse a little bit of the yeast and move it to a slightly warmer area to encourge the yeast to start back up

just remember not to get air bubbles in the semifermented beer due to oxidation issues giving it an off flavor. take the gravity in a few days and if its still the same then your beer is probably done. did you aerate your wort very well before you pitched the yeast?

Yes...aerated well.
Made some noob mistakes like pitching too cold and topping off with straight tap etc.

If I go to rouse the yeast, should I actually mush about in the bottom stirring the trub?
Of course being careful not to oxidize etc.....

If it matters, I plan on using this batch as my first kegging experiment. So, I guess no matter I won't have to worry about bottle bombs lol.....

if the flavors good and your just looking for added alcohol you could consider adding more fermentables back in. Theres should still be plenty of sugar in there though. If it tastes good you could just leave it be. Some beers are 3.5-4% and some are as higher than 12%...it all depends on taste. i would bring it up a lkittle bit in temp by moving it to a warmer area. yuo used a hefe yeast which by nature doesnt drop out of suspension well. there is still yeast in there and opefully the temp causes fermentation to restart without rousing yeast from the bottom

scinerd3000 said:

just remember not to get air bubbles in the semifermented beer due to oxidation issues giving it an off flavor. take the gravity in a few days and if its still the same then your beer is probably done. did you aerate your wort very well before you pitched the yeast?

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This shouldn't be a problem since all the "air" in the fermenter is relatively pure CO2. As long as you swirl it around pretty good, hopefully it will continue to drop but I'm in about the same spot right now. You might likely have to do what I'm about to do if my F.G. hasn't been reached and that is to chuck in some more yeast. But I'm using dry so if this is a liquid yeast for your Hefe, you might have to get some more.

hef yeast doesnt flocculate well so there should still be plenty in suspension.

Yeah...its pretty cloudy still. Don't know if my pic of the test tube did justice.
Only recently did the action in there really start to die down. The kreusen dropped just a few days ago after 3 weeks of being pretty thick up there lol.
While I guess in a better situation there would be about another 1%ABV for the yeast to make, the sample I took last night tasted decent slightly chilled. I'm betting it would taste even better cold and carbed lol.

I guess I'm wondering if it is worthwhile to fuss since it has already been 1 month in the primary. I don't want to put any more money into this batch (like buying more liquid yeast) etc. as I can use that towards my next one (learning from mistakes this time should prove to make a better beer next time).

The pros seem like I could make the beer better by rousing.
The con is that theres more a chance for this noob to make a mistake when doing so lol.

I like the idea of maybe trying to warm it up just a tad but keep it within its range is the best bet to see if the yeasties will eat a bit more.
However, at what point is it "too long" to be sitting in there for this beer?

Thanks again everyone!
I hope that not only I gleen info from this thread but other noobs can find the help in here useful as well.

its probably done....dont fret. theres always the next batch. if its still cloudy then theres still alot of yeast in solution. dont bother repitching. also you can look into yeast washing to save money on your next hef batch.

My only concern if you decide to be done with it is if it continues to ferment slowly in the bottles. If you stored these for a couple months it is possible the remaining yeast would slowly ferment and cause gushers or at worst bottle bombs.

But if you're kegging that is not an issue at all. I say warm it up a little bit, and let it sit a week or so. Then, keg it and drink it!

Yes, I do plan on kegging this.
I wrapped the carboy in a blanket last night and will let it set till the end of the week.
Then I will keg.
This will be my first dive into kegging so it should be fun.
When I received the cornies in yesterday, I felt like a kid on christmas morning lol.
I'll report back my thoughts on how it turned out...

Thanks again everyone.
I really appreciate all your help and thoughts and I hope others can get some info out of this thread too.
I'll be moving on to an oatmeal stout kit I ordered from AHS during the sale.
Probably start that after I free my only 6gal carboy from this wheat.
Woooohoooo!

Shaggy said:

Yes, I do plan on kegging this.
I wrapped the carboy in a blanket last night and will let it set till the end of the week.

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Are you planning on increasing the temp in the room? Wrapping a carboy that is not actively fermenting won't help to increase the beer temp since the yeast are basically dormant. You'd need to:

1. turn the heat up in the room the carboy is in


2. move the carboy into a warmer room


3. use a blanket heater/etc. to actively warm the carboy

Otherwise nothing's going to happen.

7Enigma said:

Are you planning on increasing the temp in the room? Wrapping a carboy that is not actively fermenting won't help to increase the beer temp since the yeast are basically dormant. You'd need to:

1. turn the heat up in the room the carboy is in


2. move the carboy into a warmer room


3. use a blanket heater/etc. to actively warm the carboy

Otherwise nothing's going to happen.

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I think I've done good...turned thermostat to 67 and I've moved it nearer to my heat vent.
I figure since the carboy sits on milk crates, the warm air will go in and be kept in by the blanket.

So like you I had mentioned my current batch (AHS Double Chocolate Stout Clone of Young's) pretty much stopped about 0.01 too high (1.125 and it should finish up closer to 1.115). I had tried swirling the carboy but it didn't appear to do much. So I had 2 packets of Munton's Dry yeast (not the Gold variety so I don't plan on using it for brewing) and pitched one of the packets. Boiled some water, let it cool, added the yeast for 15min, and then wisked it up into a froth, then pitched. Hopefully it's doing something, though the airlock does not appear to be doing anything.

Well, took a sample today and it remained the same so I had my first kegging experience which went pretty well I guess.
In a week or so I'm hoping I've a decent brew.

FWIW...

Been in the keg for 6 days now so I figured I'd have a taste.
I poured out just a bit and dumped figuring there would be some sediment and then I poured 1/2 pitcher and from there into a pint glass.
I'm pretty happy with its turnout though it seems a bit "sweet" since its fermentation stalled. In this wheat you can taste the lemon alongside some banana...the carbonation is righteous...a bit thin in the mouth, but I likey.

The first beer we made was done in a class at our LHBS and bottled. It was pretty half ass (the procedure we did there and the resulting bottled IPA) and we are happy to have made a "better" beer than what we made in that class for the first time on our own.

We certainly made mistakes on this one, but we learned a lot along the way.
The next beer soon to be brewed (AHS Oatmeal Stout) should be even better as we improve processes and knowledge.
Thanks again all!!

Shaggy said:

FWIW...

Been in the keg for 6 days now so I figured I'd have a taste.
I poured out just a bit and dumped figuring there would be some sediment and then I poured 1/2 pitcher and from there into a pint glass.
I'm pretty happy with its turnout though it seems a bit "sweet" since its fermentation stalled. In this wheat you can taste the lemon alongside some banana...the carbonation is righteous...a bit thin in the mouth, but I likey.

The first beer we made was done in a class at our LHBS and bottled. It was pretty half ass (the procedure we did there and the resulting bottled IPA) and we are happy to have made a "better" beer than what we made in that class for the first time on our own.

We certainly made mistakes on this one, but we learned a lot along the way.
The next beer soon to be brewed (AHS Oatmeal Stout) should be even better as we improve processes and knowledge.
Thanks again all!!

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Glad to hear its drinkable! :O) Give it another week or 3 and I bet some of the green-ness will disappear. It did for my first brew.

And I'll be brewing the AHS Oatmeal Stout in the next week. I just transferred over my AHS Double Chocolate Stout to secondary and so the primary is free for the Oatmeal. Hope it goes smoothly for both of us.

Thanks!
I'll have to post a pic of it in a glass...waiting for my SO to get here so she can try some while we BBQ.

On aging...I thought I read with wheats you want em "young"? I guess a few weeks don't make them old though. This batch was started on 4/19.

Yeah...I gotta get equip to make a starter (this will be my first attempt at starters) for that Oatmeal Stout....as well as some flashing for the turkey fryer. So, I'm hoping to have it all set to brew next weekend.
Cheers!


~edit~

Shaggy said:

On aging...I thought I read with wheats you want em "young"? I guess a few weeks don't make them old though. This batch was started on 4/19.

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I keep forgetting you did a wheat. I don't think they need to age much if at all. I'm already hung up on your next brew which I hear really benefits from a couple months in the bottle.

Beer looks great!

7Enigma said:

I keep forgetting you did a wheat. I don't think they need to age much if at all. I'm already hung up on your next brew which I hear really benefits from a couple months in the bottle.

Beer looks great!

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Thanks!
After working some in the heat today...I can't wait to get home, not worry, relax, and have my homebrew!



I'm waiting on material from AHS now. I ordered their yeast starter kit and am going to use that for the stout. I will age that for sure...once out the primary I'll probably bulk age in a carboy for a month or two and then keg it.