Pitched yeast at 61 degrees...

I brewed a batch of oatmeal stout today, with an ingredient kit from LHBS. I got a Wyeast Smack Pak (Irish Ale 1084), and activated it about 4 hours before I anticipated pitching. Well, once again, I overshot my target temperature on the wort. I rapidly got the concentrate down to 70 degrees (in under 20 minutes, this time). But, unfortunately, the water I had in the fridge was a lot colder than I anticipated. I put two gallons in the primary, and added the wort concentrate, and the temp was 53 degrees!

So, I topped off the wort to 5.25 gallons with some pretty warm water, to get the temperature close to acceptable pitching temp. It pushed it up to about 58-59 degrees. I aerated the wort like crazy, all the while hoping the temperature would rise a bit. After about 1/2 hour of doing this, I was at about 60-61 degrees. At this point, I started getting concerned about the batch being exposed to the outside air for too long, and it appeared to me that the Wyeast pack was about to burst, so I decided just to pitch, and hope that once the wort got to about 65 degrees or so, that fermentation would commence.

Am I going to be alright by doing this? I don't think the wort was too cold to shock the yeast, not by a long shot. I just hope that there isn't some adverse affect to pitching at too low of a temp that I'm unaware of.

My magic eight ball says things look favorable.

Interesting, I had the exact same problem...

It may take an extra 24 hours to get going, but it will be fine. 53F would have been rough on the yeast. Wyeast says 1084 ferments well in the 62-72F range.

Its preferable to pitching too warm.

Too warm, too cool, all subjective...


Life finds a way. You'll still make good beer, but will want to work on your technique for consistency.


Thanks!