1 week into fermentation my primary dropped to almost freezing temps

So I brewed my second beer a double IPA on Feb 21. Everything was going good and I kept a steady temperature of about 65 degrees for the first week. On the 28th of Feb my wife and I went on vacation for a week. When we got home (6 March) our house was freezing. The power had gone out and we don't know for how long. Only that it turned on about 7 hours before we got home. The outside temp had been in mid 20s for the week and our temp was off for atleast a day to be so cold.

My primary bucket was very cold and was not reading any temp on the liquid crystal thermomter. It is now back into the mid 60's which took about 2 days. I don't have anyway to control the temp of the beer except to control the ambient temperature of the room.

I had planned on keeping it in the primary bucket for 3 weeks and then adding dry hops for another week (I don't have a secondary).

Any suggestions on what I should do?



**I tried searching this topic before asking but I couldn't find anything. I think its that I don't know the words to use to search this subject.

Check the SG, and see where you're at. It could be that it was already fermented out, and you've inadvertently done the cold crash and it's perfectly fine!

Did you take a gravity reading? There is a good chance that primary fermentation was complete. However, the cold temps certainly dropped the yeast out and they didn't have an opportunity to clean up after themselves, but I certainly wouldn't be too worried.

Given that the yeast has dropped out of solution, all that is really going on in there is further clearing. If you hit terminal gravity, I would think about dry hopping now because you are no longer getting the benefit of those extra 2 weeks at 65. Warming it back up may have stirred up some yeast activity, but nothing like what would have been the case if you didn't cold crash them out.

So my initial FG was 1.07, I'm at work right now so i can't check the FG at this moment. To be perfectly honest opening it up and checking the FG makes me nervous. I had to dump my first batch because it smelled (and tasted) like rotten eggs. It was a traumatic experience. I know I have to check so I'll nut up and do it. If its acceptable FG I'll dry hop and bottle in week, if not... I'll ask some more questions.

My FG was 1.018 so I went ahead and added the dry hops. When I put the hops into my primary I didn't use a muslin bag and they just sat on top of the beer. Will those hops become saturated and add flavor/smell?

By the way the beer is a beautiful rich gold and tastes delicious. All it needs is that hoppy marijuana smell and it will rock my world!!!! (Its been over a year since I've had an IPA and this is then entire reason I started homebrewing)