How to save a 70 IBU 3% ABV stout?

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foodplusbeer

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So in short, I messed up big time. Tried to make a parti-gyle from an oatmeal RIS. I added cocoa powder, and reused my late hop addition from the RIS (4oz of K. Goldings boiled for 15 min) in addition to .5oz of Magnums (all boiled for 60 min in the parti-gyle).

Yea I know, stupid - but, I meant to only re-use 2 oz. To make matter worse, the OG turned out to be 1.03. So now I have a low gravity, high IBU chocolate oatmeal stout. How can I save it? It's already fermenting...

Would adding more sugars help? How can I add highly concentrated sugars? Is there any hope?
 
lots of corn sugar....why didn't you check your OG of the parti-gyle prior to dumping in your hops. do you have a refractometer. if not, that might be a good investment if you keep doing PG's
 
blizzard said:
Instead of adding that much table sugar, you could add DME or LME. It won't hurt it to add it during fermentation.
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+1. If you added even a pound of simple sugar you would be pretty close to the 20-30% mark where your beer has a greater chance of tasting like bunghole.
 
Thanks for the replies! Can I just add the DME to the fermentor or do I have to boil it down first? How much do you think is necessary?
 
+1 on the dme. Just add it to a little bit of boiling water and dump it in once it cools.
 
You did just create a new beer though, I will call it a session BPA, black ipa. Fun. You can definitely add more DME but that 70IBU will be harsh anyway. Might as well add the DME now though.
 
asterix404 said:
You did just create a new beer though, I will call it a session BPA, black ipa. Fun. You can definitely add more DME but that 70IBU will be harsh anyway. Might as well add the DME now though.
Click to expand...

Actually, I would surprised if it was at 70 IBU. Since most of the hops were reused from a late hop addition, there probably weren't many IBUs left. My understanding (correct me if I'm wrong) is that you can re-use dryhopping hops for bittering because the AAs are still in there. But, in a boil or whirlpool addition you are pulling out the AAs, even if you aren't isomerizing them. So, I think the bitterness is mostly from 0.5 oz magnum addition.

How did it taste?
 
It tasted REALLY bitter. From the hop charts I saw it looked like about 50 % of the alpha acids are used in the first 15 mins. I calc'd 70 IBU by using that concept.

I like the idea of another 6% 0 IBU stout and blending. But I'd have to wait a week for supplies. Also I fear I'll just end up with 12 gallons of crappy beer instead!
 
mcaple1 said:
Ok...well here is to all the naysayers. Obviously the utilization of AA's are higher in the front end of their use than in the tail end. From the data I collected, roughly 70% of the hops will be utilized in the first 30 minutes compared to what will be used if the same amount were boiled for 120 minutes. With that said, IT IS NOT NEGLIGIBLE. If you are using homebrew technology, and can't get below isomerization temps within a reasonable time, then hops will be giving off a decent amount of AA's. My only caveat to that is if you are only using a small amount of whirlpool hops. However, if you are intentionally trying to get 10% or more of your IBU's from whirlpool hops, like Stone or Firestone, then clearly it is something that cannot be debated....hops will will isomerized at whirlpool temps, and not only that, a large amount of potential AA"s will come out....not a "small amount". The reason why we boil hops for 60 minutes, as you can see from the graph, is that you hit a point at 60 minutes where the efforts to boil any longer are kind of pointless. Not only that, but at 60 minutes, most of the aroma/flavor compounds are driven off, which depending on the hop, might be undesireable. Remember everyone, hops aren't just for bittering. But if you are using them just for bittering, then yes, 60 minutes makes sense.


View attachment 37043
Click to expand...

Here you go
 
foodplusbeer said:
It tasted REALLY bitter. From the hop charts I saw it looked like about 50 % of the alpha acids are used in the first 15 mins. I calc'd 70 IBU by using that concept.

I like the idea of another 6% 0 IBU stout and blending. But I'd have to wait a week for supplies. Also I fear I'll just end up with 12 gallons of crappy beer instead!
Click to expand...

Blending is an old idea. There was a time when brewers had no idea of aa%. Back then if they had higher bitterness than normal they had to blend to get it to where they wanted. They would also blend in a small part of the bad batches just to get rid of them. But as a home brewer it's probably best to just add 3lbs or so of dark DME.
 
I ended up adding 3 lbs of light dme. The beer came out great! The color is a little light to call a stout though. Thanks for all of the help!
 

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