What's the likelihood that I infected my brew?

Obviously the best answer is, "wait and see", but I wanted to get some idea of the severity of my idiocy first.

Brewed AHB's Holiday Special yesterday, and after it rested in the settling bucket for an hour, I went to transfer to the fermenter. Well, two things made this a pain (I was tranferring via spiggot/hose from the settling bucket). First, my grain bag burned through, allowing a handful of grain bits and chunks into the open. Second, the kit has spices, including a bunch of cloves. Anyway, these grains and cloves kept jamming the spiggot and hose, so I thought of a turkey baster to "plunge" it, but jammig it int he end of the hose and squeezing. Now, I did dunk the tip in the disinfectant mix (which my airlock was resting in) for 30 seconds or so, but crap was dripping everywhere and I was tired, so it didn't sit for the 5+ minutes it should have. In addition, I didn't FILL the baster completely, just more the tip area. Sooo, with me squeezing and plunging, it unclogged it perfectly, but I realized I'm an idiot for sucking up some wort and squeezing it back out in the process of unclogging, into this non fully sanitized baster. Now, the thing hasn't been used for cooking in MANY MANY months, and has been sitting tucked in the kitchen drawer. Still, I guess it could hav had a germ or two on it. Who knows. I hope I'm not screwed. I'll be fired up if that infected it.

I made a beer once that clogged when I was draining it into the carboy. Within five mins five people had their hands in my wort unclogging it and it turned out to be good beer. I wouldn't worry about it but if this happens to you again and you want to be sure just pour it back into the pot and reboil it for 5 mnis. RDWHAHB!!!!

It's way harder than you think to infect your beer. The yeast tend to outcompete all of the other bugs you've introduced.

Yeast love the shuga the way a fat kid loves cake.

blacklab said:

It's way harder than you think to infect your beer. The yeast tend to outcompete all of the other bugs you've introduced.

Yeast love the shuga the way a fat kid loves cake.

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Mmmmmmmm cakes! :cross:

ezatnova said:

...Sooo, with me squeezing and plunging, it unclogged it perfectly, but I realized I'm an idiot for sucking up some wort and squeezing it back out in the process of unclogging, into this non fully sanitized baster. Now, the thing hasn't been used for cooking in MANY MANY months, and has been sitting tucked in the kitchen drawer. Still, I guess it could hav had a germ or two on it. Who knows. I hope I'm not screwed. I'll be fired up if that infected it.

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Worst case your batch will have a shelf life of a year instead of two at room temp. All beer is infected to some degree. Sanitation is an exercise in reducing the % of bugs and wild yeast so the beer won't spoil as quickly in storage. Bugs work on wort much more slowly than yeast, and yeast work quickly so they strip away most of the nutrients available to the bugs. So unless you commit a really horrible sin like forgetting to sanitize your fermenter at all , your beer will be fine, and even then you might have a nice lambic after a year or two.

you increased the risk of infection a little.

more than likely its gonna turn out just fine. you have to do a lot worse things to guarantee an infection.