5 extra minutes of boil time -- big mishap...

[mjrinkenbaugh]

So I had quite an interesting brew day the other day. It's one of those days where everything just isn't going to plan. I got a late start, had issues with my grain mill, then my drill battery for running the grain mill died, then my pump was locked up and wouldn't pump, then I realized I was too low on propane to finish out the brew day. Ugh!! Once I worked past all of these issues, I finally began brewing the IPA I'd planned. By the time the boil was wrapping up, I must have been fed up with the way the day was going, because I forgot to put my immersion wort chiller in before the boil ended in order to sanitize it. I even put 6oz of hops in at flameout right before I realized the chiller wasn't sanitized yet. I was going for lots of late hops. I put the chiller in and I turned the flame back on for 5 minutes to sanitize the wort chiller before actually running the water through the chiller. Afterwards, I added 5 minutes worth of boiling all the hops to my recipe and according to BeerSmith, I basically doubled my IBUs. In theory, this beer will be around 160 IBU's because of my little mishap. Anyone else ever made this mistake and ruined a batch over forgetting to insert the chiller on schedule? Ugh.

 

[Lamrocks]

You should be fine, I'm not familiar with BeerSmith but late hop additions shouldn't add much IBU's. I could be wrong but the bulk of your IBU's are generated in the early hop additions.

 

[mjrinkenbaugh]

You should be fine, I'm not familiar with BeerSmith but late hop additions shouldn't add much IBU's. I could be wrong but the bulk of your IBU's are generated in the early hop additions.

Well, I had 15 minute, 5 minute and flame-out additions that were essentially changed to 20, 10, and 5 minute additions when I sanitized the chiller. Just the 6 oz that was added at 5 minutes theoretically added 55 IBUs because they were SUPPOSED to be flame-out hops, adding no IBUs at all. So the "late" hope additions were not so late.

 

[kh54s10]

I doubt it really made your IBUs that much higher. If the boil was just over when you put the IC in, I would not have worried about bringing it back to a boil. If I did I would have brought it just to a boil then cut it off. You don't really need boiling temperatures. What the cut off is, I am not certain. I would expect 140+ would have been enough. A
spritz with starsan would have worked also.

55 doubled is only 110, not 160. I would say that your 5 minute increased to 10 did little and the flameout even less, even though you did boil for another 5 minutes.

It is also said that you cannot detect any IBU differences once you pass 100.
I bet it will be fine. Besides a lot of IPAs shoot for the 100 range anyway.
RDWHAHB

 

[bleme]

I think you will be fine but in the future, I wouldn't turn the flame back on. You don't have to heat the chiller all the way through, just kill whatever is on the surface, and that happens instantly over 180F.

 

[mjrinkenbaugh]

I doubt it really made your IBUs that much higher. If the boil was just over when you put the IC in, I would not have worried about bringing it back to a boil. If I did I would have brought it just to a boil then cut it off. You don't really need boiling temperatures. What the cut off is, I am not certain. I would expect 140+ would have been enough. A
spritz with starsan would have worked also.

55 doubled is only 110, not 160. I would say that your 5 minute increased to 10 did little and the flameout even less, even though you did boil for another 5 minutes.

It is also said that you cannot detect any IBU differences once you pass 100.
I bet it will be fine. Besides a lot of IPAs shoot for the 100 range anyway.
RDWHAHB

Hindsight, I wondered why I didn't spritz with starsan instead, but it is what it is. For the record, the 55 IBUs was what BeerSmith calculated was the increased IBU's just from the final (6 oz) "flameout" hop addition. The bittering hops added at the beginning, plus the hops to be added at 15 and 5 minutes originally totaled around 80 IBUs, so when you increase those hop additions by 5 minutes each, and then add 5 minutes of boiltime to the 6oz of "flameout" hops, I got I total of 163 IBUs. I'll try it as soon as I can. I think I've heard too that you can't tell the difference on anything over 100 IBUs anyway, I guess I'll get to judge that for myself.

 

[JordanKnudson]

Hindsight, I wondered why I didn't spritz with starsan instead, but it is what it is. For the record, the 55 IBUs was what BeerSmith calculated was the increased IBU's just from the final (6 oz) "flameout" hop addition. The bittering hops added at the beginning, plus the hops to be added at 15 and 5 minutes originally totaled around 80 IBUs, so when you increase those hop additions by 5 minutes each, and then add 5 minutes of boiltime to the 6oz of "flameout" hops, I got I total of 163 IBUs. I'll try it as soon as I can. I think I've heard too that you can't tell the difference on anything over 100 IBUs anyway, I guess I'll get to judge that for myself.

My bet is that you won't see much difference compared to what it would have been had all gone to plan. Yeah, maybe a little more iso-alpha acid, but it was already a bitter beer, so the difference will likely be negligible, despite what the software estimates (see the Experimental Brewing podcast episode with the Glenn Tinseth interview to get an idea of how much faith you should have in that number). Maybe a little more of the hop aromatics were driven off, but it was already a highly hopped beer, so there's plenty of wiggle room. Overall, I seriously doubt this little mishap will have much, if any, meaningful impact on your beer.

All that said, if it ever happens again, even if you have turned off your flame, your wort is still up above 200 degrees. You could still set your chiller in the kettle and let it sit (not boiling) for a few minutes, which would essentially just be a hopstand anyway.

 

[lstewart89]

I doubt it really made your IBUs that much higher. If the boil was just over when you put the IC in, I would not have worried about bringing it back to a boil. If I did I would have brought it just to a boil then cut it off. You don't really need boiling temperatures. What the cut off is, I am not certain. I would expect 140+ would have been enough. A
spritz with starsan would have worked also.

Yeah, sanitation within boiling wort is near instantaneous, and will happen even at below boiling temperatures (though not instantaneous). I wouldn't have worried about it.

To OP: what was your brewing software predicting for the IBU contribution of those flameout hops?

 

[mjrinkenbaugh]

My bet is that you won't see much difference compared to what it would have been had all gone to plan. Yeah, maybe a little more iso-alpha acid, but it was already a bitter beer, so the difference will likely be negligible, despite what the software estimates (see the Experimental Brewing podcast episode with the Glenn Tinseth interview to get an idea of how much faith you should have in that number). Maybe a little more of the hop aromatics were driven off, but it was already a highly hopped beer, so there's plenty of wiggle room. Overall, I seriously doubt this little mishap will have much, if any, meaningful impact on your beer.

All that said, if it ever happens again, even if you have turned off your flame, your wort is still up above 200 degrees. You could still set your chiller in the kettle and let it sit (not boiling) for a few minutes, which would essentially just be a hopstand anyway.

Very interesting podcast! I had almost questioned if I'd really added that many IBU's with just 5 extra minutes of boiltime or if there were variables that might make that number come out wrong. Without getting a definitive answer, this podcast mostly answered that question for me. I'm looking forward to trying this beer again when it's kegged up and ready to drink! Thanks for the feedback!

 

[flars]

Sanitizing regulations for restaurants is at least 171°F for one minute.