Check OG before or after adding extra water

[Kalaloch]

Ok I think I know The answer to this but I thought I’d check.

I am brewing 5 gallons hard ginger beer and a lot of sediment goes to the bottom (a couple inches worth), then I rack it after 30 days but I found that I lose way too much liquid that is stuck in the lees.

So I add 5 gallons of water, the ginger, sugar and took OG and got 1.076. But then I added another 1 Gallon of water to make up for when I lose when I rack it the first time. So this makes it 6 gallons total. Should I have taken the OG after I added the extra gallon of water ?

 

[IslandLizard]

You lose a whole gallon to your trub/lees? That sounds like a real lot.

Most brewers will scale their recipes to brew 5.5 gallon batches, counting on .5 gallon fermenter loss. That way 5 gallons gets kegged or bottled.

If you brewed 5 gallons of 1.076 ginger beer, by adding a gallon of water you diluted it by 1/6, so you have 6 gallons of 1.063 now. Is that what you had planned?

 

[Kalaloch]

@IslandLizard that’s great thank you! I went ahead and added 1 more pound of sugar to off set the extra water.

Much Appreciated!

 

[IslandLizard]

You may be able to strain some or most trub out through a large, very fine mesh nylon (hop) bag before you pitch yeast. If you filter after fermentation is over, yeast will not be filtered out. And be careful not to oxidize your ginger beer after fermentation has started.