Question on my Fermentation

[BrewerBaj]

Hey all, I have been brewing about two years now. I had a decent patch of time recently where I haven't brewed but I had an extract kit still lying around and thought I would get a practice brew in to get up to speed for this winter. Anyways I brewed and everything went as planned. I had no problems but I ran out of time. I left the wort in the primary fermenter to continue to cool to pitching temp as I had to go to work for a few hours. I knew that this generally isn't a good idea but a few hours didn't seem like a big deal. I put the bucket in my keezer which was at 43 degrees or so. I got home late from work and pitched the dry yeast right on top. I usually don't do this either but I thought hey, why not try it out. I didn't really think it would make a big difference... Anyways long story short I didn't get any fermentation for an entire week. I know the wort wasn't too cold as it was right around pitching temp when I got home from work. I am not going off of air lock activity since I know that is no way to tell. I didn't see any activity or krausen forming. I was about to give up until sure enough this morning (over a week later) I had a lot of activity in the beer.

My question is... how bad is this going to turn out? Likely infected? Drinkable?

 

[kaisetti]

Have you taken a gravity reading? That's the only real way to tell if it's fermenting or not. As for infection, it depends on your cleaning and sanitizing process. If you cleaned and sanitized well, I doubt there will be an infection. I suggest taking a gravity reading to see if there's been any fermentation, assuming you took a SG reading. Oh, and RDWHAHB.

 

[Tall_Yotie]

As said above, take a gravity measurement to see if it has been fermenting. And there is a difference between fermentation and seeing airlock activity.

Infected/Drinkable; only you can tell. Smell the sample you pull off. Does it make you want to vomit? If no, then probably not infected. From what I gather nothing bad growing in beer can do real hard, so take a taste. If it tastes of vinegar or rotten grain then it is bad, otherwise let it ride.

But more often then not, you are going to be fine.

 

[ncbrewer]

I agree it depends a lot on sanitation, but I think luck is very much involved, too. IMO it would be better not to sample until time for FG - to minimize any more chance of contamination.

As a side note, Fermentis instructions call for pitching temp of at least 68F for dry pitching. You might have been cooler than that, although this rule seems to be broken a lot.

 

[BrewerBaj]

Thanks everyone. I'll take one tonight