Beginner, question about the sludge

DeGamma · Mar 30, 2018

I am new to brewing beer and three days ago I brewed a batch but misread the instructions. The recipe I am trying is a very hoppy beer and I had a lot of sludge. I thought the instructions wanted me to leave the sludge with the wort when I put it in the fermenter.
Should I strain out the beer and put it back or just take care of it later? Should I just toss the beer? It has been bubbling for the last 24 hours and is starting to slow down.
Thank you.

z-bob · Mar 30, 2018

Why would you toss it?

Be more specific about what you did. Is this an extract kit? Is the beer in a carboy or a bucket or what?

What kind of sludge? (hops and protein, probably) Generally you want to leave it alone for a week before you do anything. All the crud packs down, then you can siphon the beer off to another container to finish fermenting or for bottling. If you try to do anything while the sediment is still fluffy you will leave a lot of good beer behind.

DeGamma · Mar 30, 2018

The beer is in a carboy. It was an extract kit. I didn't strain off the sludge when I put it in the carboy, it's all in the carboy with the wort.
Thanks for the reply.

Biscuits · Mar 30, 2018

Regardless of method, you should be okay. There are many people who believe leaving it on the sludge will impart flavors, but I personally have never experienced these.

DownstairsBrewing · Mar 30, 2018

If the sludge is left over from making the wort from extract, it is a sign that the wort wasn't ready yet - may as well put it into fermentation, and be patient.

If the sludge is from the first stage of fermentation, it will settle to the bottom. Lots of people don't worry about it, just don't bottle it.

flars · Mar 30, 2018

DeGamma said:
I am new to brewing beer and three days ago I brewed a batch but misread the instructions. The recipe I am trying is a very hoppy beer and I had a lot of sludge. I thought the instructions wanted me to leave the sludge with the wort when I put it in the fermenter.
Should I strain out the beer and put it back or just take care of it later? Should I just toss the beer? It has been bubbling for the last 24 hours and is starting to slow down.
Thank you.

You can go either way with how you handle the hop debris and break material during the pour into the the fermentor. Some will leave some of the heavier material in the boil kettle and some will pour all of the contents of the boil kettle into the fermentor. You will lose some of your fermentable wort if you don't pour all the contents into the fermentor. Might only be a quart but it is wort that the yeast can turn into beer. In the end the hop debris and break material will form a compact layer called trub at the bottom of the fermentor. There will not be any adverse impact on the flavor of your finished beer pouring the entire contents of the boil kettle into the fermentor. You will just end up with a thicker trub layer with the same volume of beer above.

DeGamma · Mar 30, 2018

Thanks for the replies, guys. Much needed.

madscientist451 · Mar 30, 2018

If you are brewing a beer with a lot of hops or are using whole cone hops (not pellets) the amount of hop/kettle sludge could be 1/2 to 1 gallon! Sometimes I dump it all in the fermentor, sometimes I don't. Recently, I've been increasing my total water by 1/2 gallon and then NOT dumping in the last 1/2 gallon or so of hop sludge.