Blending too bitter IPA with unhopped wort in secondary fermenter

[Alex413]

Hello everyone! Recently I brewed my first IPA with chinese Nugget, and I had a sip of that yesterday after gravity reading and it's bitterness is way too harsh. It's been fermenting for 11 days already including 5 days of secondary. People say here that bitterness mellows with aging, but I want to try to bottle one third of the batch now and pour the same amount of diluted DME (6l +650g DME) back into fermenter. Do you think it will start fermenting again and if it's not a stupid idea at all?

Batch size: 17l, OG: 1.060, FG 1.016, Boil time: 60min, est. IBU: 57.1
Yeast: Safale S-05
Hops: Nugget (9.8 aa)
15g FWH
15g @15min
20g @10min
40g @5min
40g @0min
50g @ 5 days dry hop

 

[RM-MN]

Yes it will ferment the additional diluted DME and no it isn't a stupid idea.

In the future, you do not need to use a secondary for dry hopping or clarifying your beer. It will do the same thing in primary and avoid the possibility of infection or oxidation that come with transferring to secondary. Instead, use your secondary (carboy, I hope) to make wine, cider, or mead which do not need the space above the liquid for a krausen that beer brewing produces.

 

[Alex413]

Yes it will ferment the additional diluted DME and no it isn't a stupid idea.

In the future, you do not need to use a secondary for dry hopping or clarifying your beer. It will do the same thing in primary and avoid the possibility of infection or oxidation that come with transferring to secondary. Instead, use your secondary (carboy, I hope) to make wine, cider, or mead which do not need the space above the liquid for a krausen that beer brewing produces.

Thanks, I'll try that and show the results

 

[CascadesBrewer]

If you are a new brewer, I would advise to not mess with your beer. Bitterness will mellow, but carbonation will significantly increase hop flavor and aroma. Even if this beer is off, I would move forward with the lesson learned. The end result here will likely be just more volume of mediocre beer.