Brewed 2 year old extract

[josephjp216]

About 2 years ago I bought a sell us Belgian wheat extract kit and yeast. I forgot about it and finally got around to brewing it. All ingredients were in sealed bags. Yeast expired a couple months ago.
The brew went good. I didn't prime the yeast. I added a pinch of yeast nutrient. Gravity was 1.050 like the instructions indicated.
After 24 hours in 55 deg garage the airlock was bubbling good. Then I moved it inside to 66 deg. After 48 hours the bubbling slowed down. After 72 hours, not much activity. I tested gravity to 1.016. The kit said the final abv is 4.5%
I racked to a secondary but no action after 4 hours. I decided to bottle. I added a cup of corn sugar and about 5oz of agave. Gravity was 1.024.
Since fermentation went so fast I checked the bottle after 24 hours. Plenty of carbonation. I put in dishwasher to kill of the yeast.
5 days after starting my brew I'm enjoying a couple bottles.

 

[Gar]

yeast are some amazing critters i made a cream ale pitched a pack us-05 on it put it in the basement looked at it about 24 hours later it was down to 52 deg and slowly went down to lower 40s and has been fermenting for almost a month very slowly. i hope it does not cause some bad off flavors. hows yours tasting? thats the fastest ive ever heard of it being done

 

[josephjp216]

Tastes good. The hops were quite bitter, the extra sugars helped mellow them.
No funny after taste like the apple cider I made had.

 

[dwhite60]

If this was five gallons and you added a cup of corn sugar plus 5 oz. of Agave and bottled it, I think you've made some grenades. You need to be VERY careful with those bottles. Just a cup of corn sugar in five gallons is a lot of sugar.

The only ways to stop the yeast from fermenting all the sugar you put in there is to refrigerate it very cold, pasteurize it, or stabilize it with potassium sorbate in which case it won't carbonate.

I've had bottles explode. It isn't pretty. If they are stored without dividers between the bottles one going means other surrounding bottles could go at the same time.


All the Best,
D. White

 

[unionrdr]

The only time I got bottle grenades, it must've happened when no one was in the man cave on the comp? I went to pull some bottles outta the box, & the bottom half inch or so came off, & the box was wet. Lost a few bottles on that batch. Good thing no one was in the room anyway. So be careful with those bottles! i have to agree a cup of dextrose & a cup of agave is going to be a bit much. I wonder, can you taste the agave? I like the Occulto, secondaried with tequila barrel staves. A Belgian with a bit of that flavor sounds interesting.

 

[kh54s10]

I can't imagine that you can brew a batch and bottle it in just 5 days?!?! 20-30 days is more normal. As said above, handle those bottles very carefully. They are most likely going to be at least over carbonated and quite likely some will explode. It normally takes at minimum one full week to carbonate bottles, usually 2 weeks and often 3 weeks or more.

Also, if you rack to secondary at the proper time you will not see any activity. A secondary is more accurately called a bright tank. It is just for letting sediment settle.

 

[douglasbarbin]

So you started at 1.050 and your "final gravity" was 1.024?

 

[Calder]

The guy pasteurized the bottles "Since fermentation went so fast I checked the bottle after 24 hours. Plenty of carbonation. I put in dishwasher to kill of the yeast."

 

[josephjp216]

I pasturised it in the dishwasher with the sanitize cycle after being bottled for 24 hours. A couple bottles are now in the fridge and a couple bottles are in a box in the garage. I'm using the 1liter ez top bottles.
Gravity went from 1.050 to 1.016 before sugar to 1.024 after sugar.
The instructions said it included "1 cup of corn sugar but most brewers will use 3/4 cup" 5gal batch.
Agave doesn't have much of a distinctive taste. It tastes sweet, like simple sugar.
I'll update if there is any bottle bombs.

 

[douglasbarbin]

Just curious, where did you get the idea to do this? And my god, that beer must be cloying!

 

[dwhite60]

Just curious, where did you get the idea to do this? And my god, that beer must be cloying!

Even using 210F water I doubt one trip through the dishwasher was enough to kill off all the yeast. Dishwasher will do a surface sanitize but penetrating through a bottle of liquid takes time and the temp must be held for some period. Even in a pressure cooker where you can get the heat into the 220F range you still have a period to let the jars/bottles "soak".

All the Best,
D. White

 

[douglasbarbin]

Even using 210F water I doubt one trip through the dishwasher was enough to kill off all the yeast. Dishwasher will do a surface sanitize but penetrating through a bottle of liquid takes time and the temp must be held for some period. Even in a pressure cooker where you can get the heat into the 220F range you still have a period to let the jars/bottles "soak".

All the Best,
D. White

I wasn't suggesting that I thought it would work or it was a good idea. Quite the opposite, actually.

 

[ericbw]

Curious if there have been bombs, OP?

 

[josephjp216]

Curious if there have been bombs, OP?

No bombs, I believe the dishwasher did the trick to pasteurize.