Can you add water to the brew after fermentation but before racking?

[gundock]

Hi,

Started my first full mash brew the other day. A Dark Star festival recipee. I have ended up 5 ltrs short with my wort around 18 ltrs. The recipe was for 23 litres so I purchased 25 ltrs of the local mineral I always use. I didn't think about the fact that I would lose water in the sparge grain retaining water, the boil process or the hop residue left after. Basically I was roughly 5 ltrs down but continued with fermentation any way. Currently a couple of days into secondary fermentation stage.

My question is: Can I add 5 ltrs of heavily boiled water to the keg for racking to mix with the rest of the fermented wort? Otherwise surely I will end up with a very strong tasting and alcoholic brew.

 

[dnslater]

I don't see why it would be a problem. Just make sure it is cooled and sterile.

 

[Clonefan94]

How was your OG reading? I would only add water if that was higher than expected. Without knowing that, you might just be diluting the beer, as opposed to bringing it up to where you want it.