Did I ruin this beer?

[Ferde357]

This is my 3rd batch so I am new to brewing and my attempt is to brew a nut brown ale. I first baked 1 lb grains for 10 mins at 350 then put them in water and steeped for 30 minutes while water came to boil, then discarded the grains. Next I added 3.3 lbs LME, 2.5 lbs DME, and hops. Boiled for 60 mins.

After cooling I combined the wort with water to exactly 5 gallons in my fermentation bucket and took a hydrometer reading which was 1.032. 2 days later nothing was happening in the airlock so I popped the lid and could see fermentation was indeed happening.

But I became concerned my beer would be too weak after looking at a beer gravity chart I calculated it may only be 3% abv. I found an article online that indicated 1 lb of DME to 5 gallons of beer would increase the abv aprox .5%. Soooo, I boiled 3 lbs DME in about 1/2 gallon of water and added that to my fermentation bucket with yeast nutrients. By the end of the day the airlock was showing vigorous fermentation activity. By the next morning activity in the airlock had subsided altogether.

I need some advise because I am really concerned about this batch of beer.

1) Was I correct that original gravity on a brown ale of 1.032 would have only produced a beer with about 3% abv?
2) Was I correct that adding 3 lbs DME would increase the alchohol content by approximately 1.5%
3) Will my final beer likely be between 4.5 and 5.5% abv?
4) Did I do anything that will ruin or adversely affect the beer?

Thanks in advance.

 

[flars]

This is my 3rd batch so I am new to brewing and my attempt is to brew a nut brown ale. I first baked 1 lb grains for 10 mins at 350 then put them in water and steeped for 30 minutes while water came to boil, then discarded the grains. Next I added 3.3 lbs LME, 2.5 lbs DME, and hops. Boiled for 60 mins.

After cooling I combined the wort with water to exactly 5 gallons in my fermentation bucket and took a hydrometer reading which was 1.032. 2 days later nothing was happening in the airlock so I popped the lid and could see fermentation was indeed happening.

But I became concerned my beer would be too weak after looking at a beer gravity chart I calculated it may only be 3% abv. I found an article online that indicated 1 lb of DME to 5 gallons of beer would increase the abv aprox .5%. Soooo, I boiled 3 lbs DME in about 1/2 gallon of water and added that to my fermentation bucket with yeast nutrients. By the end of the day the airlock was showing vigorous fermentation activity. By the next morning activity in the airlock had subsided altogether.

I need some advise because I am really concerned about this batch of beer.

1) Was I correct that original gravity on a brown ale of 1.032 would have only produced a beer with about 3% abv?
Your OG was about 1.047. The low reading was most likely due to poor wort mix with top off water.

2) Was I correct that adding 3 lbs DME would increase the alchohol content by approximately 1.5%
Adding 3 pounds of DME bumped the OG to 1.074.

3) Will my final beer likely be between 4.5 and 5.5% abv?
Your beer may end at 7%, if you pitched sufficient yeast for the bumped up OG, and you give the beer a long primary time.

4) Did I do anything that will ruin or adversely affect the beer?
The IBU, malt, and ABV may be unbalanced.

Thanks in advance.

A few good calculators in the Brewers Friend site.
http://www.brewersfriend.com/extract-ogfg/

 

[dude3516]

As far as ruining a beer goes, I've found that some perceived ****-ups on my end have still produced excellent beer. Plus, as a kindly old gentleman at my LHBS told me once:

"Humans have made beer for thousands of years, and I suspect that at the end of the day, you will have too."

 

[jbob7171]

I'll take a stab at answering, but other, more experienced people should chime in as well.

1. 1.032 does seem rather low. After you added the top off water to the wort, did you mix it well? If not, it is very possible you got a sample that was not representative of the entire wort. Based on the LME and DME alone, you should have been closer to 1.045. If you added all the extract as you state and the correct amount of water, I'm guessing your hydro reading was incorrect and you probably were closer to 1.045.

2. Adding 3 lbs DME would increase the OG by ~25 points. If the 1.032 was correct, that would take you to 1.057 (~5.7% abv). But, if 1.032 was wrong and you were actually at 1.045, you're now looking at ~7.2% abv.

3. Really depends on item number 1. But if you followed your directions, I would guess you'd be closer to 7%.

4. Doesn't sound like. Beer should be fine.

 

[wildactbrewer]

I agree with all of the above. Also, you shouldn't use your airlock as a means of determining fermentation activity. If you are using a bucket, they are notorious for leaking air. This isn't a bad thing...just a characteristic of buckets.

The only way to know that you have reached your final gravity is with a hydrometer reading, but with the gravity being where it probably is I would wait a week or two. I don't think it's ruined by any means, but it may not be exactly what you were looking for. My best guess is that it will be on the sweet/strong side.

 

[metanoia]

Besides the answers above, I'm interested in learning more about the grains you mentioned. What kind of grain did you use, and why did you bake it? I've only ever roasted malts to bring out a darker color and fuller flavor in a SMaSH (single malt and single hop) beer, but cooking a 2-4 L grain for only 10 minutes at 350 will yield something less than 10 L. Check out this article if you want more info on roasting grains, but there's not much reason for doing so with most brews.

As for how to use your grains, you should not be boiling them. You need to put them in a grain bag then place them in 160 degree water, with the heat off, and let it steep for 30 minutes. This will get your grains into the 148-152 degree range, which is the best temperature for extracting the right sugars and other components from the malt. If you go above this range, you risk extracting tannins and other undesired byproducts.

 

[Ferde357]

I'm pretty sure I took the initial reading after topping off with water so it was probably diluted to begin with as many guessed. It does appear the brew will have an ABV of 7% or slightly higher. Using the link to calculate ABV I see if I increased my batch size to 6 gallons then my ABV would be around 6 % which is more what I am looking for. Would it be OK to just add more water to a secondary fermenter then transfer to the secondary so I end up with 6 gallons at 6%?

Some more details on the grains -
I heated my oven to 350 degrees then I took a 1 lb of Dingemans cara 45 grain malt and spread it out over a cookie sheet and baked it for 10 minutes. Man did that smell good! I then put these grains in my brew kettle full of cold water. I then slowly heated up the kettle over a period of 30 minutes to boiling. Once the boiling started I then removed the grains. I saw a similar technique in another recipe in a homebrew book I have and decided to use it because I thought it would impart the nutty flavor I was looking for.

 

[jbob7171]

I'm pretty sure I took the initial reading after topping off with water so it was probably diluted to begin with as many guessed.

You are correct to take the reading after topping off with water, but be sure to mix it really well before taking the sample (maybe you do and it was just an anomaly). If you don't mix well, it's easy to grab a sample that is mostly water.

Would it be OK to just add more water to a secondary fermenter then transfer to the secondary so I end up with 6 gallons at 6%?

That's a great question that I would like to know as well. If you did, definitely boil it first. It will also affect color and maybe IBU's (?). Looking forward to hearing others thoughts on this.

 

[SpankyMcBee]

Forgive me, but did you happen to cool this additional wort you made that you dumped into the beer that had begun to ferment?

 

[Ferde357]

Forgive me, but did you happen to cool this additional wort you made that you dumped into the beer that had begun to ferment?

Yes I let it cool and after adding to the existing beer the fermentation picked up substantially.

 

[chisena]

How's the beer doing?

 

[Ferde357]

How's the beer doing?

Beer is doing well. I moved it to secondary fermentor a week ago and dry hopped with 2 oz Liberty hops. The beer looks and smells excellent. I'm going to leave the beer as it is and not mess with it anymore. Will update to close the thread once I have the finish product.

 

[BlueHouseBrewhaus]

If you plan to do more roasting of your own grains in the future, there is a lot of good information on this site. In general, you need to roast at very specific temps for specific times to get different effects. I believe 10 minutes is probably too short a time to have much effect. I also see that most people let the newly roasted grain "rest" for a few days before brewing with it. I haven't done this myself but check around and you'll find some really knowledgeable people here.

 

[Ferde357]

After downloading beersmith2 and putting in the boil volume and late addition the malt extract I am within the parameters for an IPA in all areas. Not what I intended but I am not disappointed now.

 

[Ferde357]

The toasted malt (1 lb caramel 45 baked @350/10min) was in the background as the beer has a big malt flavor. The hops compliment it well also. Not what I was going for but definitely not ruined. It's good! Hops used were:

-60 min 1oz Centennial
-30 min 1oz UK Kent Goldings
-15 min 1oz US Goldings
-7 days 2 oz Liberty dry hop

So what do I have here? It reminds me of a Scottish Ale.

 

[ArkotRamathorn]

The toasted malt (1 lb caramel 45 baked @350/10min) was in the background as the beer has a big malt flavor. The hops compliment it well also. Not what I was going for but definitely not ruined. It's good! Hops used were:

-60 min 1oz Centennial
-30 min 1oz UK Kent Goldings
-15 min 1oz US Goldings
-7 days 2 oz Liberty dry hop

So what do I have here? It reminds me of a Scottish Ale.

What you have is probably a strong American brown ale, or a weak English barley wine. It's tough to really force something into a certain style. Too hoppy and maybe a tad too dark for a Belgian dubbel (and without the Belgian yeast not gonna fit) too weak to reach barleywine levels. Probably too much hop character to fit into a scotch ale category.

Seriously though it's not a big deal what it "is". If you are serving it to family members that aren't beer nerds just tell them whatever you want, say it's a dark elephant beer and they will probably be like "we're so proud of our son/daughter". If you are serving beer nerds, just say it's "whatever beer style, but it's a stronger version, more hoppy, more malty, drier than the BJCP style guidelines" and tell them to be happy with the free beer.

Could fit into something like an ESB but it might not be hoppy enough.

 

[Ferde357]

Although looks like a lot of hops the overall hops effect is very subtle. I find it very similar in style to Founders Dirty Bastard, which is labeled a Scottish Ale.

 

[Psylocide]

Don't try to force it into a style now, I called my "experiment" an APA, when it is almost certainly an English-style IPA with American Hops.

Whatever man, it's beer. Drink it and enjoy.