Everything has gone wrong!!!

[coffeebreath]

Hey folks, this is my third beer... and I think I'm doing a test to see how many things you can do wrong before you ruin a beer!

Brew day went great. (I'm trying to make a Belgian Golden Strong Ale)

1 pound DME (CBW Pilsen)
2 pounds LME (CBW Pilsen)
2 pounds corn sugar
2 ounces bittering hops
Whirlflock tablet
Wyeast 3522XL

My OG was 1.080... got plenty of air in the wort before pitching the yeast, beer cooled quickly, everything seemed great.

Mistake 1
Then, I was concerned that the airlock would clog, so I went with a blow-off tube. (Note: I don't have a blow-off tube... so I'm an idiot.) Instead, I used my siphon equipment instead. The blow-off (?) end was going into a bucket of StarSan, and it all looked fine. The next morning, the krausen had forced the plastic stopper off of my glass carboy... krausen all over the place. (I'm guessing the 1/4 inch siphon tube wasn't big enough to use as a blow-off tube.)

Mistake 2
Cleaned that up, forgot to sanitize the cork, and put everything back together. I then let it sit for two days before I realized that I should have sanitized the cork. (Doh!)

Mistake 3
I also learned that I'm supposed to keep the beer out of the light. I'm fermenting in a glass carboy for the first time, I've used a plastic bucked for the other batches... so I wrapped the beer in a towel to keep the light out.

Mistake 5?
I'm not using a secondary... I know people are all over the map on this, but it's my first attempt at not using a secondary. Maybe this is a mistake, maybe not.

Mistake 4
Took another gravity reading at the end of the first week, and it was 1.015. (Pretty good!) Then... get this... UGH! I left the siphon down in the beer... when I came back from checking my gravity, I had accidentally siphoned 2 gallons of beer into my blow-off bucket. (Grrr... dumb.)

So now, I have a half-batch of (probably) contaminated beer that has been sitting on the yeast cake for two weeks. I took a gravity reading today and it's holding steady at 1.011 for the third day in a row.

Here are my questions:

1. What are the chances my beer is going to be completely ruined? I know, relax... we don't know... I'm just curious what people think.

2. Since this is a Belgian Golden Strong, should I stir the cake up a bit to let the yeast come back into the mix and give it another week, hoping to get the gravity to drop a bit more? Or should I not risk aerating the beer in addition to everything else that I have done wrong?

3. If I don't stir up the cake, should I bottle today since the gravity hasn't changed for the past three days? Or should I wait and let it go for the third week?

4. Should I pitch extra yeast at bottling time? If so, do I need to use thicker (Chimay, Ommegang, Dubel type) bottles? Or should I just use priming sugar like the recipe says and go with regular bottles?

5. I plan on letting this condition in the bottles for two months at the very least... am I nuts?

Sorry, it's a lot... but I've done a lot wrong here. Yay homebrew!!!

 

[pumpkinman2012]

Maybe, you should make a list of the steps in your brewing process, this way you can check items off as you complete them, at least until you get a few more brews under your belt.
Your starting gravity was 1.080, ending is 1.015, this gives you an ABV of 8.26%, that's a fairly decent ABV, the norm is between 8-11%, I wouldn't worry.
Maybe you are getting too worked up or nervous when brewing, this is supposed to be fun!
I use a secondary, but many don't no big deal.
The beer was exposed to light for a while, big deal, you have it covered, I use old t-shirts on all of my carboys.
You didn't sanitize the the stopper, although it isn't recommended, it isn't the end of the world, unless it was sitting in dirt and you put it back in, no need to panic.
I personally wouldn't let the beer sit on the yeast much longer.
I would rack to a bottling bucket, off the yeast, if you bottle from the fermenter with all of the yeast, it is inevitable, you will stir up the sediment and end up bottling some of it.
On big beers I use 2 vials of yeast, or a yeast starter.

 

[slarkin712]

So you used a siphon to get a gravity sample? This is not necessary, as there are much better/simpler ways to gather a sample. There is a tool called a wine thief. It is a long, hard plastic tube with a one way valve at the bottom. I use this when I ferment in carboys and buckets and it works great. You gather the sample, stick your hydrometer into the tube and read it. Another option is to use a turker baster or syringe type thing to draw the sample out. Then you need a tube of some sort to put your hydrometer into to get a reading.

 

[LLBeanJ]

Sounds like it's done. 1.011 with an extract brew from 1.080 is more than likely as far as it's going to go. You can bottle at any time, although there would be no harm in letting it sit on the yeast for another week or two.

Foregoing the secondary is not a mistake. The decision to secondary or not for most brews is a matter of personal preference. After nearly 50 batches, I can still count on one hand the number of them that went to secondary.

No need for more yeast. Maybe if it had been bulk conditioning in secondary for 3 months it would be necessary, but not after a few weeks of brewing.

I wouldn't be too concerned about your sanitation mistakes. Definitely try to do better next time, but at 8+% AVB, most nasties are going to find it difficult to get a foothold in that environment.

 

[coffeebreath]

So, it's been 21 days since I brewed the batch, and I bottled today. Because I wasn't sure how much I lost when I accidentally siphoned a bunch out, I primed by pouring 1 tsp of sugar water into each bottle instead of pouring a cup of sugar water into the carboy. (I only ended up using about a half-cup of the sugar water.) I drank the sample I used for my final gravity reading, and it actually tastes pretty amazing! I finished with a final gravity of 1.009 (at 74* F). According to different ABV calculators out there, it seems like my beer is about 9.5% ABV.

So, here's my next question: how long should I let this condition in the bottles? The recipe says three weeks, but I have heard people on the internet recommend up to three months for Belgian Golden Stong Ales. Any thoughts?

 

[g-star]

While we're at it, mistake #6 was not pitching nearly enough yeast. A 1.080 beer needs a big starter, one smack pack isn't going to cut it. While the beer managed to ferment out, the flavor profile will suffer from too low an initial cell count.

Chalk this one up to a learning experience, and read up on making starters. Proper pitch rates, fermentation temps, and O2 levels are the trifecta of turning drinkable homebrew into great beer.

 

[khawk95]

If bottle conditioning, I've always used 1 week conditioning for each percentage of strength. Therefore 9 weeks. You could try one at four weeks to see how it tastes. Up to you.

 

[Calder]

1 pound DME (CBW Pilsen)
2 pounds LME (CBW Pilsen)
2 pounds corn sugar
2 ounces bittering hops
Whirlflock tablet
Wyeast 3522XL

My OG was 1.080

There is a mistake in there somewhere because you can't make 5 gallons of 1.080 beer from those ingredients.

If that is really what you used, your OG would have been around 1.040.

If that is really what you used, 40% sugar is extremely high even for a Belgian Strong.

 

[sweetcell]

calder beat me to it.

maybe it was a 2 gallon batch?

40% sugar is indeed really high.

 

[Calder]

calder beat me to it.

maybe it was a 2 gallon batch?

40% sugar is indeed really high.

The OP said he accidentally siphoned 2 gallons into the blow-off bucket and was left with about half left. I took this to mean he started with 5 gallons.

 

[coffeebreath]

The OG was straight from my hydrometer, maybe I actually had two pounds of DME? Regardless, I only boiled three gallons of water, I added two more gallons of water after the boil for a total volume of five gallons. I took the gravity reading after adding the extra water... Does that sound like it might be right?

 

[TungstenBeer]

The OG was straight from my hydrometer, maybe I actually had two pounds of DME? Regardless, I only boiled three gallons of water, I added two more gallons of water after the boil for a total volume of five gallons. I took the gravity reading after adding the extra water... Does that sound like it might be right?

Hmm... No, that's still a bit light. Is it possible it was like 1 package of DME and 2 packages of LME, this giving you like 9 lbs of total extract?

 

[longhornbarrett]

Did you shake the carboy to mix the additional water with what you boiled before you took the sample
When I used to do partial boils once I forgot to and my OG was crazy high because the sample was pulling from the 3 gallons on the bottom of the carboy

Sent from my HTC One using Home Brew mobile app

 

[sweetcell]

The OG was straight from my hydrometer, maybe I actually had two pounds of DME?

even with 2 pounds of DME, i'm getting 1.049 (1.041 with only 1 lb). it's hard to mix the cold water addition completely, so i'm with those who think that you got an un-mixed thick sample.

Hmm... No, that's still a bit light. Is it possible it was like 1 package of DME and 2 packages of LME, this giving you like 9 lbs of total extract?

good theory. coincidentally enough, 2 lbs DME + 6.6 lbs LME (aka 2 tins) + 2 lbs sugar = 1.081, on the nose, for 5 gallons.

 

[coffeebreath]

It was two jars of LME and one big package of DME. And I poured the extra water at the same time as I cooled it. There was a bunch of stirring and whipping and shaking that went on while it was in the ice bath in an attempt to cool it down fast enough, so I'm pretty sure I mixed the extra water in just fine. The gravity reading was taken after the beer had cooled, right before I pitched the yeast. (I actually almost forgot to take the reading.)