After a year off, I decided to get back in the game. Still learning and probably over ambitious, but it's fun. First stout and first time double pitching on a Milk Chocolate Holiday Stout. After 9 days in the primary, it's still pretty far off of the FG, but I don't know if that's good bad or just impatient!
The recipe says OG = 1.071, and it was probably a little high at 1.073
Took my first reading today after 9 days and I get a 1.029 at 66 degrees. FG is supposed to be 1.019.
I double pitched with two room temp vials of WLP013. Here are all the "flashback" moments I'm thinking about:
1. when steeping the grains it boiled for about 1 - 2 minutes before we caught it, due to poor temp probe placement (it was in the 6lbs of grain) and poor monitoring (nice Sunday NFL afternoon), otherwise the grains steeped for an hour. Hour long boil was uneventful.
2. pitching temps were less than precise. New wort chiller worked awesome and I think it was close to 80 - 82, but concerned I might have been too hasty in pulling the chiller at about 85. Poured the wort into the fermenter with a couple of gallons of room temperature distilled water, stirred like crazy to aerate the wort (but did I aerate enough?). When I took the OG reading, the wort in the glass was 77 degrees.
3. The airlock was screwed up the first 24 hours due to not enough liquid in the airlock. Airlock was on and it was definitely fermenting, but not bubbling until I put more vodka in the airlock (it's the cap type). Not real vigorous bubbling, just steady.
4. temps. It got cold here in Texas and ambient temps around 68 - 70 degrees, which is pretty good. It was still occasionally bubbling after 7 days (at about 1 per 90 seconds). The last two days I was out of town and the bucket got down to 66. No bubbling tonight, so I took the reading.
The good news: it tastes pretty good, there is definitely a holiday stout in there, just maybe a "light stout" at this point.
My questions: if I get the temp up to 70, would it help the fermentation? Do I need to help the fermentation at this point, or just wait it out another week? Any chance I damaged the yeast by pitching at too high a temp? It will go straight to the corny keg and age for 4 weeks or so, so I'm hoping for a nice Christmas stout.
thanks for any advice!
The recipe says OG = 1.071, and it was probably a little high at 1.073
Took my first reading today after 9 days and I get a 1.029 at 66 degrees. FG is supposed to be 1.019.
I double pitched with two room temp vials of WLP013. Here are all the "flashback" moments I'm thinking about:
1. when steeping the grains it boiled for about 1 - 2 minutes before we caught it, due to poor temp probe placement (it was in the 6lbs of grain) and poor monitoring (nice Sunday NFL afternoon), otherwise the grains steeped for an hour. Hour long boil was uneventful.
2. pitching temps were less than precise. New wort chiller worked awesome and I think it was close to 80 - 82, but concerned I might have been too hasty in pulling the chiller at about 85. Poured the wort into the fermenter with a couple of gallons of room temperature distilled water, stirred like crazy to aerate the wort (but did I aerate enough?). When I took the OG reading, the wort in the glass was 77 degrees.
3. The airlock was screwed up the first 24 hours due to not enough liquid in the airlock. Airlock was on and it was definitely fermenting, but not bubbling until I put more vodka in the airlock (it's the cap type). Not real vigorous bubbling, just steady.
4. temps. It got cold here in Texas and ambient temps around 68 - 70 degrees, which is pretty good. It was still occasionally bubbling after 7 days (at about 1 per 90 seconds). The last two days I was out of town and the bucket got down to 66. No bubbling tonight, so I took the reading.
The good news: it tastes pretty good, there is definitely a holiday stout in there, just maybe a "light stout" at this point.
My questions: if I get the temp up to 70, would it help the fermentation? Do I need to help the fermentation at this point, or just wait it out another week? Any chance I damaged the yeast by pitching at too high a temp? It will go straight to the corny keg and age for 4 weeks or so, so I'm hoping for a nice Christmas stout.
thanks for any advice!