I cannot Relax, I am worried

[DirtyHaus]

After getting through most of Charlie P's Joy of Homebrewing and what my wife calls an obsession with reading forums on HBT I have not learned my lesson. I've been brewing for about 8 months now and still get some anxiety when things don't go as i think they should. The weird part is that aside from brewing, i'm very relaxed and tend to not worry enough about things.

I just started brewing Partial Mash and have 1 somewhat successful pale ale that i brewed since graduating from extract brewing. About 1 1\2 months ago I brewed a milk stout that had an OG of 1.060 and it's been stuck at 1.030 since i racked to secondary about a month ago. I'm worried about attenuation but wondering if maybe it's the 1lb of Lactose that is responsible for my high gravity reading as Lactose is not a fermentable sugar. I'm thinking about pitching more yeast but something tells me i need to chill out and leave it alone.

Then there's the IPA I brewed 9 days ago that I just racked to secondary today. It's not as bitter as i was hoping. It was supposed to be an Imperial IPA but due to a horrible boilover (pre hop addition) my OG wasn't high enough so i didn't add as many bittering hops as originally planned. I'm wondering if i could just boil some hops in water and add to the secondary to increase IBU's. Again, there's that voice in my head telling me to leave it alone.

I must say that i formulated both recipes myself based on other recipes i found online and some educated guesstimating based on previous experiences. I'd appreciate any feedback that anyone is willing to give.Cheers!

 

[Shooter]

First, you don't need to be racking everything to secondary, it's an unnecessary step for most beers. As to the milk stout, yeah, you do have to figure lactose into your figures. However, 1.030 does still seem slightly high. Does the IPA taste bad? I don't know that I would mess with it.

One bit of advice, this is going to be a bit of a torturous hobby if you worry too much about every little item that could possibly go wrong.

 

[phenphen]

i drink a couple before i start; i get the same thing when i do chemical synthesis. i'd drink before that too

 

[Zamial]

Brew Another Batch!​

 

[Shooter]

Brew Another Batch!​

...and forget that secondary!!!!!

 

[PoppinCaps]

I would also add to leave things alone if they will still make drinkable beer. It's how we all learn. Take rigorous notes on what happened every step of the way, and determine how that affected the taste.

 

[WortIfied]

I brewed an IIPA and when I tasted it at bottling I had the same concern, not enough hop kick/bitterness, I left well alone and after a month in bottles, whoa, it's my new best friend!

 

[Reno_eNVy]

+1 to losing the secondary. How long did you leave it in primary? It would probably be at your expected FG by now if you left it alone

 

[OHIOSTEVE]

I have been brewing for two years now and screw up all the time. You will learn to just roll with it. For example I racked my Kentucky bourbon barrel ale to secondary tonight and added the soaked oak.. I realized that my oak pieces were too big to fit through the neck of the carboy. I pulled out my pocket kinfe and dunked it in sanitizer...grabbed a hammer and did the same to it and used those to split the pieces in half. It will either be good or it won't. No amount of worry will change it.