Increasing gravity possibilities

[EricBrew]

So I brewed my first all-grain batch yesterday and my beer is now fermenting. The problem is, I forgot to add corn sugar to my boil, and my OG is only 1.04.

Is there any way for me to increase the gravity now?

I also noticed that a thick layer of foam has started at the top of my beer in the fermenter. Is this normal? Should it be skimmed off?

Thanks.

 

[bob1006]

What kind of beer did you make? What's the recipe? All the above info would help determine what the gravity should have been. Each style is different.

Yes foam is normal. Its called krausen.

You can increase the gravity. boil a cup of water add some corn sugar. Pop the cap on the fermenter and pour it in. put the lid back on, shake a little and your good.

 

[EricBrew]

I made an IPA, and I used 10 pounds of 2 row pale malt, and half a pound each of carapils and crystal 40. It was then hopped with Centennial and Chinook, and the yeast is WL California Ale 5.

If I'm not mistaken, I thought I saw elsewhere that it's not a good idea to shake the fermenter. I knew that corn sugar could be used as carbonation, but unsure if it could be added to the fermenter.

 

[bob1006]

I think you might want to look into your process with that gravity that you got its well below what it should be. At 75% efficiency, your starting gravity would have been 1.053 or so.

Shaking it won't hurt. People seem to think that it oxidizes it. if its already fermenting then the o2 has been purged.
Plus yeast need oxygen, that's why you oxygenate the wort for the yeast.

 

[bob1006]

I brewed a lite lager today. 6.5# German pils 1.5# of flaked corn. My SG was 1.044.

 

[EricBrew]

Thanks for the tips. It's my first batch of homebrew, so I'm sure that my efficiency isn't great. I steeped the grains around a temperature of 150 for an hour, and then batch sparged for another 15 minutes around the same temperature.

I ended up with about 3.5 gallons of wort. I think I didn't use enough water to steep, and I should probably use more grains next time.

 

[bob1006]

Yeah its cool. Next batch try this

Mash 3.5 gallons @150 for 60 min
Mash out 3.5 gallons @175 for 15 min
Sparge to 7 gallons or so with 180° water.
Boil for 60 min.

It all depends of you have a pot for a full boil.

 

[Fid]

If boosting the ABV is a must I'd say that you should boil x amount of DME in a half gallon or so of water, cool it to the temp of your already fermenting beer and carefully add it in. This would give you an ABV boost without negatively impacting the body of your beer. Considering how small this beer seems to be I'm guessing that it would be pretty easy to over do it with the corn sugar and leave you with a beer that tastes like jet fuel.

 

[Fid]

I think the best advice would be to just leave it as it is though. It might be a smaller beer than you were shooting for but that doesn't necessarily mean that it won't be fantastic. Plus you just turned dried up grains into sugar for yeast that is going to make alcohol! I mean, how badass is that!? If nothing else I'd say thats reason enough to not "fake it" with sugar additions.

 

[EricBrew]

Thanks Bob & Fid for the advice.

Since we're on the topic, should I add water to my wort next time to increase the volume? I didn't add any water to my steeped grain this time.

 

[bob1006]

A full boil is your best bet. Of you do the process I stated above no extra water is needed. You sparge to fill to boil volume.

 

[Fid]

Well, if more water was added to this batch you likely would have just decreased your OG as you would be further diluting your wort. That being said I'm guessing you had a pretty thick mash with 11 lbs of grain in 3.5 gallons of water so maybe your mash inefficiency is due to your grains not being exposed to enough of the water? Someone else might need to weigh in here though... I haven't brewed an AG batch but I've done some mini mashes (same process just a much smaller grain bill) and I don't really know how much impact water volume has on mash efficiency. Something is definitely a little out of wack here though. A quick calculation shows that with that grain bill in a 3.5 gallon batch you'd should be looking at a massive, massive beer. Somewhere in the 1.087 rage for an OG.
Theres all kinds of things that can impact you efficiency and everyones system is a little bit different. Your water temp may have not held, your grains may have not been crushed finely enough, its tough to say. Let this one ride out in the fermenter, keep good notes of what you did and change one thing in your process next time you brew to try to isolate what the issue is.