More beer than expected?!

[Hackinjeebs]

Red ale. Racked and bottled a few days ago. What was weird is I got 55 beers out of a 5 gallon batch. I didn't even get all of it. I did taste it and it tasted great. Didn't seem watered down. Additionally, I know I topped it off to the 5 gallon mark before fermentation because I am anal about having it perfectly on the line. thoughts? Only thing I changed besides the recipe was the use of a large auto siphon.

 

[unionrdr]

My guess is that you didn't have much trub to speak of. I've heard that 54 bottles is max. 55 bottles is pretty good,My wife got 48 out of a 5G batch.

 

[usfmikeb]

If 5 gallons equals 640 ounces, that would be 53 12 ounce bottles of beer. If you fill them with 11.9 ounces, it would make 54 bottles of beer. So, it all depends on how much you put in each bottle.

 

[Hackinjeebs]

Actually, now that you mention it, I ran the wort through a strainer before topping off to clear out trub and aerate the wort. Could that be the culprit here?

 

[unionrdr]

It helps a little,but you still have all the stuff in it that makes it look cloudy,plus the yeast. You'd just have less trub to start with.

 

[Hackinjeebs]

Yeah for sure. hmmm. thanks. I can think of a few things that may have increased my out put. None of them would have an impact on taste luckily. : )
I am sure you can imagine my shock when I had x amount of beer still in my bucket and I was already at 50 beers... haha. I didn't even have enough bottles ready for it.

 

[Rivenin]

if you're doing all extract you will have a VERY small ammount of trub, which will help in what you are talking about. once you hit AG it'll get more trub in there, but i've hit about 54 once, just means you had a good brew session

 

[unionrdr]

I do all extract,but I get varying amounts of trub. I usually use a mixture of DME & LME's with added hops. And I do 6G batches. They all come out good,but I think it has something to do with yeast activity as well as the amount of fermentables used.? I also have gotten as few as 62 bottles,to the max of 66 bottles from 6G.

 

[dnslater]

How much head space in your bottle?

 

[Hackinjeebs]

About an inch.

 

[Hulud]

most i have gotten was 49 but i tend to get a lot of trub which i attribute to steeping grains because in the one that went to 49 i did not use steeping grains

 

[rgontasz]

This doesn't seem like a problem. More beer + tastes good= the beer Gods blessed you with an extra brew! Enjoy it, or if you still feel bad about it you can ship it to me for sampling to make sure it's not poison!

 

[TopherM]

You can get 1,000 bottles out of a batch if you put in enough water.

The question is, were your numbers on point? Did you hit your OG AND fill 55 bottles? That would indicate that you maxed out your efficiency.

Likely, you ended up with slightly over 5 gallons, your OG is a little lower than the recipe target, and you are just slightly off on your target ABV in the final beer, which would lead to perfectly good beer, perfect volume, but just a bit lower body and ABV than the recipe intended.

As long as it tastes good and gives you a buzz, it's a successful brew in my book!