pouring cold water directly in kettle

[jigidyjim]

Hey, n00b here...

I'm on my 3rd brew. The instructions for this kit say something different than every other kit/book I've read: instead of recommending an ice bath, it says to pour some cold water directly into the kettle to cool down the wort, and then when cool transfer to fermenter and top off with the other 2 or 3 gallons of water.

My question - this seems so obvious I'm shocked that it's the first time I've seen it. Why is it not usually recommended? Should I not follow these instructions?

Thanks.

 

[Nurmey]

The reason it's not common is that adding cool water to hot doesn't cool your wort down as much as you think it would. Not cool enough to pitch yeast anyway. It works much better to cool 2 gallons of hot liquid, then add your water to top off.

Welcome to HBT!

 

[BarleyWater]

Like Nurmey said, It won't cool it off enough for the yeast, and then you have a lot more liquid to cool down to pitching temps. It's just easier to cool a smaller amount of liquid even though it may be hotter.

 

[ChshreCat]

On my last brew, I froze a couple plastic containers (sanitized) of brewing water. Then while I had my kettle in a cold waterbath in the sink, I dropped the big ice cubes in. That cooled it off pretty quick. Not instantly, but it shaved off some of my cooling time.

 

[hopsoda]

sometimes i do a little of both to bring the final volume up , to the desired gallons, if i loose to much from evaporation , make sure you boil the water first to kill any stuff that might be in it and put it in the fridge the night before brew day, in a sanitized closed container ... "or buy water in jugs" ,

everything that touches the wort could potentially contaminate your beer so watch your steps carefully. sanitize the top of the jugs and everything.

recommend building a copper immersion cooler. There is many examples on HBT.