Speed Brew - Thoughts?

[OppR2nist]

Anything that doesn't get drunk at the BBQ well be kept in a safe place to be sure it does its work. Since I'm going on vacation, I'm gong to keep the bottles in my bath tub to make cleaning up possible explosions easier. I'll be drinking my first one the night I get home (after any possible cleanup).

 

[TastyAdventure]

Bottle bombs. According to your "desired/calculated" Attenuation, you hit your OG, but I would bet big money the yeast would've taken it to 1.012, maybe 1.010. There's extra residual, fermentable sugar in there that will get eaten in the bottle. Dangerous. I don't understand why you ignored everyone's advice.
I guess the best thing to do at this point is check a bottle everyday, and once you've hit a decent carb level, put all of them in the fridge and DON'T take the out until you are about to drink them.

 

[OppR2nist]

Why would you suggest that. Everything I've done has been according to the advice I've Goren from just about every source EXCEPT what people have said here. What makes you think it would ferment lower?
And, most importantly, what happens when and if I have a beer that didn't explode and tastes great?

 

[Gameface]

Why would you suggest that. Everything I've done has been according to the advice I've Goren from just about every source EXCEPT what people have said here. What makes you think it would ferment lower?
And, most importantly, what happens when and if I have a beer that didn't explode and tastes great?

I honestly get the vibe that many here would be happier to see you fail than to succeed.

That said, many are just giving you the facts based on their experiences.

5 days from brew to bottle? Sure you hit your target F.G., but many of us here have gone beyond our target F.G. a time or two. In fact, depending on the yeast and the recipe I sometimes expect to hit a lower F.G. than the software tells me. I certainly don't just check at day 5 and if it's at my target F.G. assume it's done.

Seems like a big risk.

I get that you have an opportunity to show off your beer and you've challenged yourself to hit the mark in an extremely tight window. I wish you the best! Level of difficulty on this one is pretty high. It can be done, but there's a lot of room for error.

 

[OppR2nist]

Thank you for the more level-headed approach.

After talking to a few people, I realize probably would have been better if I had taken readings on days 3 & 4 to be sure that that fermentation had slowed down or stopped before I bottled. Given the circumstances, I should have done that, but at this point I'm left with needing to take the risk and hope for the best. I bottled on Friday night, and there's been no disasters yet. We'll see how things look when I get home.

 

[Dudest]

If it does not work its not the end of the world You could always use it for a depth charge drop a shot of Drambuie glass and all into a glass of the beer. It stays seperate like oil and water it looks cool and tastes good just don't plan to drive.

 

[OppR2nist]

That was my idea, too (minus the Drambuie). If it fails, I haven't lost much (even the ingredients were fairly cheap, so money wasn't as much of an issue). If it succeeds, though, it will be a great thing to have in my back pocket when I need to brew something up quick and want to have something of my own to bring along.

 

[jbaysurfer]

Why would you suggest that. Everything I've done has been according to the advice I've Goren from just about every source EXCEPT what people have said here. What makes you think it would ferment lower?
And, most importantly, what happens when and if I have a beer that didn't explode and tastes great?

Oh I get the feeling this is going to turn out just peachy for you. LOL...writing's on the wall. You against the world. Every source you've consulted says that the collective experience of your repliers is worthless. You're golden.

I'll come back in a week to read the post where the beer turns out awesome.

 

[OppR2nist]

So, it's been a week, and the beer is fantastic! It's a little green (to be expected, given the short time it's been conditioning), but it's doing well, and it's ready to go. If anyone is interested, I'll post about how things worked out. As it stands now, we've got beer. And it's pretty damn good.

 

[kmckiou]

Well, it doesn't look like you going to have problems with it being over-carbed.

If you are having a problem with foam retention, check into LME that includes carapils. I know that the LME from Northern Brewer includes carapils. They have a number of convenient (fast) LME combinations.

BTW, for a brew like this I would have used Cascade hops. About an ounce for bittering and then an ounce at 10 min and an ounce at 5 min. That would give you nice bitterness and hop aroma.

 

[zoonose]

...what happens when and if I have a beer that didn't explode and tastes great?

Then, you drink it.

 

[OppR2nist]

Well, to be fair, this particular glass was from a swingtop that I need to replace the gasket on. It foamed pretty heavily when I opened it, but the head died down in a hurry. I'm going to try one of my regularly capped bottles as a comparison, so the story isn't over yet.

As for your other suggestion, I may very well, try Cascade hops the next time I do something like this. I just wanted to keep hip additions as simple as possible for my first time doing something like this.

 

[kaconga]

What day did you actually brew that on? I have pushed beers from grain to glass in 3 weeks with bottle conditioning and typically it is just a matter of picking the right styles.

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Brewday was on 7/21 according to a previous post. I saw OP stated it finished at 1.015. Some are concerned that it could have gone down to 1.010. IMHO, even if it couldve and did, thats not gonna cause bottle bombs, actually it jus might help the carbonation. At over 1 week in the bottle, carbonation ahould be coming in nicely.

 

[OppR2nist]

Yup, just a matter of style. In this case, it was a blonde. The key is a relatively low gravity.

 

[OppR2nist]

So the verdict is in. I brought my speed brew to a BBQ last night, and it was the Belle of the Ball. I wasn't sure how it would be received until someone came up to me and asked, "Have you tried 'The Seven Day Itch' yet? It's amazing!" ('Seven Day Itch', btw, is what I called it.)

 

[jbaysurfer]

Lol..there it is.

 

[casualbrewer]

Very Impressive for sure that it came out decent. I know my beers seem to ferment quick as well and are carbonated enough to drink in a week but of course they are better in 2-3 weeks.

Have any of you tried to bottle while the beer was still fermenting? You would have to be spot on what your FG would be as well as how many volumes of co2 would be needed but I'm thinking you could essentially bottle near the end of fermentation and add little to no priming sugar. Should carb a bit quicker I would guess. Then you could cold crash the bottles after 1-2 weeks. Would have lots of yeast in the bottles but given the right pour into a glass you should be ok.

 

[dpatrickv]

Very Impressive for sure that it came out decent. I know my beers seem to ferment quick as well and are carbonated enough to drink in a week but of course they are better in 2-3 weeks.

Have any of you tried to bottle while the beer was still fermenting? You would have to be spot on what your FG would be as well as how many volumes of co2 would be needed but I'm thinking you could essentially bottle near the end of fermentation and add little to no priming sugar. Should carb a bit quicker I would guess. Then you could cold crash the bottles after 1-2 weeks. Would have lots of yeast in the bottles but given the right pour into a glass you should be ok.

Personally that sounds like a horrible idea.

 

[wardens355]

Very Impressive for sure that it came out decent. I know my beers seem to ferment quick as well and are carbonated enough to drink in a week but of course they are better in 2-3 weeks.

Have any of you tried to bottle while the beer was still fermenting? You would have to be spot on what your FG would be as well as how many volumes of co2 would be needed but I'm thinking you could essentially bottle near the end of fermentation and add little to no priming sugar. Should carb a bit quicker I would guess. Then you could cold crash the bottles after 1-2 weeks. Would have lots of yeast in the bottles but given the right pour into a glass you should be ok.

This idea should have a disclaimer regarding possible bodily harm or damage to property.

 

[Schol-R-LEA]

Agreed. This is an exceedingly bad idea - it would be virtually impossible to judge the bottling time correctly so as to avoid both bottle bombs, on the one hand, and flat beer, on the other. The bulk priming sugar method is reliable and well-tested, providing that you wait until the existing fermentation has run its course, have a suitable priming sugar calculation for the desired level of carbonation (most brewing software will do it for you), and are careful about sanitation.

If you really need to speed up the carbonation that badly, you should consider kegging rather than bottle conditioning. While it is expensive, especially if you then want to bottle after carbonating, it does avoid a lot of the issues and headaches inherent in bottling your entire batch. With a kegerator and force carb, you should be able to carbonate a kegged beer in less than 48 hours, at most - according to most people who speed brew, such as Brulosopher, a 24 hour cold crash followed by kegging and 24 hours @ 40 PSI is more than enough for most average gravity beers.

 

[casualbrewer]

I mentioned that as an extreme case scenario. I did read and found many examples where it had been done before. Wouldn't be that hard if you brewed the same beer over and over with consistent results and knew where your FG would end up at. Just a matter of bottling a few points short to get desired volume of co2. I'm sure it can be done with a beer that is very repeatable, using the same yeast, etc. Going from grain to coming out of bottle could be a week and a half with the right process. In no way am I saying this is better or should be done. I'm just saying it definitely can be done.