Under pitched!

[WhackedBear]

I think I under pitched my last brew. It has been a week and I am wondering if it's too late to add more yeast. I made a midwest supplies Hank's Heffeweizen extract kit. The OG was supposed to be 1.060 and I got it to 1.080 with the addition of blood oranges. I used the Wyeast Weizen yeast. With doing some research it looks like I should of used two packs, not one. Should I add more? Are there going to be off flavors since I under pitched?

 

[duboman]

Unless it stalls or gets stuck adding more yeast at this point will do nothing to erase what may already have been done, in fact it's probably already close to being finished if not already.


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[zacster]

Have you checked the gravity? That's the only way to tell if you're done. It is probably too late to add more yeast unless it isn't mostly done.

Checking gravity will tell you two things. First, is it done. Second, does it taste good when you try the sample? I'm usually more interested in the taste, so much so that I keep tasting.

 

[boydster]

At this point, it probably won't help to add any more yeast. Underpitching doesn't always mean you don't end up with enough yeast to ferment your beer. Usually it just means the yeast needs to go through more cell divisions, which can result is more yeast flavors in the beer than you might have intended. Once the vigorous part of the fermentation is in full swing, it's a pretty safe bet you have a large enough colony to finish the batch and adding additional yeast won't actually make an impact. If your beer stalls before it is at a reasonable FG, you might consider at that point making a starter with some new yeast and pitching at high krausen, but that's jumping the gun right now since you don't know that the yeast you have in there is going to stall. Further, it won't undo any off flavors that have already been generated from an initial underpitch.

Take a look at this page for some insight into the lifecycle of yeast:
http://www.brewgeeks.com/the-life-cycle-of-yeast.html

 

[cjgenever]

Any excessive esters were created during propagation, before the airlock started bubbling. It is what it is now.

But hey, Maybe you'll get some fun fruity esters that you like!

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[WhackedBear]

Well I was going for a fruity Heffe anyways. I took a peek and it has a hefty Krausen, so I'll wait and let settle before I move it to secondary.