Underpitching Yeast

[Wreckoncile]

So here's the deal:

Yesterday, I brewed a 2.5 gallon clone of Avery's Old Jubilation (OG: 1.067) in preparation for the coming holiday season. My plan was to throw it on top of the Nottingham yeast cake I had for the smoked mild I had in the fermenter.

The problem was that after I already had my mash and was mid boil, I went to bottle to 10 day fermented smoked mild (OG: 1.031) and discovered that my FG was only 1.018 (while the target FG was supposed to be 1.008, although I did mistakenly forget to take my hydrometer reading until after I added my priming solution) and there was no yeast cake to speak of to pitch on (I ended up bottling anyway and just hope there is some yeast in there to carb it). I made a mistake a with the mild and pitched 2/3 of a dry nottingham package without rehydrating, figuring that even if half died I only needed 1/3 of the pack for fermentation (also figured any negative flavors from the dead yeast would be masked by the intense rauchbier flavor).

So I ended up rehydrating the remaining 1/3 of the Nottingham and pitching that onto the Old Jubilation clone. Per MrMalty, I should have used 2/3 of the Nottingham package. So here's the questions:

1. Will this beer fully ferment or will be a stuck with some sweet mess?
2. Should I add another package of yeast and if so when would that need to be added by?
3. Is my 2% ABV smoked mild going to be the biggest abomination in beer history? Will it not carbonate?

This Old Jubilation clone is only my fourth brew and I keep struggling or mucking up some part or another of my brew process each time. Someone please give me some words of encouragement because I feel like a failure of a brewer right now.

 

[slarkin712]

1. It may ferment out all the way. Might just be a little estery.
2. Add more yeast asap. If you add new yeast add the ABV has already climbed, that and a few other factor may cause the newly added yeast to go dormant very quickly. The yeast needs to have a nice environment to start fermenting in.
3. You 2% beer may taste quite good, just won't get ya drunk. I had a mistake dunkelweiss once that was less than 3% ABV and I actually enjoyed it. Your beer will carbonate just fine. There are plenty of yeast left in suspension to consume the priming sugar and carbonate you bottles.

Just keep at it. We all make brewing mistakes. The sign of a good brewer is making mistakes that can be fixed and knowing how to fix them.

 

[Wreckoncile]

2. Add more yeast asap. If you add new yeast add the ABV has already climbed, that and a few other factor may cause the newly added yeast to go dormant very quickly. The yeast needs to have a nice environment to start fermenting in.

If I don't add more yeast, will I still get a full fermentation? I have no additional yeast on hand, and given my work schedule and the fact that I am going out of town tomorrow to watch my Chiefs play at San Diego, I won't be able to get any more yeast from my LHBS until Friday afternoon at the earliest, at which point it may be too late to have any real impact.

If the beer doesn't fully ferment and comes out a little sweeter than expected, I would be ok with that. A few estery flavors won't be the end of the world either.

 

[Dirty25]

My first couple of beers were kits from the LHBS store. All they gave you was a small 5g packet of mutons yeast for 5 gallon batch. All those beers turned out decent enough but if we did the math I bet they were way under pitched.