Yesterday I made my first beer. I've tried my hand at ciders a few times and really enjoyed making them, which I figured would be a good segway into beer, and I was right. I really enjoyed making my first beer but I have a couple questions. First I should say, I made a chocolate maple porter from one of the kits through Brooklyn Brew Shop. They're one gallon kits and really work well for it being my first time. My question is, has anyone else used one of these kits and not had your wort reach a hot break point? Mine didn't and through research I found that it happens sometimes. Is this true and if so is it okay? Next question, I had too much boil off. I assume that I boiled too hot or had too much surface area. Would that be the case? I tried to keep a rolling boiling but maybe it was too hot. Anyway, my beer came in OG at 1.032 and is bubbling away in the fermentor! Any help appreciated.
Boil Off is a largely a function of BTUs and of kettle material and configuration. The key is to know how much your patrticular setup boils off in a given period of time, so you can adjust your total starting water volume accordingly. Different boil off rates (and the different starting water volumes) will marginally affect things like hop utilization. But once you've established your consistent boil off rate, you can dial-in the rest. Software helps. What was the expected OG? If you had more boil off than you expected, and didn't top off with water at the end, I'd expect the OG to be high. (1.032 is very low, for most styles anyway.) Was this an all-grain kit? If so, you might have a mash efficiency issue.
The kit never told me what OG should have been. It's all grain kit. I had to add a bunch of water at the end. I was truly disappointed but for my first time I wasn't overly concerned. Before water addition it was 1.12 Anything I could do at this point to get abv back up and not ruin the beer?
Maybe there's a possibility I read it wrong but I really don't think I did.... It's a problem on my end at some point. I used my stovetop,stainless pot that was far too big and probably used too much heat too boiling. Then was forced to add water. I'd like to fix it but I'm going to chalk it up to experience and do it better next time. I just hope it tastes decent so I can drink it.
To go from 1.120 to 1.032, you would have had to add enough water to get the volume to 3.75 times as much as it was when you measured 1.120. For example, if it was 1.032 at 1 gallon, the 1.120 must have been measured at just a hair over a quarter of a gallon. If that doesn't sound right, there must have been a gravity measurement error somewhere. At this point, I would recommend letting it ride.
Thanks. I'm going to let it ride. I thought it was at half gallon when I added water but it may have been under. We'll see how this goes. Is it too much to ask for a 4.5%?
If the wort really ended up at 1.032, it's not going to result in a 4.5% ABV beer. More like 3.2% ABV, assuming about 75% apparent attenuation. The attenuation may be a little higher or lower than that, depending on the fermentability of the wort and the yeast strain, but I wouldn't expect any 1.032 porter to get very close to 4.5% ABV. ETA: How thoroughly did you mix the wort and the top-off water before you took a sample for the gravity reading? It's not uncommon to get a bad sample if not well mixed.
I'm in camp with let it ride. Your numbers sound off. One gallon batches can be really tricky if you don't compensate for a lot of boil off. Also, the temperature that you read your wort at is important if you're using a hydrometer. 60F is usually the baseline for readings.
I'd bet you're right. I didn't mix it very well, until I pitched. It was still going strong last night before bed. Made it Monday morning.
A strong krausen isn't always a good indication that this beer is doing what it should--No kausen is an inication that there's isn't enough healthy yeast or that there's no sugar for the yeast to chew on. I'd rather be where you are right now. It's your first brew. You're going by taste for the next six months, if the beer lasts that long.
