On Sunday I made 2.5 gallons of an IPA. Brew day went smoothly and I basically hit all of my targets for gravity, cooling, etc. I put the beer in my fermentation bucket, put the bucket in my basement, pitched the US-05 right on top of the wort and went to make dinner. Well, after more than 24 hours I saw no activity, airlock or krausen. I noticed that my basement was much cooler than I expected, about 58 degrees. That seemed a bit cold for US-05, but I was also worried that maybe the packet I used was bunk. So I opened another pack of US-05, from a different batch, and added a heat pad to the beer. That was last night. This morning I saw that the temp of my beer had raised to 82 degrees. I hadn't setup my controller correctly. Lots of bubbling now, but WAY hot for fermentation. I think I corrected the issue, but had to go to work so I couldn't check. Is my beer screwed? Can I save it? Should I bother dry hopping it? Help me please!
You may get some unexpected flavors from that temp. Maybe some fusels, maybe some peach (yes, peach), or it may turn out fine (it will be 'beer', no matter what happens here). Your best strategy would have been patience. It likely would have fermented just fine had you left it alone. What do you mean by "another pack of US-05, from a different batch"???
Yeah I probably should have waited. I use US-05 all the time and hadn't seen this long of a lag before with the pitching rate I used. So I quickly blamed both the cold and the pack of yeast. The yeast I added the second time had a different expiration date and batch number than the first pack I used.
I agree and with an ambient temp of 58 once the yeast got going it would have raised into the more standard ale fermenting range anyway.
58F is fine for S05, I've fermented in the lower 50's and it turns out very clean. Leave it alone now and just taste it when it's done and see how it is.
But I guess we are past that point... Let it ride. Letting it age could help with the fusel issue and then you could just dry hop after that. The problem with aging out fusels though is that I've read some sources saying it could take as long as a year. I have no experience with it taking it that long though. I've had a beer that I perceived to be a tad hot mellow after a couple months.
Thanks for the replies, everyone. Fusels are the thing I was most afraid of. I brewed a fusel bomb, headache-inducing triple a few years back that as of a few months ago is still 100% fusel. It looks like I'll give this beer a few weeks in primary, keg it, and see what I have (C02 is cheap). If it's not terrible, I'll probably dry hop it then. Next time I'll take everyone's advice and chill out.
I think US-05 is one of the toughest yeast strains. You were only over temp by 7F for likely a few hours. the beer might be estery and if you are really unlikely have some fusels. The beer will be drinkable. Here are two suggestions to fix the beer, 1. LEAVE IT IN PRIMARY FOR 3 WEEKS MIN. This will let the yeast clean un any off flavours. It won't make it perfect but if they are there they will be reduced slightly. 2. DRY HOP. This will "mask" some off aromas. It will hide some of the excess esters that might have been made. Overall you can breath easy, the beer will probably be alright. If after bottling and carbing it still tastes a bit leave it in bottles for a few monthes and get started with another brew. Some of the off flavours will melow out a bit. Good luck.
