Arrgh! How did I ever learn human speech?!

[surista]

Thanks to everyone's help (in this thread), I thought my latest batch was coming along quite well.

Then I got home this evening from work, and my wife casually mentioned, 'you know for a lager it seems kinda dark'.

Hmm, now that you mention it, it does. And now that you mention it again....there seems to be a lot of room in that 23-litre FV for what is supposed to be a five-gallon batch.

Hmmm.



!!!!!!

Yep - I completely forgot to top up to five gallons. As a result, I have about 15 litres of what should be a five-gallon batch.

Soooo - is it too late to anything? The yeasties are bubbling away, so I'm guessing I should just go with it and see what happens - any guess as to how it will turn out? Really really really strong and high alcohol content? Will it be drinkable? Anyway I can add more water to the mix at some point?

[Garth]

I have topped up during fermentation with about 3 litres of cool boiled water with no detrimental effect to the beer, it tasted great.

Boil 8 litres of water, keep it covered and let it cool to 20C, gently, and very gently add it to the wort/beer.

The trick is not to splash as the yeasties will probably be in anaerobic mode now, splashing will add oxygen and will encourage them to go back to aerobic mode, which may now give the beer an odd taste.

[surista]

Garth - txs for your advice. Tried it just now - boiled 8 litres, let it cool to around 20C. I had a small tube and funnel; steralized both. Took out the airlock in the FV, gently stuck the hard casing end of the tubing in (it just fit) and lowered it into the mix, and used the funnel to slowly add the water.

The tube and funnel itself was not perfect fit (bought separately), so I lost some water there, and of course lost a bit during the boil. Still, I ended up with around 20L or so. Plus, it looks like the yeasties are back to work.

Obviously I've increased the odds that something has gone wrong during the process, so we'll see if I get anything drinkable from it.

[sonicated]

I believe Coopers actually recommend you brew their Stout with less water to stop the krausen explosion and then top up with more water after a few days of initial fermentation. That's what I did with mine.