Low OG, fix it or roll with it

[Devvrider]

Hi guys, this is my second BIAB batch and I'm trying to replicate the lone galaxy recipe in a 18L batch.

I got 4.5kg Pale malt 2 row with 0.5kg carared and 0.3kg of wheat malt.
I mashed at around 68C with 25L of water and post-mash it was about 22L

Post-boil it became 18L but the OG is just 1.030 where the target should be 1.052.

I suspect that I did not get the grains stirred well because I dont have a bag large enough this time to wrap around my pot. I can just tide it up and throw the whole thing in.

So the question is, can I still fix it, maybe with cane sugar? (I have no DME accessible) or should I keep going? The est ABV will be less than 3% .

 

[Alex4mula]

Try to fix if you can. I don't know how. I did a milk stout 2 month ago were the final ABV was like 2.5%. Taste was good but more like a milkshake than beer. I had to have 5 instead of 2 to feel a kick. Oh well. Learned a lot from it.

 

[McKnuckle]

Adding sugar of some kind will definitely increase the alcohol, but won't do anything for the flavor. Unless grain and other ingredients are expensive for you, I'd just roll with it and get to brewing another batch.

This is exactly why brewing large batches can be wasteful until you dial things in. But nobody tells new brewers that... it's 5 gallons all the way, always the standard. If you are bottling this, you could also boil it down to a higher gravity and just fill fewer bottles.

 

[WhiteRhyno]

You might well of created a fantastic low % IPA. Then again, it might be blah
1/2 it, fix one half, then just roll with the other half and see what its like

 

[foolsbrew]

I'd add the sugar. You only need to a kilogram to get to your OG and that's the usual recommendation kits come with anyway(just to say lots of people do it and they like it ). I'd take a slightly worse beer if it comes with higher alcohol content any day.

 

[Devvrider]

Thanks people, I have the wort sealed in the fermentation bucket now, yeast not pitched yet
I'll try to fix it with sugar.

Boil the sugar in distilled water, let it cool and mix with the wort. Is this correct?

 

[McKnuckle]

There really isn't a need to boil the sugar, and if you do that, you're just watering everything down even more. I would just dump it in there, oxygenate the wort, then pitch yeast.

 

[foolsbrew]

Thanks people, I have the wort sealed in the fermentation bucket now, yeast not pitched yet
I'll try to fix it with sugar.

Boil the sugar in distilled water, let it cool and mix with the wort. Is this correct?

That's correct. Start with a cup of water, get it to boil, add the sugar slowly. Once it can't dissolve any more, add more water. It should be about 1-to-1 ratio of sugar-to-water. (off the top of my head)

There really isn't a need to boil the sugar, and if you do that, you're just watering everything down even more. I would just dump it in there, oxygenate the wort, then pitch yeast.

This works too. Some people are concerned about sanitation, others are not. Personally I don't boil my priming sugar since I figure the beer has enough alcohol to be relatively safe. I boil it if I am adding it before or during fermentation

I am stealing my sugar from the kitchen though. By the time it gets into my beer it's been fingered vigorously.

 

[Devvrider]

Used a gravity adjust calculator and got the sugar into the fermenter.

OG is now back to 1.052, pitched the yeast and fingers crossed !