St Peters IPA Kit Trouble/Mistakes

[Conorhd]

Hi guys, I am new to this community as well as the whole brewing adventure!

I bought the St Peters IPA brew kit as my first venture into home brewing. I made a few mistakes which I will detail out here and hope some of you could provide some tips/advice.

First of all, I made a very bad mistake of following general instructions on the website I got the kit off of, instead of the kit on the beer kit box. I only realised after I had finished, which was too late to make any adjustments.
So, basically I added 2 kg of sugar to the wort along with the yeast. After this, I topped up the fermenter to 23 litres instead of the recommended 19 on the box. I also added the hops three days after I had sealed the wort. I am wondering if these will cause the whole process to mess up? Or if the beer will come out tasting horrible?
my fears have been fuelled by the fact that my airlock has not bubbles at all, to my knowledge, and it has been sitting in 18/19 degrees for 5 days now.
Any advice would be extremely welcome. I know first time is always tough but feel these mistakes (particularly the sugar) was a very bad one haha.

anyway, glad to be here and looking forward to learning.
Thanks guys!

 

[Obadiah Boondoggle]

None of the things you have done should mess it up, it might not be the ABV you want but it should be drinkable. Adding 2kg of sugar might make it taste "thin" - not alcohol just taste. You need a balance of simple sugars (i.e. a bag of sugar) and the more complex sugars that were part of the malt extract in your kit. Complex sugars will not all ferment but are there for taste and depth

My question is what temperature is recommended on the kit for fermentation?

 

[Pezza24]

Did you measure the gravity at all before you pitched the yeast? Adding the extra sugar will only increase the ABV. That is as long as the yeast can handle all the sugar. The extra water will then dilute the wort. Without gravity readings it's hard to know where you are. Could have a loose fitting lid so the airlock won't be showing any activity. As for the dry hop at day 3 it will give you a stronger hop flavour.

 

[Conorhd]

None of the things you have done should mess it up, it might not be the ABV you want but it should be drinkable. Adding 2kg of sugar might make it taste "thin" - not alcohol just taste. You need a balance of simple sugars (i.e. a bag of sugar) and the more complex sugars that were part of the malt extract in your kit. Complex sugars will not all ferment but are there for taste and depth

My question is what temperature is recommended on the kit for fermentation?

Hi there, thanks very much. 18-20 degrees Celsius is recommended, which is what the room is at where it is sitting.

 

[Obadiah Boondoggle]

As Pezza says - you might have a loose fitting lid

If you have not taken the gravity so far I suggest that you should start

If it does nt move for two days it has finished fermenting

 

[Conorhd]

Did you measure the gravity at all before you pitched the yeast? Adding the extra sugar will only increase the ABV. That is as long as the yeast can handle all the sugar. The extra water will then dilute the wort. Without gravity readings it's hard to know where you are. Could have a loose fitting lid so the airlock won't be showing any activity. As for the dry hop at day 3 it will give you a stronger hop flavour.

I forgot to mention that. Another mistake I made was taking gravity measure after pitching yeast. It came out as 0.072, which I gather is quite high(?).thank you for your reply

 

[Obadiah Boondoggle]

I forgot to mention that. Another mistake I made was taking gravity measure after pitching yeast. It came out as 0.072, which I gather is quite high(?).thank you for your reply

It is high but not surprising if you have added 2kgs sugar

It will be a strong brew - if a little "thin"

 

[Pezza24]

That's ok it's high as expected with the 2kg of sugar and what I see online was a two can kit. The expected 5.5% will be quite a bit north of that I'm assuming. Not quite sure how to calculate though as OB says some of that sugar won't be fermented out.

Enjoy in moderation.

 

[Obadiah Boondoggle]

That's ok it's high as expected with the 2kg of sugar and what I see online was a two can kit. The expected 5.5% will be quite a bit north of that I'm assuming. Not quite sure how to calculate though as OB says some of that sugar won't be fermented out.

Enjoy in moderation.

I agree entirely

The gravity is now where it is and it will end up where it will end up, now beyond anyone's control

Just enjoy in moderation

 

[Skello]

I’ve done this kit and it turned out well. I don’t recall the instructions saying to add more sugar, the two cans of malt extract you get with it should be enough, it will (as has been said) just have a bit more of a kick to it!

I noticed that this didn’t bubble the airlock much after about a week in the FV. I left it for about 3 weeks in the FV before it hit FG.
One thing I would say is ignore the box instructions when it comes to carbonation. After you have bottled it leave it for 2 weeks or so at room temperature, not two days and then 2 weeks in the fridge. I did one bottle that way and it didn’t carb up very well at all. All the bottles I left for 2 weeks turned out perfect.

 

[Ezza]

I'm doing this kit next,how did it taste?.

 

[SmallSpacesBrewing]

Just take a gravity reading after it's been in the fermenter for while. 2kg of sugar Is a lot. This will be a strong beer. And it'll be thin. Let it ferment out til it stops. If it stalls at to high of a gravity it'll be sweet. There are tricks that you can do to get it starting again. Obviously this yeast wasn't made for that kinda heavy beer so it might die on you. Keep us posted

 

[Conorhd]

Thanks everyone for your replies.
My OG was 1.072, not 0.072, and I took a reading this morning and it came out as 1.023. I will take another one tomorrow.

for my next steps, I have read in some places that you can transfer the wort to another fermenter and let sit for another week/10 days, and that will let it settle more and reduce sediment. Is this something I should do or ignore?
i have also read that you should add a teaspoon of sugar to bottles when bottling - do I need to do this, given the amount of sugar already in?

 

[Conorhd]

Thanks everyone for your replies.
My OG was 1.072, not 0.072, and I took a reading this morning and it came out as 1.023. I will take another one tomorrow.

for my next steps, I have read in some places that you can transfer the wort to another fermenter and let sit for another week/10 days, and that will let it settle more and reduce sediment. Is this something I should do or ignore?
i have also read that you should add a teaspoon of sugar to bottles when bottling - do I need to do this, given the amount of sugar already in?

I'm not sure if it's reading as 1.023, or if the hydrometer is just hitting the bottom instead of floating. Would this be possible?

 

[SmallSpacesBrewing]

Hi,
Nice, that means the yeast has been working. Still a high, but getting there. To answer your question about adding more sugar or not to the bottles i think i need to explain what is actually happening to your beer, what the yeast is doing to your wort.

You have wort aka sugar from malt. You aso have added sugar. This is the yeasts food. When you add the yeast to your bucket it start eating the sugar and the biproducts of this are mainly two things: Co2 and Alcohol.

The Co2 leaves your bucket through your ''Plopper'' () and the alcohol stays in the beer.

When you are bottling, the yeast should have eaten all the sugar it can from the wort. So now it cant make more alcohol or Co2.

Basically when you add sugar to the bottle it is so the yeast gets new food to produce co2 and alcohol, though in these small messures the alcohol isnt much. The difference this time is that you have sealed the bottle, there is no where for the Co2 to go except for into the beer. This process is called Natural Carbonation.

I personally prefered to batch prime, though you have to carefull as to not splash or disturb the beer to much because Oxigen can be really bad for you beer. It'll end up tasting like cardboard. You need a second fermenter bucket for this. Basically its adding all the sugar you need for bottling to the wort at once.

You transfer the wort to this other bucket, leaving the trub and yeast cake and all that stuff behind and then you add the bottling sugar (previously boiled in some water). You can then bottle from this bucket and all the bottles will have the same amount of sugar in them. I used to use 6g/liter for most of my beers, 4-5 in my stouts. I mainly keg now. So 21liter*6grams of sugar = 126g sugar for the whole batch.

Again, dont splash the beer. Also stir the sugar in gently, you want it in all the beer.

Hope this was helpfull

 

[SouthDownsBrewer]

Hi,
Nice, that means the yeast has been working. Still a high, but getting there. To answer your question about adding more sugar or not to the bottles i think i need to explain what is actually happening to your beer, what the yeast is doing to your wort.

You have wort aka sugar from malt. You aso have added sugar. This is the yeasts food. When you add the yeast to your bucket it start eating the sugar and the biproducts of this are mainly two things: Co2 and Alcohol.

The Co2 leaves your bucket through your ''Plopper'' () and the alcohol stays in the beer.

When you are bottling, the yeast should have eaten all the sugar it can from the wort. So now it cant make more alcohol or Co2.

Basically when you add sugar to the bottle it is so the yeast gets new food to produce co2 and alcohol, though in these small messures the alcohol isnt much. The difference this time is that you have sealed the bottle, there is no where for the Co2 to go except for into the beer. This process is called Natural Carbonation.

I personally prefered to batch prime, though you have to carefull as to not splash or disturb the beer to much because Oxigen can be really bad for you beer. It'll end up tasting like cardboard. You need a second fermenter bucket for this. Basically its adding all the sugar you need for bottling to the wort at once.

You transfer the wort to this other bucket, leaving the trub and yeast cake and all that stuff behind and then you add the bottling sugar (previously boiled in some water). You can then bottle from this bucket and all the bottles will have the same amount of sugar in them. I used to use 6g/liter for most of my beers, 4-5 in my stouts. I mainly keg now. So 21liter*6grams of sugar = 126g sugar for the whole batch.

Again, dont splash the beer. Also stir the sugar in gently, you want it in all the beer.

Hope this was helpfull

I'm finding this really helpful knowledge. How long do you leave it in the second fermenter before bottling?, and is there any need to take gravity readings during this batch prime?
Also...can I use spraymalt instead of bottling sugar? - if so 100% spraymalt or a mix of spraymalt and dextrose?
Thanks!

 

[SmallSpacesBrewing]

I'm finding this really helpful knowledge. How long do you leave it in the second fermenter before bottling?, and is there any need to take gravity readings during this batch prime?
Also...can I use spraymalt instead of bottling sugar? - if so 100% spraymalt or a mix of spraymalt and dextrose?
Thanks!

hi,
When the beer is transferred into the bottling bucket you want to start bottling as soon as possible. Remember this is so the yeast makes Co2 for your beer. If you leave it too long in the bucket youll just have stronger beer, im not saying you have to bottle in like 2 minutes haha but you know, when the bottles are clean and ready, transfer the beer , add the sugar. then start bottling. I hope you have a bottling wand. Bottling can be a drag when you dont. Ive done it all man. I used to tape the siphon hose to the bucket so it wouldnt move. then bottled with just pinching the hose. Horrible. Bottling wands are cheap and saves beer and time and frustration.

Yeah you could use spraymalt if you want, there are reports on this being better. I personally didnt note much or any difference the times ive tried. Especially in a beer like yours, that has been sugared half way to hell theres really no need. Just normal table sugar will be fine.

For future reference:
2 can kits dont need sugar, you can add some like 200-300g if you really want it a little bit stronger.

1 can kits should be mixed with spraymalt or at least a betterbeer blend 50% dextrose / 50% spraymalt.

 

[Skello]

I'm doing this kit next,how did it taste?.

Like an English IPA, not too hoppy but a nice hop bitterness is present on the aftertaste. Nice malty presence but again, not too much. It’s very well balanced on both the malt and bitterness.

 

[trummy]

Just started this kit. No mention of checking the wort temperature before pitching the yeast and no info on starting O.G. Pretty poor considering its not difficult to write comprehensive instructions. After saying that I have done enough kits to fill in the gaps

 

[SmallSpacesBrewing]

Smallspacesbrewing formerly known as soyyojuli. Don't know if you guys are using Instagram, but if you do. Come check out my account: smallspacesbrewing. Im posting a lot of brewing stuff. Also there's a link to my very new YouTube channel there. You never know, maybe there's something there to learn :) or maybe you can share some knowledge.