Will adding clean, cool water to the fermenter before pitching to reach preferred volume mess up my wort? For example, I want 2.5 gal batch but after mash and boil and racking I only have lets say 2 gal, would adding cooled boiled water to the fermenter to get to 2.5 gal make a difference in final product?
Thanks,
Cmacbeen
Bottled: American Light Ale
Fermenting: Irish Red Ale
Up next: Belgium blonde
Water can be added. This will dilute the wort you have boiled by 20%. Specific gravity will be lowered. Current hop bittering and flavor will also be reduced by the addition.
Is the post boil gravity much higher than the estimated OG of the recipe? How does the wort taste? Go with the addition if the OG is higher than estimated in the recipe and the dilution of the hop bitterness/flavor won’t give you just a very weak tasting beer when bottle conditioned.
I would let it go as is if the wort tastes good even if it will be a little higher in ABV.
Cmac- what you are proposing is a fairly common technique among partial volume boilers, especially extract brewers. For example, if your recipe calls for 5G in the fermenter, and you only have 3.5G after the boil, it’s perfectly acceptable to add 1.5 G chilled water to make up your volume. If it’s an extract batch and it calls for 5G, then you actually must have the full 5G in order to keep to the recipe.
I’ll bet the big shooters do this all the time. Sneezles61
