How bad did I mess up?

Northern Brewer General
1

Hi. I brewed the Australian Sparkling Ale extract kit on 3/11/13 (about 2 weeks ago). I’m at that point in brewing where I don’t have enough time to do all grain, and I’ve done enough extracts to feel confident, but there’s enough time between brewing cycles that I still follow the instructions. Everything went fine, and it went into its fermentation cycle, and it’s actually still just winding down. But I’m brewing another batch today, and I realized when I brewed, I boiled in almost 5 gallons as opposed to 2.5 gallons and then topping off after cool down. What might that do to the batch? I’ve brewed many batches, but just got lazy and distracted. That’s not going to happen again. Thanks.

Frank

2

You normally boil 2.5g but this time you did closer to 5?

No problems with that. It’s actually beneficial. The lower the OG on the boil, the better the hop utilization is. Also, less likely to scorch the wort.

You can avoid this with the smaller boil amount by only adding 1/2 the LME/DME. Then at the end of the boil add the remainder. This will pasteurize the remaining ME.

3

That’s good to know. Thanks for replying.

Frank