Immediate help appreciated--forgot to add the malt

We are in the middle of a boil of Chinook IPA and some pinhead (that would be me) forgot to add the malt. We were into the boil 40 min when we decided to add it. We plan to let it boil for 30 min before we add the remaining 1 oz of Chinook hops (that were scheduled to go in at 40 and 59 min of the recipe’s original 60 min boil). Anyone see a problem with this or can suggest a plan B? Or are we screwed/resigned to a lousy beer?

Thanks to all who respond.

To clarify, you forgot to add all of the extract and are boiling just the steeped grain water and hops? In that case, you’ll have a bit more hop utilization as the density of the wort is much less but it’s not going to ruin your beer. Back in my extract days, I’d add 2/3 at the start of the boil and 1/3 at turn off to improve utilization.

Sorry for the confusion–we added the luquid malt and the hops per directions but forgot to add the dry malt extract until approx 30 min into the boil. so we added it then and just extended the boil by 10 min to give the dry malt 30 min of a good solid boil. I think we’ll be OK, but I have no idea of how it will affect the taste.

But being canners who’ve canned about everything, we’ve realized not to freak out about some minor missteps…hopefully that logic applies to beer as well!

I doubt I would even increase the length of the boil. I would just dump it in, stir well to make sure it does not scorch and move on just like I meant to do it that way.

you should be fine.

Thanks for the reassurances. The official excuse is that this was our 2nd brew, and our 1st–Amercian Wheat–had no DME. The unofficial one is that I didn’t re-read the directions :blah:

Several years ago a bunch of brewers brewed together at someones home. Each bringing his own equipment.

One fella was making a pumpkin beer, extract. After putting it in the fermenter he pulled a sample for a hydro reading. Then pitched the yeast. Read the hydro… 1.020! He added the can of pumpkin but didn’t add the LME.

Freaking out, I told him to pull 1g out and boil the LME for 5-10 minutes. Then add it back. There would be enough yeast left in the 4 gallons to ferment it out. And it did.

Beer is very forgiving.

:cheers: