My complete bottling snafu

[hopshead]

So, I was bottling a pale ale yesterday and about half through filling the bottles I realized I totally forgot the priming sugar, what an idiot. I wasn't sure what to do, I didn't want to try pouring the beer out the bottles to bulk prime, surely they would be cardboard when ready to drink due to oxygenation. So, I went old school and measured a tablespoon of sugar and poured in each bottle. I think I really "f" d this one up. Now the fill level rose due to adding sugar making less headspace and more likely one tablespoon is not enough to get the proper carbonation. Looks like this bitch is going to be at "cask" levels of carbonation, unless I screwed up and overprimed a bottle. Has anyone else ever screwed up like this before? How did the beer turn out?

[San_Diego_Matt]

one tablespoon sounds like a lot per bottle to me, but I guess it depends what you were priming with.

Depending on how close your LHBS is, maybe picking up some of the fermentation caps would have been a good solution.

[Nyakavt]

Heh, I've been there You want more like 1/2 tsp table sugar per bottle for the standard 2.5 vol CO2, these are probably going to be pretty darn carbonated, over 4 volumes. Unless you used the thick bottles, you'll want to uncap after a few days to relieve the overpressure. Standard beer bottles are only good to about 4 volumes. The tricky part is going to be guessing when to relieve the pressure. Remember too that dissolved CO2 is a function of temperature, so if you open the bottles when they are colder less CO2 will be degassed.

The beer will *probably* turn out fine, the only real risk is that you were using sugar that was not sanitized, but it typically isn't harboring lots of bacteria and wild yeast in the solid form. Overcarbing is not so bad, just do a double pour and you'll be all set.

[hopshead]

Nyakavt >> I bottled on Saturday, so after reading your post on Monday... I uncapped all bottles and recapped. Several bottles started to foam over very slowly. I guessed they were uncapped for about a minute before the foam started to slowly spill over. I recapped on foam. Do you or anyone in the BN Army think I should recap again in a few days? Or should I try to chill them all down in ice? Or, do you think after recapping Monday I will be fine?

[Nyakavt]

It's hard to say, fermentation is not a linear thing. Most of the sugar reduction happens fairly quickly, and the last few points of reduction takes longer. I *think* you'll be ok, maybe just pick a test bottle here or there and see how it's coming along. Depressurizing the bottle will reduce your chances of bottle bombs, but it would take a bit more to for the CO2 dissolved in the beer to equilibrate. I would just get the bottles to a safe level of carbonation and adjust in the glass with the pour.

[hopshead]

NyaKavt >> thanks bro! If I had bottle bombs after 3 years of pestering my wife with this hobby, I might be a retired brewer. I'll taste a bottle tomorrow after work and evaluate. If it seems safe, I'll let it ride another day. If I think its going to blow - I'll recap again. Now for the beer itself... I am not sure how the taste will be - I tried an all summit hops pale ale with hop bursting (first time using summit). Who knows if those hops will get a fair taste given the carbonation issues.