Adding wort to an overfermented batch?

[ColinOKeefe]

Hey guys, I'm a fairly new brewer operating in a developing country. We have been brewing on a 150 liter system for the past year and making a great pale ale. After a year of developing our recipe and testing the market we decided to contract brew on a 4000 liter system and make a real go of it.
The brew day went really well and everything seemed great until after crashing. Because of the inefficacy of their cooling system it took so long that our gravity dropped to 10.08. It was suposed to be at 10.13.
The beer is not bad. It's just dry and missing a lot of the flavor from the red malt(we had reduced the grain bill slightly because of their high efficiency)
Would it be crazy to add wort (heavy on the red malt) to increase the sugar and round out the flavor?
I would think it would be similar to undermines sugars but any advice would be appreciated. We have spent all that we have on this batch. We could probably raise the capital to make a new batch but really don't want to waste this fairly good beer. Because it's our premier batch we can't have it so dry though. Many people here have never tried craft beer and we want to leave the best impression possible.
Any thoughts would be highly appreciated.
Cheers
Colin

[ChristianSA]

Hey guys, I'm a fairly new brewer operating in a developing country. We have been brewing on a 150 liter system for the past year and making a great pale ale. After a year of developing our recipe and testing the market we decided to contract brew on a 4000 liter system and make a real go of it.
The brew day went really well and everything seemed great until after crashing. Because of the inefficacy of their cooling system it took so long that our gravity dropped to 10.08. It was suposed to be at 10.13.
The beer is not bad. It's just dry and missing a lot of the flavor from the red malt(we had reduced the grain bill slightly because of their high efficiency)
Would it be crazy to add wort (heavy on the red malt) to increase the sugar and round out the flavor?
I would think it would be similar to undermines sugars but any advice would be appreciated. We have spent all that we have on this batch. We could probably raise the capital to make a new batch but really don't want to waste this fairly good beer. Because it's our premier batch we can't have it so dry though. Many people here have never tried craft beer and we want to leave the best impression possible.
Any thoughts would be highly appreciated.
Cheers
Colin

You definitely do not want to add unfermented wort to a fermented beer. Even if it gets pasteurized, you will still get weird flavor from it. Consider adding back lactose to add body and sweetness. Make sure you try it out on a smaller amount of beer before adding it to the full batch.

[ColinOKeefe]

Thanks Christian, unfortunately where I am access to materials is really limited. Im going to do my best on Monday to see if that's a possibility though. Basically all we have here are pilsner, lager, and a black stout-ish beer. Thanks for the advice I will give it a shot. Any other ideas are welcome as well.

[gitchegumee]

Leave it the way it is....

I've found that in hot, tropical locations, people favor dry beers. A rich, overhopped, high ABV beer doesn't have much of a place in tropical climates. At least none that I've seen. A 5% beer with little residual sweetness is what gets folks to buy a second pint. Or third. And in a new market, you want a beer without massive flavor impact. Subtle is preferred. You're in a market that is dominated by fizzy, light beers. Don't overdo your first attempt or you will miss your audience. Consider this a blessing in disguise and release it. Either confirm my observations, or sell it as a one-off. I think you will be surprised at the local reaction. Remember that you are not brewing for yourself or other expat beer geeks. You are brewing for an inexperienced market. You may have just hit a home run and don't even know it yet. Best of luck!

[ColinOKeefe]

The problem is that the bitterness is there but the residual sweetness had fermented out leaving the beer very dry. Also the rounded Ness that the additional red malt had created on all previous batches (which sold very well with the locals) is missing. If there is anything that I can do to help the batch gain those missing aspects I would love to hear any ideas.
Cheers

[Swags]

Honey for sweetness

Not sure if you can get honey, but that's one way to back sweeten beer after fermentation.

A little goes a long way. My feeling is that over dry beats over sweet.

[J&B]

Is the beer pasturized or filtered? Unless there is the risk of refermentation withvery high co2 instead. If honey is used you risk having a even dryer beer than before if there is viable yeast (and a co2 bomb).
Also, the reason for your beer finishing lower in gravity should not be an effect of slow cooling. The beer should be finished before crashing. There must be other factors. Different mash temp, different grist, different yeast. Also how do you monitor you gravity readings on the smaller batches? Might be an error of measurement co.pared to the bigger brewery.

[populuxebrewing]

What he said ^

I would argue that 1.008 is where this beer was meant to finish out. If you wanted to crash at 1.013, then you'd be crashing before it was done. Where you starting to crash at the desired gravity on the smaller scale, or waiting for fermentation to complete and getting to 1.013 consistently? I usually wait until I get the same gravity at the same time over 2 days readings before declaring a beer "done". Then, if there needs to be more sweetness or body, adjusting my mash profile the next time around to adjust.

Personally I'd leave the beer the way it is and introduce it as something slightly new. Instead of "Super Pale Ale" call it "Really Super Pale Ale" and gauge response. Back sweetening risks compounding your "problem".

[kabrewku]

What about brewing a second batch, heavy on the red malt, and then blending them together? Might not be quite as easy to dial in, but it is doable. Much better then adding unfermented anything to a finished beer.