Forgot to smack Wyeast package - can I use it now anyway?

So... what did you do with it? Stick it in the wort already?

If so, it's not a "big" deal. The smack pack just gives the yeast some food to work like a mini-starter ("starter" == you feed the yeast some fermentable sugars before "pitching" into the wort so there are tons more yeast to start the fermentation process when you do dump it in the wort).

You can, but you won't get very good performance out of it and you'll likely end up with an underattenuated beer. You really should smack it in plenty of time, wait for it to swell, then make a starter with it.

--------->Denny

Yes. You will have a longer lag time, which is not the best thing, but if you have been sanitary, there should be no problem using the yeast.

There are bigger issues than lag time...likely you'll have an incompletely fermented beer in that scenario.

----------->Denny