Stalled/Stale Brew?

[ChristinaS1]

Hi @DonPolo. I am having difficulty accessing my messages so will answer you here. If you the gravity is still higher than predicted despite warming it up and adding rehydrated yeast you could try is racking the beer to another vessel. This often works, provided the temp is warm enough. As an aside, Coopers dry ale yeast was derived from a distillers yeast and has a high alcohol tolerance, so it is a good choice for adding to a stalled brew, but it is a lousy choice if you are brewing below 18C. 

When brewing in winter, the night time temp can often drop below 18C. This can be problematic when making ales, both during fermentation and during carbonation. In terms of fermentation, the problem can be solved by using a heat belt plugged into an Inkbird temperature controller. In terms of carbonation, you either have to keep the bottles in a warm place, or deal with it through yeast choice. Winter is a good time to brew with the Mexican Cervesa and Australian Pale Ale kits, which come with an ale/lager yeast blend. If the temp drops below 18C, the lager portion will make sure the brew still ferments and carbonates. Nottingham yeast is pretty cold tolerant too. 

If you can't get the FG of this brew close to target, consider using less priming sugar.

Cheers,

Christina.

PS Regarding brewers yeast, boiling some in water for a few minutes produces a great yeast nutrient called ghost cells, AKA yeast hulls. Yeast nutrient is not necessary when brewing an ordinary gravity ale, but it can be helpful when making high gravity brews, or when trying to get a stuck fermentation going again. Some people will add ghost cells first, to see if that will work, and if it doesn't, then adding fresh, rehydrated yeast a day or two later. 

 

 

[DonPolo]

4 hours ago, ChristinaS1 said:

If you can't get the FG of this brew close to target, consider using less priming sugar.

PS Regarding brewers yeast, boiling some in water for a few minutes produces a great yeast nutrient called ghost cells, AKA yeast hulls. Yeast nutrient is not necessary when brewing an ordinary gravity ale, but it can be helpful when making high gravity brews, or when trying to get a stuck fermentation going again. Some people will add ghost cells first, to see if that will work, and if it doesn't, then adding fresh, rehydrated yeast a day or two later. 

 

 

Thanks for the advice Christina,

If you were to use less priming sugar how much would you use? I have a measure for 350ml and 700ml bottles. I guess they  are roughly  one and two teaspoons respectively.

When you were talking about boiling the brewers yeast, did you mean bakers yeast? Or were you talking about the nutritional yeast you can sometimes buy in health food shops?

I'm going to have one more go at pitching 5mg of absolute new fresh re-hydrated yeast and see what happens.

This morning if you can believe it, the SG reading if anything was slightly ABOVE the previous readings at around 1.018. I can't really account for it. Granted, my hydrometer is the one supplied with the Coopers Starter Kits but it has served me well in the passed (despite consistently showing water to be 0.95 so I have to add 0.05 each time but that's no biggy).

[DonPolo]

5 hours ago, davids47 said:

looks like clumped yeast

Well I have no idea so that is a theory  I'm happy to consider!

[iBooz2]

@DonPolo , first of all my apologies for not picking up your thread earlier.

Having recently done a Coopers lager batch and only got my FG down to 1.016 so I think yours was as good as done.

With all due respect to @Shamus O'Sean and others for their very good input and help, I reckon yours was a low as it was going to go and if it did not get any lower by warming the brew up by a couple of degrees or more over few days then it never had a a chance to go any lower in the bottle and become bottle bombs.  The old yeast may have played a part in this but when I did mine back in January with fresh kit and well in date yeast pack it only got down to 1.016 and I was very particular with temps (had temp control fridge FV) and have brewed hundreds if not thousands of times before so know whats going on, or at least I think I do.

So you may have tarnished the brew somewhat by adding more yeast as they may have nothing left to chew on and the beer may not turn out as expected.

See my technical graph for my batch using the lager kit + BE1 + 1 x 500 g pack of Coopers Light Dry Malt + just the 7g Coopers lager kit yeast.

You will see yours would have been very close to finished if not done and dusted at 1.017 when compared to mine.

Hopefully you will get a drinkable beer out of your efforts.

Cheers - AL

Edited July 23, 2020 by iBooz2

[DonPolo]

11 minutes ago, iBooz2 said:

@DonPolo , first of all my apologies for not picking up your thread earlier.

Having recently done a Coopers lager batch and only got my FG down to 1.016 so I think yours was as good as done.

So you may have tarnished the brew somewhat by adding more yeast as they may have nothing left to chew on and the beer may not turn out as expected.

Hopefully you will get a drinkable beer out of your efforts.

Cheers - AL

 

AL thanks for this advice. Why do you think it yours (and mine) would have finished so high? I don't think that even Ian H would say his spreadsheet is 100% accurate but it predicted an OG of 1.038 and a FG of 1.010. I only used the can plus 1kg LDM.

Goodness knows what all the yeast additions will do but we'll see. I'll do a cold crash out on my sunless Canberra balcony and see what happens.

[ChristinaS1]

@DonPolo Sorry for the confusion re: brewer's yeast or bread yeast. Either would be fine. Use whatever you have, and which is cheaper. The main ingredient in Fermaid O and Fermaid K is autolyzed yeast, which is basically what ghost cells are. They provide organic nitrogen, B vitamins, and a few trace minerals. 

Nutritional yeast might work as well, but I have never used it. It is not something I keep in the house.

I don't think I would add more yeast, as with that much yeast in the brew you may end up with a yeasty taste in the beer. 

If the gravity still does not budge after racking, I would go ahead and bottle it. @iBooz2 may be right that it is done. Don't think it would be necessary to reduce the priming sugar if you rack it first and wait for a couple of days. I don't think it is necessary to cold crash the beer if you rack it first. I doubt your balcony is cold enough for a proper cold crash, but it won't hurt to try.  Just be sure to cover it, to protect it from UV. Even cloudy days have UV.

If you can't rack and can't do a proper cold crash, then it may be prudent to reduce the priming sugar by 20-25% if you bottle in glass. If you bottle in PET, it is okay to prime at your usual rate. 

Good luck,

Christina.

Edited July 23, 2020 by ChristinaS1

[iBooz2]

@DonPolo Please do not cold crash it straight away.  Keep it warm, say 20 C if you can for a few days at least and wait to see if the extra yeast has something to go forward with, if nothing more happens with SG in say 4 days @ 20 C then for sure, start the cold crash and try and get most of the extra yeast to drop out.  I would also think about (in the case that nothing extra happens with your FG) to cold crash it for longer than 7 days say 10 days and maybe look at some gelatin fining additions to help drop it into a firm trub.  That way you are more likely to finish with a clearer beer at least.  Don't let the sunshine hit your FV if on the balcony make sure its covered with a dark cloth, towel or the like.

PS . I now see @ChristinaS1 has mentioned the suns effect on your beer.

Cheers - AL

Edited July 23, 2020 by iBooz2

[DonPolo]

10 hours ago, ChristinaS1 said:

I don't think I would add more yeast, as with that much yeast in the brew you may end up with a yeasty taste in the beer. 

If the gravity still does not budge after racking, I would go ahead and bottle it. @iBooz2 may be right that it is done. Don't think it would be necessary to reduce the priming sugar if you rack it first and wait for a couple of days. I don't think it is necessary to cold crash the beer if you rack it first. I doubt your balcony is cold enough for a proper cold crash, but it won't hurt to try.  Just be sure to cover it, to protect it from UV. Even cloudy days have UV.

Hi Christina, in the end I did add more yeast. We'll just have to see how it goes.

I don't normally rack. I don't really have a vessel to do it in at this time. Nor the other equipment. Normally the trub is well below the FV in any case. Should I invest?

The temperature on the balcony that I'm talking about is predicted to swing between -1 in the evenings to 14 during the day. It is south facing (southern hemisphere) so gets no direct sunlight at this time of the year and I put it in a north east corner which is solid concrete. Just to be safe I usually cover the FV with three black garbage bags. Hopefully that will have some sort of effect.

What do you think?

Edited July 23, 2020 by DonPolo

[DonPolo]

10 hours ago, iBooz2 said:

@DonPolo Please do not cold crash it straight away.  Keep it warm, say 20 C if you can for a few days at least and wait to see if the extra yeast has something to go forward with, if nothing more happens with SG in say 4 days @ 20 C then for sure, start the cold crash and try and get most of the extra yeast to drop out.  I would also think about (in the case that nothing extra happens with your FG) to cold crash it for longer than 7 days say 10 days and maybe look at some gelatin fining additions to help drop it into a firm trub.  That way you are more likely to finish with a clearer beer at least.  Don't let the sunshine hit your FV if on the balcony make sure its covered with a dark cloth, towel or the like.

PS . I now see @ChristinaS1 has mentioned the suns effect on your beer.

Cheers - AL

Hi Al,

I have had the wort at around 22C since I got back home last Friday. As you have advised, I'll leave it for a few more days and then put it outside (see my reply  to Christina above).

I'll consult my LBS about fining agents, specifically gelatin as you have suggested. I don't normally bother with fining agents. I'm used to drinking these 'crafty' cloudy beers these days but in this case perhaps there would be excess yeast floating around.

[DonPolo]

Well I just did another SG and it might have dropped by one point to around 1.016 but that's about it. I reckon I'll do one more tomorrow and then put it in the cold.

[ChristinaS1]

 

[DonPolo]

3 hours ago, ChristinaS1 said:

 

[DonPolo]

Got it in the cold now. May bottle it somewhere between Saturday and Monday next. Is there anything to add like a dry hopping or something that may add some interest to the brew? 

[DonPolo]

Have bottled the last brew in PET. I must say having the FV outside in sub zero Canberra temperatures in the night time for a few days, the bottled beer looks a lot clearer. The bottles are firming up nicely and there seems to be a lot less sediment at the bottom ... but we'll see.

Put a new brew down yesterday and it's looking fine. I used a 5g packet of Brigalow ale yeast which should be enough given I"m only brewing 11L. It is currently sitting at about 21C.

The yeast packet says that it tolerates temperatures between 16-35 degrees C. Given my last experience where the brew seemed to stall because I let it drop to about 14C (even though this was Coopers yeast supplied with the Lager kit) I'm a bit reluctant to let it fall much lower. I've seem some recommendations here that say that it should be around 16-18C but I'm not sure.

Any suggestions?

[Titan]

Let it run. Should be fine.

 

[DonPolo]

20 minutes ago, Titan said:

Let it run. Should be fine.

 

Day 2 and a bit of very mild frothing but not much.

[DonPolo]

So the brew has finally been cracked after about 2 weeks in the bottle and a couple of days in the fridge.

As expected the EBC is much darker as suggested by those that said that being 6 months out of date would effect the extract.

And also as expected it is carbonated but has a sort of fizz like coke in that the head is not creamy at all and dissipates rather quickly. This consistent with the other KK brews I've done where I use only LDM instead of the suggested brew enhancers.

Consequently it drinks more like the English Ales/Bitters I've experienced in England, so that doesn't worry me. Thanks to those who provided me with advice and/or reassured me all would be well.

I've just bottled an identical brew except for a Winter Wheat Malt steep which I am told may improve head retention.

The Ian H spreadsheet says that the style is similar to an English Best Bitter.

We'll see.

[DonPolo]

On 7/23/2020 at 10:46 AM, ChristinaS1 said:

Hi @DonPolo. I am having difficulty accessing my messages so will answer you here. If you the gravity is still higher than predicted despite warming it up and adding rehydrated yeast you could try is racking the beer to another vessel. This often works, provided the temp is warm enough. As an aside, Coopers dry ale yeast was derived from a distillers yeast and has a high alcohol tolerance, so it is a good choice for adding to a stalled brew, but it is a lousy choice if you are brewing below 18C. 

When brewing in winter, the night time temp can often drop below 18C. This can be problematic when making ales, both during fermentation and during carbonation. In terms of fermentation, the problem can be solved by using a heat belt plugged into an Inkbird temperature controller. In terms of carbonation, you either have to keep the bottles in a warm place, or deal with it through yeast choice. Winter is a good time to brew with the Mexican Cervesa and Australian Pale Ale kits, which come with an ale/lager yeast blend. If the temp drops below 18C, the lager portion will make sure the brew still ferments and carbonates. Nottingham yeast is pretty cold tolerant too. 

If you can't get the FG of this brew close to target, consider using less priming sugar.

Cheers,

Christina.

PS Regarding brewers yeast, boiling some in water for a few minutes produces a great yeast nutrient called ghost cells, AKA yeast hulls. Yeast nutrient is not necessary when brewing an ordinary gravity ale, but it can be helpful when making high gravity brews, or when trying to get a stuck fermentation going again. Some people will add ghost cells first, to see if that will work, and if it doesn't, then adding fresh, rehydrated yeast a day or two later. 

 

 

Hi Christina,

If I was going to put some bakers yeast in as a nutrient, how much would I use? Could I throw some into the boiling wort near the end or do it separately?

[ChristinaS1]

@DonPolo The dose is 1gm baker's yeast per 1gm brewer's yeast. The proper way is add it to the water you are boiling to rehydrate the yeast. Then let it cool to the temp the yeast manufacturer recommends for rehydration. I have gotten away from rehydrating dry yeast, though I might do it if I were making a high gravity brew.

The only time I still use baker's yeast as nutrient is if I am making a starter for liquid yeast, and even then, sometimes I don't bother. Depends if it is nearing expiry.

Cheers,

Christina.

Edited August 18, 2020 by ChristinaS1

[DonPolo]

1 hour ago, ChristinaS1 said:

@DonPolo The dose is 1gm baker's yeast per 1gm brewer's yeast. The proper way is add it to the water you are boiling to rehydrate the yeast. Then let it cool to the temp the yeast manufacturer recommends for rehydration. I have gotten away from rehydrating dry yeast, though I might do it if I were making a high gravity brew.

The only time I still use baker's yeast as nutrient is if I am making a starter for liquid yeast, and even then, sometimes I don't bother. Depends if it is nearing expiry.

Cheers,

Christina.

Thanks Christina, I was thinking of using it to supplement a 'virtual Australian Pale Ale Toucan' i.e. one Pale Ale Kit fermented in 11L. I've got an 11g packet of US-05 because I used up the Coopers yeast that came with the can. That packet should be more than enough to chew through the kit but I suppose adding some yeast nutrient couldn't hurt.

Or, could it? 

[ChristinaS1]

Probably won't hurt it. US-05 can be a bit slow to get started, compared to the kit yeast, so rehydrating it in water with boiled yeast in it could help it. But you might need double the amount of water that the rehydration instructions call for, to accommodate it all. 

Good luck,

Cheers.

[DonPolo]

2 hours ago, ChristinaS1 said:

 But you might need double the amount of water that the rehydration instructions call for, to accommodate it all. 

Whoops. I had a bit of an inkling that this may be an issue. However, I didn't do anything about it. I guess that normally it is just sprinkled on top of a 23L brew volume so hopefully it is not a major issue.

[ChristinaS1]

If you are sprinkling the US-05 onto the wort, throwing the baker's yeast into the kettle five minutes before the end of the boil should be fine too. I gather that is what you did?

Cheers,

Christina.

[DonPolo]

Just now, ChristinaS1 said:

If you are sprinkling the US-05 onto the wort, throwing the baker's yeast into the kettle five minutes before the end of the boil should be fine too. I gather that is what you did?

Cheers,

Christina.

I actually had a measuring jug in which I put two teaspoons of bakers yeast (around 10g I'm thinking) then I filled to 110ml with boiling water. When the water had cooled to around 30C, I sprinkled on the US-05, covered the jug with cling wrap and then waited for around 15 minutes. Then I stirred the yeast into the water and then pitched it into the the 22C wort.

[ChristinaS1]

Hopefully having boiling water poured on them was enough to kill the baker's yeast. 

If you use an airlock, please let me know how long it takes before it starts bubbling, as I wonder if it reduces your lag time....I suspect you don't use an airlock.