elmwood

Recipes 

i made a decoction mash doppelbock almost two months ago. it had a OG of 1.084. i used wyeast munich yeast and applied oxygen. it now has a gravity of 1.026 and tastes too sweet. i racked the beer three weeks ago when it had a gravity of 1.030. apparent attenuation is about 70%.

should i pitch more yeast to dry it out?

JVD_X

Recipes 

Ya know... I had the same issue. The correct answer is...

is... next time use more bittering hops to balance the sweetness out. You probably will not gain too much more in the ways of gravity drop by pitching more yeast since the existing yeast is probably within a few attenuation % of any yeast you might pitch.

What yeast was it? Did you look at the potential attenuation and compare it to the actual attention?

__________________
- JVD_X

elmwood

Recipes 

i used munich lager yeast by wyeast 2308 which has a predicted attenuation between 70-74% and my actual apparent attenuation was about 69%. the decoction worked well as it defintively has a malty taste. but the sweetness is too much.

do you think dry hopping or lagering will help?

JVD_X

Recipes 

Maybe. Dry hopping will add hop aroma / flavor but not bitterness. You might try doing a very small beer with some extra extra hops and then inject the small beer into the larger beer. I guessing though.

__________________
- JVD_X

oldschool

Recipes 

You can boil some hops in a small ammount of water and add it carefully to get the bitterness you want. Or you can get some hop extract.

Brew-boy

Recipes 

How long did you let that beer sit in the fermentor?

__________________
Next:Smoked Pilsner.
Primary:Belgian Red, American Stout w/Roeselare
On Tap:Pale Ale, English Bitter
Aging: Imperial Oatmeal Stout on Vanilla beans.

I rather owe you a dollar than cheat you out of it.."Dad"

http://lapeerareabrewers.com/

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LapeerAreaBrewers/

SpanishCastleAle

Recipes 

Take those 'predicted attenuation' numbers with a grain of salt. They are just VERY rough guidelines to compare yeasts to each other but do not necessarily indicate what you will get. The fermentability of your wort will have more effect on the attenuation.

Do you mind posting the recipe?

There's two ways your FG can be too high. Either your wort was not very fermentable and the yeast did all it could (which would leave unfermentable sugars)...or the yeast just didn't finish the job (which would leave fermentable sugars in addition to any unfermentable sugars). Or a combination of those two. Generally speaking, fermentable sugars are sweet...unfermentable sugars are not (but they add body). So if it tastes too sweet that could indicate the yeast just didn't quite finish the job. Doing a Fast Ferment Test is a great way to know 'why' your FG is too high. It's all in Kaiser's Understanding Attenuation article.

__________________
Early brewers were primarily women, mostly because it was deemed a woman's job. Mesopotamian men, of some 3,800 years ago, were obviously complete assclowns and had yet to realize the pleasure of brewing beer.- Beer Advocate

Niederhofer

Recipes 

Did you make a starter? At 7-8% ABV, it may be too late.

david_42

Recipes 

If the beer is too sweet, pitch fresh yeast to dry it out. Select something with a high attenuation, the more neutral the better.

__________________
Remember one unassailable statistic, as explained by the late, great George Carlin: "Just think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize half of them are even stupider!"

"I would like to die on Mars, just not on impact." Elon Musk

elmwood

Recipes 

brewed the beer nov 1st, racked it over a month later. tried warming the beer up and swirling it around to agitate the yeast. i think it may have dropped a couple more points but it stayed around 1.026 for about 5 days.

32 lbs domestic 2 row (Canadian)
2 lbs munich malt germany 30L
1 lb belgian aromatic (I think)
1 lb caramunich malt

3 oz hallertauer 120 min
1 oz hallertauer 30 min

1 liter starter 12 hrs in advance wyeast munich yeast

Hochkurz double decoction

sounds like a plan. i'll use dry lager yeast and maybe add some yeast nutrient. i may even put some 02 as well. i think it definitively has fermentables left but the alcohol is already around 7.5% by volume. i don't want to mix it with another batch. i was planning on drinking it for christmas.