AHBS AG Cream Ale Fermentation

Recipe is Cream Ale from AHBS.
9.5 Lb 2 Row
4 oz crystal 40
12 Oz cara pils

Malto Dex at boil 8 oz
ABV boost at boil (corn sugar) 14 oz

1 oz Williamette @15
1 oz Fuggle @5
White labs Cream ale

"Mashed @150f W/3G
Batch sparged enough to make 6G (sorry wasnt keeping notes on that part)
Pre boil gravity of 1.047
Added malto and ABV boost then 60 Min Boil SG of 1.058

Sounds decent to be but Maybe a little confirmation from yall. Im just starting to tinker with beersmith so Im not sure if My data is all entered accurately. Please help"

Above post was from an efficiency question I asked days ago and it was replied that I was right on at 75%. Perfect.

Well now 7 days of primary and Im only down to 1.035 target final is 1.014 and I lnow im not going to be there yet but there has been no krauesen or bubbling in airloc. it was bubbling like crazy on day two and three. My basement is usually 66 or so year round. I gave it a good stir today with sanitized spoon and brought it upstairs where it is currently 72. Should this help or should I whip up a starter and re pitch? I was going to rack to secondary this evening but held off when I saw numbers where the same as 24 hrs ago.

Bump for a little help for the noob!

I'm relatively new myself, so I can't really offer any helpful advice regarding your slow/stalled fermentation, but I did have a question. What makes this a "Cream" ale? The recipe looks like a plain old pale ale, except for the yeast. I thought Cream ales had to have adjuncts like rice and/or corn to lend body to the beer. Is simply using a Cream Ale yeast enough to push this recipe into "Cream Ale" territory?

Also the maltodextrine added to boil. It should give that thicker cream ale mouth feel.

kombat said:

I'm relatively new myself, so I can't really offer any helpful advice regarding your slow/stalled fermentation, but I did have a question. What makes this a "Cream" ale? The recipe looks like a plain old pale ale, except for the yeast. I thought Cream ales had to have adjuncts like rice and/or corn to lend body to the beer. Is simply using a Cream Ale yeast enough to push this recipe into "Cream Ale" territory?

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Its a cream ale because of several reasons the SRM (color), IBU (bitterness) and SG 1.054 and FG 1.014 all of these factors help to determin style along with the yeast used which lends its own character to the beer. The corn sugar takes the place of the adjunts, normally i would just use flaked maize or grits, but the use of adjuncts like corn and rice are there to lighten the body while adding more alcohol with little flavor contribution.

Its good that you are not just going by what your airlock is doing your taking gravity readings. I would do what you have done rouse the yeast and bring up the temp to try and get the yeast working again. I would give it a minumum of three days and take another reading and see where you are. Also make sure that you have a calibrated hydrometer. That also could be your problem.

I've been using a calibrated refractometer. Is this ok?

I guess not. My bad. I found the More beer spread sheet and entered 1.047 into red OG box followed by 1.058 SG and put 1.035 into first box for checks and it converted to 1.007. I over shot fermentation and its done already in just 8 days of primary?

that spread sheet is nice, but i dunno if I would trust it in the future, get yourself a hydrometer, a refractometer is great for the pre-fermantation, brew day gravity readings, but one fermentation takes place accuracy becomes a real problem. If your beer really is at 1.008 then so what that will be fine for a Cream Ale. You want a Cream Ale that is crisp at the finish imho. In my cream ale recipe I use enzymes to get it to finish at 1.004ish and i really enjoy drinking it.

Yea, just a word on the style: A cream ale is a beer that is light in color and body, and very dry, a traditional american style that mimics many of the qualities of adjunct lagers. Typically they have a fair portion of corn in the grist. Cream is just a name and there should be no creaminess in the finished beer. Yours is also very hoppy (lots of late addition hops) for a cream ale (if we're talking about the standard BJCP styles) and the malto may give you more body than you want in a light beer.

Those refractomter charts are not much more than educated guesses. Throw them out and only use your hydrometer after fermentation has started. You shouldn't need to repitch, it has probably finished up just fine. It's an interesting pale ale, for sure. Let us know how it turns out.

WiseEyes said:

that spread sheet is nice, but i dunno if I would trust it in the future, get yourself a hydrometer, a refractometer is great for the pre-fermantation, brew day gravity readings, but one fermentation takes place accuracy becomes a real problem. If your beer really is at 1.008 then so what that will be fine for a Cream Ale. You want a Cream Ale that is crisp at the finish imho. In my cream ale recipe I use enzymes to get it to finish at 1.004ish and i really enjoy drinking it.

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daksin said:

Yea, just a word on the style: A cream ale is a beer that is light in color and body, and very dry, a traditional american style that mimics many of the qualities of adjunct lagers. Typically they have a fair portion of corn in the grist. Cream is just a name and there should be no creaminess in the finished beer. Yours is also very hoppy (lots of late addition hops) for a cream ale (if we're talking about the standard BJCP styles) and the malto may give you more body than you want in a light beer.

Those refractomter charts are not much more than educated guesses. Throw them out and only use your hydrometer after fermentation has started. You shouldn't need to repitch, it has probably finished up just fine. It's an interesting pale ale, for sure. Let us know how it turns out.

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I did and still do batches where I test the morebeer spreadsheet and refractometer against my hydrometer and its the same. I trust it.

Well I calibrated my hydrometer and took a sample. 1.022. Ok I'm right on pace after all.

I'll chime in on this since I just had a similar issue. I just got done brewing 6 days ago a vanilla caramel cream ale ( not a real cream ale classified as a brown hybrid) any how I digress.

My original gravity was 13.55 brix before pitching or 1.055. On day 6, I measured again and it was down to 7.2 brix. Now by entering this data into beersmith, it provided me an estimated 1.011 as my FG. This seemed really far off and some thing didn't seem correct... I picked up a new hydrometer this afternoon ( my other one broke) and pulled another sample. It read 1.022. So you can see there is a large margin of error between the two measuring devices and I have a few more days before I cold crash the beer.

That being said, I think that you fermented at the low end of the yeast strain range. (66-70 is the range)

divrguy said:

I did and still do batches where I test the morebeer spreadsheet and refractometer against my hydrometer and its the same. I trust it.

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Really, maybe I will give them another look, I still like a well calibrated hydrometer. I think for the new brewer getting the hang of using a hydrometer is an important skill to learn. Learning how to rely upon the readings is also important for botteling.