What are the best techniques to ensure a lower FG?

I am trying to make a more diabetic friendly beer for someone with type 2 diabetes. I found a nice carb calculator in another post - http://www.mrgoodbeer.com/carb-cal.shtml.

It seems that making FG drop as low as possible is what lowers carbohydrates in a serving of beer. I am thinking of something that will have an OG in the 1.040 range and an FG no higher than 1.010. The processes that I am aware of to help this happen are:

Mash temp - lower temp = lower FG
Some sugars like to ferment out more than grain - honey, candi sugar

Any other tips to get a lower FG?

Are there specific yeasts that will go lower than others?

The darker the grain usually means more unfermentable sugars too. I've always had the Cali Ale yeast drop pretty low, usually ~80% att. The thing is that, though sugar isn't good for diabetics, neither is alcohol. I would be afraid to enable a diabetic by tempting them with a "friendlier" beer, but that's just me. I'm not saying you're a bad guy or anything .

Yes, yeast strain makes a big difference. Both White Labs and Wyeast have on their websites the attenuation ranges for their yeasts. Go with the highest %. Also, as fermentation slows down, you can give the carboy an occasional swirl to keep more yeast in suspension to help drive the FG down. You can also boost the temp a couple of degrees and the very end to help dry it out.

How about a low OG Saison? mash at 149° and pitch a big starter of 3711, my 1.068 OG Saison dropped to 1.002 on a few days.

Brewing Clamper said:

The darker the grain usually means more unfermentable sugars too. I've always had the Cali Ale yeast drop pretty low, usually ~80% att. The thing is that, though sugar isn't good for diabetics, neither is alcohol. I would be afraid to enable a diabetic by tempting them with a "friendlier" beer, but that's just me. I'm not saying you're a bad guy or anything .

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I am aware of the alcohol issue and so is he. It would still be nice to make him some beer that is 8 - 10 carbs per serving rather than 20 - 30 as my typical ones are. Even just being aware of the the carb count in a beer is a step forward.

Another thing to take into consideration is the abv since alcohol is converted back to sugar in your liver (causing a blood sugar spike), a shot grain alcohol has close to 200 calories and a shot of vodka has almost 100.

Exogenous enzyme, step mashing, decoction, direct addition of fermentables (sugar).

remilard said:

Exogenous enzyme, step mashing, decoction, direct addition of fermentables (sugar).

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What is "Exogenous enzyme"? Never heard of that one. How do I use it to get to a lower FG?

Beano. It is a beta-galactosidase I believe. You can add it to the fermenter to break up sugars the yeast can't use (and give a higher FG) and converts them to sugars yeast can use (resulting in a lower FG)

You can also add amylase to the mash to ensure complete conversion