Interesting little pickle I'm in

So I made this recipe but converted it to all grain and bottled it two weeks ago with the lactose. Anyhow I opened one today to see how it was coming along and when I poured it there was absolutely no carbonation, and it was fairly sweet. So I'm not sure if it's because I didn't add enough priming sugar and the sweetness I'm tasting is the lactose or if the yeast didn't make it and I'm tasting the lactose and priming sugar.

Now I'm wondering if it would be wiser to add more yeast or more sugar. Any thoughts?

Have you tried rolling the bottles to get the yeast back into suspension, also open another bottle and see how it is doing and recap it. May be that you just got a bad bottle.

I would not add more sugar(bottle bomb extravaganza) I would repitch some est.

When you say you bottled it with lactose, do you mean lactose was used as the priming sugar? If so, your beer is never going to carbonate, because lactose is a non-fermentable sugar. Try dextrose, DME, or even table sugar. Sadly, that sweetness you got from the lactose won't go away, but maybe the carbonation will tone it down a bit.

bigzippo said:

So I made this recipe but converted it to all grain and bottled it two weeks ago with the lactose. Anyhow I opened one today to see how it was coming along and when I poured it there was absolutely no carbonation, and it was fairly sweet. So I'm not sure if it's because I didn't add enough priming sugar and the sweetness I'm tasting is the lactose or if the yeast didn't make it and I'm tasting the lactose and priming sugar.

Now I'm wondering if it would be wiser to add more yeast or more sugar. Any thoughts?

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So you put in priming sugar (corn sugar or something fermentable) as well as lactose, correct?

What was the priming sugar and how much did you use? Did you weigh it or measure it? Also, when you added priming sugar, are you positive you got it mixed in well? It is entirely possible to get too much sugar in some bottles and not enough in others without thorough mixing.

Finally, two weeks may just not be long enough. The yeast should be fine if you had a normal length fermentation. Try moving the bottles to a warmer spot and swirl them to re-suspend any yeast that may have dropped out. Open another in another week or so and see how it's doing. I've had plenty of batches show very little carbonation after two weeks and be perfect after four.

llazy_llama said:

When you say you bottled it with lactose, do you mean lactose was used as the priming sugar? If so, your beer is never going to carbonate, because lactose is a non-fermentable sugar. Try dextrose, DME, or even table sugar. Sadly, that sweetness you got from the lactose won't go away, but maybe the carbonation will tone it down a bit.

Click to expand...

He added both lactose and priming sugar.

Yea, I added lactose and priming sugar. It should be mixed thoroughly, I poured it in my bottling bucket then racked on top of it. That's what I do every time I bottle.

I'll try swirling them around and see if that helps. I honestly didn't even think of that. Thanks

And give it more time. I had an Irish Red last year that took 2 months to fully carbonate. I don't know why. But the the first 4 bottles I tried were flat, and disappointing. Then after leaving it a few months it was great! That was the first and last time I used DME to prime.