mugzz819
Well-Known Member
Ok, so 2 weeks ago I brewed an ale with a recipe based on a homebrew mexican lager that I had tasted. I pretty much adjusted the recipe to 5 gallons from 6 and used Nottingham yeast, figuring if I fermented as cool as I could it would be pretty clean. Here's the recipe for reference...
4lbs pilsner
1.5 lbs 6-row
3lbs flaked maize (from lhbs)
hopped with hallertauer
Mashed at 150 for approximately 75 minutes. I had done 3 other batches that weekend so I know my thermometer was good and I only lost 2 degrees during the mash. OG estimate was 1.049 and I got 1.053 so that seemed pretty ok.
Cooled to approximately 70 and pitched some rehydrated notty (although I was in a rush so I only let it soak in the water for approximately 10 minutes). Then brought temps down to about 65 with a swamp cooler.
The problem is, I never got a krausen, which is very unlike all of my other fermentations with notty. The airlock bubbled occasionally, but not like expected and I only got little bubbles rising to the surface, almost like carbonation bubbles. SG after 2 weeks is only 1.030 with the estimated SG being 1.014. I've tried rousing the yeast by swirling, letting it warm up, adding another pack of notty and at my wits end yesterday after still getting no activity I pitched a starter of some harvested us-05 and still nothing.
I'm fairly certain I've probably way overpitched at this point and I probably should have looked at other alternatives before the 05 but live and learn. I also have never used that much maize in a recipe so I thought between the pilsner and 6row I had enough diastatic power to convert it but maybe I was wrong.
So.....my question is, should I go pick up some amylase enzyme and add that to try to get this to finish. I don't mind letting it sit for another month but I'd like to try to get this to finish as we were looking forward to it for the hot end of summer. Any suggestions would be awesome. Thanks in advance!
4lbs pilsner
1.5 lbs 6-row
3lbs flaked maize (from lhbs)
hopped with hallertauer
Mashed at 150 for approximately 75 minutes. I had done 3 other batches that weekend so I know my thermometer was good and I only lost 2 degrees during the mash. OG estimate was 1.049 and I got 1.053 so that seemed pretty ok.
Cooled to approximately 70 and pitched some rehydrated notty (although I was in a rush so I only let it soak in the water for approximately 10 minutes). Then brought temps down to about 65 with a swamp cooler.
The problem is, I never got a krausen, which is very unlike all of my other fermentations with notty. The airlock bubbled occasionally, but not like expected and I only got little bubbles rising to the surface, almost like carbonation bubbles. SG after 2 weeks is only 1.030 with the estimated SG being 1.014. I've tried rousing the yeast by swirling, letting it warm up, adding another pack of notty and at my wits end yesterday after still getting no activity I pitched a starter of some harvested us-05 and still nothing.
I'm fairly certain I've probably way overpitched at this point and I probably should have looked at other alternatives before the 05 but live and learn. I also have never used that much maize in a recipe so I thought between the pilsner and 6row I had enough diastatic power to convert it but maybe I was wrong.
So.....my question is, should I go pick up some amylase enzyme and add that to try to get this to finish. I don't mind letting it sit for another month but I'd like to try to get this to finish as we were looking forward to it for the hot end of summer. Any suggestions would be awesome. Thanks in advance!