Rack and/or pitch more yeast?

[mattmmille]

I have a strawberry blonde ale in primary and I pitched Denny's Favorite #50 yeast smack pack. Six pounds of whole, frozen strawberries were added after flame-out at 170F. I used too much water and wound up with a 1-1/2 gallon plain blonde, in addition to 6 gallons strawberry. For the small plain batch, I pitched Safale s-04 yeast. The OG came up way short. Next day, I drew off a gallon of the strawberry wort and boiled it with 3 lbs DME for 15 minutes. 13-1/2 cups added back to strawberry and 3-1/2 cups added back to plain, after cooling. That was supposed to raise SG to 1.053 range, but only got 1.040. I can live with that, if fermentation completes; but it looks like I'm stuck at 1.024 after 9 days in primary. Fermentation action was pretty vigorous for the strawberry blonde...I had a blow off on it and it was needed. The plain was slow, but attained the same SG.

So, the question is: Should I go ahead and rack these batches and/or pitch more/different yeast?

 

[Brewsday]

Do you bottle? I might consider bottling half the big batch then adding the little batch and bottling the blend. (or some other ratio)
Or, depending on the fermenter sizes, carefully stir up the yeast in the big batch and transfer a gallon to the little batch. Let sit for a week. Rack for week. Bottle.
Or rack the big batch and transfer the little batch to the yeast cake. Ferment, rack, bottle.

 

[mattmmille]

Having just gotten a refractometer for my birthday, I did not realize that they read differently in the presence of alcohol. With the adjustment, I might be ok...I'm going to compare and confirm with a hydrometer.

 

[Yooper]

Having just gotten a refractometer for my birthday, I did not realize that they read differently in the presence of alcohol. With the adjustment, I might be ok...I'm going to compare and confirm with a hydrometer.

Oh, the refractometer isn't even close once alcohol is in the mix. I bet your hydrometer reading is just fine, and the beer is done.

 

[mattmmille]

Just pulled a sample from the strawberry blonde and it reads 1.010 on a hydrometer...which is exactly what the recipe calls for. Thanks guys!