Stuck Fermentation Belgian Golden Strong

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Normans54

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Hey everybody,

I posted something about this approximately a week ago, and I am still having some issues. I brewed an all grain 4-5 gal batch of a Belgian Golden Strong Ale on 8/11/2015 with a starting gravity of 1.080. I did a 3 stage step mash with a 10 min protein rest at 133, 40 mins at 145, and 20 mins at 154. I aerated my wort using a spray aerator head on the end of my chiller. After cooling it overnight to pitching temp, I pitched a 2 liter starter of White Labs' WLP 570 that I made using a stir plate (I cold crashed and decanted the starter before I pitched). I had a few days of decent fermentation, but it stalled out at around 1.035. I swirled the carboy twice and raised the fermentation temperature from 72 to 74 degrees using a Ranco dual stage temperature controller hooked up to a small heater which got the gravity to drop to about 1.024 (as measured with a hydrometer). I gave it another swirl and brought the temperature up some more and that got it down to about 1.019, but it looks like it has stalled out for good. I am still 8-10 points off. What should I do? Should I pitch more yeast (and if so, should I use the same WLP570)? If so, should I create a starter (and how big of a starter), and should I cold crash/decant it after leaving it on the stir plate? I have heard that you want to add the whole starter without decanting, but I am concerned about it affecting the flavor. Thanks so much!
 
Granted, I've only attempted pitching the same yeast once when a saison stalled, but that was a failure so I have never attempted to do so again. I let time take care of it (again, only done so with Saison). I assume the environment with its alcohol content is far too hostile for ale yeast at this point. I have a friend who have had the same issue a few times when brewing barley wine or other strong ales, and he pitched champagne yeast in order to bring the gravity down. So if you don't think time will heal (or you are impatient), and don't mind a minor tweak to the taste of the final beer, maybe try champagne yeast.
 
Tough call, depending on how much specialty malts you used, this could be close to your final gravity. It sounds like you aerated before the wart was completely chilled, which can decrease the oxygen pickup, but I don't think that is your problem.
I was just reading through "brewing like a monk" and apparently a lot of the belgian style yeasts are allowed to free rise in temperature towards the tail end of the fermentation to avoid having them stall out. I don't think your beer is so big that an ale yeast wouldn't be able to take over though. I had pacman bring a 1.090 down to 1.018 for my best beer batch yet. I could be wrong because in my case the yeast were gradually acclimated to the rising abv, but I still think it is worth a shot. Those belgian guys do use champaign yeasts for bottling, so I doubt it would throw off the character of the beer
If you had some yeast cake from a strongish beer sitting around you could do a secondary pitch and continue to raise the temperature a bit more.
 
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