Using wine yeast on stalled fermentation

[SrLobaugh]

Has anyone used wine yeast to bump a stalled fermentation? Little to no activity for nearly 3 days and my wort was super sweet @ 1.048 68°f. So I dumped a packet of premier cuvée.

 

[BrewChatter]

The champagne strain is geared more towards simple sugars than the complex ones, like maltose, in beer, so there's a chance that it won't help. It's also a 'killer strain', which means it will take out any other saccharomyces in solution If it doesn't finish the wort off, you'll have to kill that culture before you pitch anything else. For what it's worth, I like to use lager strains, like WLP 840 or something along those lines, for stuck fermentations. They can eat sugars all the way up to maltotriose, and seem to do a bang up job of finishing stuck fermentations. Lol, if you want your wort at 1.000, you can always add some gluco-amylase! That will turn everything to glucose, and the champagne strain is happy to eat that up!

 

[SrLobaugh]

I did add glucoamylase to my fermenter prior to yeast pitching. Maybe this if why my wort is super sweet.

 

[BrewChatter]

If you already added the gluco, then you should be just fine. That will break down any starches to glucose, and the Premier Cuvee should be able to munch them up. Let me know how it goes!

 

[SrLobaugh]

So it appears my beer has soured. No mold, smells fine but has a sour taste. Not sure if I had too many days between my first pitch with no activity then adding the wine yeast, but I did get a low FG to put me at about 5.18%abv... I transferred to keg and turned on co2. Wonder if I inadvertently brewed a lichtenheiner?

 

[BrewChatter]

Oh no! It could be that the champagne strain added some acidity, making it taste sour, or it could be that you picked up a lacto infection somewhere in the process. LOL, maybe you did brew a lichtenheiner, but if it's drinkable..... It's hard to tell which, but lacto usually has a pretty distinct flavor - more sour and 'bready' than just increased acidity, which just makes it taste like it's more sour than it should be. You can usually smell a lacto infection, too, which makes me lean more towards acidity from the wine yeast than a lacto infection.

 

[SrLobaugh]

Never thought about the. Champagne yeast raising the acidity...the wort was super super sweet just prior to pitching and I'm pretty sure I didn't pick up any infection. Guess I'll let it ride for another week before tapping. What's the worst that can happen lol

 

[BrewChatter]

LOL! Let me know how it comes out! It doesn't sound like you picked up an infection, so that's the only thing that I can think of. It will drink, either way!

 

[DuncB]

I cloned a King and Barnes christmas ale and used a champagne yeast to bottle it. Those bottles tasted completely different to the same aged beer in a keg ( 9 months later) had that sort of sour back note to it, so it might have been the yeast.