Stuck fermentation...add yeast or sugar?

[crashlann]

My first all grain beer, a Belgian Strong Ale is stuck around 1.033. It tastes great, but I was hoping it dropped around 1.010 or lower. I mashed too high, around 160-170F for atleast 30min before getting it down to 152F (goal was 149F). Reading Jamil's yeast book, he mentions possibly adding a large starter at its peak, although this will shock the yeast as there is already alcohol in the wort, but atleast it might clean up a little right?I have already stirred, shaken and added oxygen earlier in the fermentation. I have kept it at 79F for 6 days now. Gravity hasnt changed in 4 days.
I was thinking about making a 2 liter starter with WL001 and adding that at high activity and hoping to drop 10-20 points?
Also, Im estimating 3.5% ABV, if the yeast is still active, but just not breaking down the nonfermentables due to the higher mash temp (am I on track?), can I add some sugar to get some ethanol production. This beer tastes great right now, but its gonna be a little low on the ABV. Its only been 9 days, I pitched a 2 liter starter at the beginning that was stepped up once with half the first yeast production, (I made a 2 liter starter, then decanted half the yeast and made another 2 liter starter with that, pitching both volumes of yeast).

[spiderwrangler]

It sounds like there's a good chance you mashed high enough initially that you ended up with a bunch of unfermentables. Adding sugar may allow your yeast to make some more ethanol, but it isn't going to affect your final gravity. Pitching more yeast will only help if you have fermentables yet to work with. You could also add beano or an amylase enzyme, but you run the risk of it taking it past where you want to be. You could also save it and brew a dryer beer to blend it with...

[crashlann]

Thats kind of what I thought happened. Since I like the taste, I might just add some sugar. If I DID add Beano, could I shut down by putting it in the fridge when it gets to where I want it? Thanks for all help.

[spiderwrangler]

It would be also good to double check the calibration on your hydrometer... I have no idea how far Beano would take it down, potentially quite far. If you are kegging, you may be able to just keg and chill when it gets where you want with the Beano, but it'd be risky with bottle conditioning, as it may continue to go in the bottle, and unless you can chill the whole batch of bottles, you'll wind up with over carbed beers.

[luvs_simcoe]

This is timely.

I've used Beano. It can produce very good results, but you run the risk of bottle bombs if you bottle too early. It can look done but still be working.

Bear in mind that this first part was 3 years ago, so some details might be fuzzy.

My first partial mash beer hit a little over 160F in the mash (turned out to be a bad thermometer - I was using pretty accurate temp calculations with the strike water). The OG was 1.061 and the initial ferment with WLP051 finished around 1.030. I added Beano and the subsequent uptick in fermentation (no repitch) went down to 1.012 or so in about 2 weeks. A week later, it was at about 1.011 so I figured it was done. Long story short, early bottles were fine. Later (4-6 weeks later) bottles stored at room temp were over-carbed. Not gusher over-carbed, but definitely foamier than the originals. Based on what I know about priming rates, it probably dropped about 2 more points. I don't know whether it would have kept going - it was a hoppy beer and I drank all of the bottles before it could go too far.

The next part of my story merits this disclaimer: over the past two years or so, my ferments have been awesome. I use White Labs yeast and I typically get better attenuation than they advertise for the strain. I use MrMalty.com calculator and use pure O2 at the start of fermentation. Over 50+ batches, I've had 1 that did not hit at least the mid-point of White Labs' expected attenuation, but it was above the bottom.

Two weeks ago, I brewed a very high gravity Belgian dark strong ale. I repitched from a previous ferment without measuring anything, assuming that as usual everything had gone to plan. It hadn't. The original beer finished higher than expected. The repitched beer did too (1.096 to 1.055). Because it was already a hostile environment for yeast (5+% ABV) I pitched a fresh starter and a crushed Beano tablet. The beer has dropped in gravity very slowly but consistently for two weeks. The problem is that I don't know where it will stop.

The bottom line is that if you pitch Beano, be very careful. It will keep going slowly. Keep an eye on it. You might not be able to stop it, but you can probably drink it fast if it won't stop.

[crashlann]

Is Beano easy to use? Does it come with directions? Do you always pitch it with additional yeast? I can definitely watch it close and refrigerate the whole batch when I have it carbed where I want it. That sounds better than pitching more yeast. Does Beano breakdown the unfermentables different than yeast? Thanks for all the help.

[spiderwrangler]

Beano comes with instructions, but for consumption, not use in beer! There are commercially available amylase enzymes available through home brewing retailers as well.

[crashlann]

If I did use an Amylase Enzyme, or Beano if I cant find AE locally, and I decided to pasteurize the beer after it gets to where I want it before bottling, how much yeast would I use for bottling 5.5 gallons of 6-7% beer? Would you use dry or liquid, and how much please? Thanks.