Stuck Fermentation - Prickly Pear Mead

[djkeller86]

Hi all!

I would consider myself an intermediate level beer homebrewer, but I recently decided to embark on a new brewing adventure....mead.

I'm currently brewing Charlie Papazian's Prickly Pear Mead recipe and I have a feeling I'm dealing with some stuck fermentation. I've done a lot of reading on the topic, but I'm looking for some reassurance from the forum.

Details:
Brewday 12/22/14 SG: 1.103
1/10/15 Gravity: 1.032
1/18/15 Gravity: 1.030
Yield: 5 gallons
Yeast: 30g of EC-1118
Temperature:74-76 degrees F

On 1/10, I added some yeast energizer and gave a bit of a gentle stir.

Today, 1/18, I racked the mead off the old yeast and pitched another 5g of EC-1118.

Has anyone ran into a similar situation with their mead? I tasted a sample and it tastes fine (can't detect any contamination just a bit sugary still). Maybe I'm not being patient enough but any insight would be greatly appreciated!

-Dan

 

[Brett_Bellmore]

I made that back around 2000, my very first effort at making anything alcoholic, and had no trouble. Not a difficult mead to make. In fact, I've been trying to convince the wife we should plant some prickly pear, now that we're down south where it will grow.

It ended rather sweet in my case, too, but I like it that way.

Comes out a beautiful color, doesn't it?

 

[djkeller86]

Agreed, beautiful sunset coloring right now. Hope it says that way!

 

[MarshmallowBlue]

Well it dropped 2 points in a week, so it could still be dropping. Getting it to restart (if it is indeed stuck) after the alcohol is that high will be a long row to hoe, if you get ti restarted at all. If it continues to drop to 1.020, your probably in good shape with that alcohol to match it.

Next time, read into staggered nutrient additions, and add them earlier on in fermentation (like at pitch in increments).

If it does end up stalling and it's still too sweet, you can make a very dry mead (make it to finish at 1.000 or below) and blend it with he sweet one.

 

[djkeller86]

Thanks Marshmallow, those are some good suggestions. Now that I think about it, I remember Papazian saying something about blending a drier mead with the batch if it's too sweet for your liking. Makes a lot more sense to me now. Hard for me to be patient, but I will continue to give it some time to see if it will keep dropping.

 

[noblesquirrel]

Well it dropped 2 points in a week, so it could still be dropping. Getting it to restart (if it is indeed stuck) after the alcohol is that high will be a long row to hoe, if you get ti restarted at all. If it continues to drop to 1.020, your probably in good shape with that alcohol to match it.

Next time, read into staggered nutrient additions, and add them earlier on in fermentation (like at pitch in increments).

If it does end up stalling and it's still too sweet, you can make a very dry mead (make it to finish at 1.000 or below) and blend it with he sweet one.

Another option that will likely work is to make a small starter, overpitched. From the looks of things, there may be a number of culprits. Given that it didn't have the nutrients needed during the growth phase, it likely didn't have a great one. It'll definitely keep going in time, it'll just take a while. Degassing and nutrients are the two things that can accelerate fermentation. More advanced techniques, like adding Potassium Carbonate (thought I use Potassium Hydroxide), will work the pH back into a healthy, low stress range and give the yeast the potassium they need to keep chugging along. I had a 1.120 Tupelo Traditional that I made back on 12/21 that I checked the gravity on last week and it was down to 1.002, using the Cross Evolution strain from Lallemand. It's amazing what you can coax out of a yeast if you treat it well. Good luck!