Help needed with a very mild mild.

[Eskimo John]

I am brewing a mild for the first time as as sort of nostalgic brew. I used to enjoy a pint of mild on the rare occasion I could find find one when I was young and now as mild is as rare as hens teeth I thought I would have a go at making one for the benefit of the education of my grown up sons.

Following a recipe from the grainfather app I brewed a dark mild but was horrified to only get an OG of 1.026. Now a mild is mild and I was expecting to produce a low alcohol beer but this was lower than I hoped. But I pressed on and set it to ferment using Wyeast english ale yeast, 2 packets in a 23 litre fermenter.

Fermentation has now stopped only a few days after the brew and the gravity is now 1.020 giving a 0.8% beer. Not what I had in mind. 1.026 might have given me a 2.75% beer and I would have been happier with 3.25%

So what to do?

Add more yeast to restart fermentation?

Add some brewing sugar and hope fermentation restarts? If so, how much?

Both of the above?

Something else?

Tast-wise the wort seems OK for what it is, and so the end product seems to be promising and worth saving if I can. Any advice would be welcome.

 

[Sadfield]

Given the low OG, it looks like the problem started before fermentation, so it might be useful to post the recipe in order to work out what went wrong, before offering a solution.

 

[YeastFace]

Such a high FG would indicate a high mash temp and/or lots of unfermentable malts. Agree that the recipe is the place to start.

Also are you using the same hydrometer?

Mild is also making somewhat of a comeback, so hope you can find some commercial examples.

 

[Eskimo John]

Recipe used:

Mild Mannered Dog
English-Style Dark Mild Ale
Batch Size
23 L
Boil Time
75 mins
Mash Efficiency
60%
Mash Volume
13.18 L
Sparge Volume
10.13 L
IBU
22.6
Colour (EBC)
68.3
Fermentables
Amber Malt 3.62 kg (87%)
Caramel/Crystal Malt 0.39 kg (9%)
Chocolate Malt 0.13 kg (3%)
Mash 67.5 °C 60 min
Fuggles (IBU: 22.6) 37 g Pellet Boil 60 min
British Ale Yeast 2 packets
Fermentation temp 20 degrees C

 

[Cheshire Cat]

I think Amber malt is your problem you should have used pale and added 5-10% Amber.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

I think there’s more wrong here. Amber malt is not so different to pale and for this recipe, even at just 60% efficiency, I get an OG of around 1036 from a quick calculation. The mash temperature isn’t especially high so I’d expect a fair attenuation of maybe 75%-80% giving an FG around 1010 and an ABV of 3.4%

Did you buy crushed grain or buy whole grain, if whole did you forget to crush it? I know this sounds silly but you never know! This could explain the low OG but not the high FG. Is it possible your mash temperature was significantly higher, 76 rather than 67?

So what to do about it? I’d start again but if you want you can add 1.5Kg sugar and leave it to ferment to add around 3% ABV to the 0.8% you’ve got now - you’ll still have plenty of body.

 

[Sadfield]

Are these GF app recipes provided by other users? I'm wondering if so, the user made or sourced some Diastatic Amber Malt? I've occasionally seen it sold as Belgian Amber Malt.

My feeling is the mash was so lacking in enzymatic activity it was more of a steep, extracting a very dextinous wort.

What to do now?

what to do about it? I’d start again but if you want you can add 1.5Kg sugar and leave it to ferment to add around 3% ABV to the 0.8% you’ve got now - you’ll still have plenty of body.

Yes, this. I was thinking Extra light DME, but it's the same solution and tricky to call without tasting what you have. And some neutral dry yeast to be on the safe side.

Other options are finding yeasts or enzymes that'll to go at what's already there, but probably a bit too much hassle and flogging a dead horse. Brett would be my choice, but a complete experiment regarding how it'll taste.

Or get a vinegar mother and make a lifetime supply of malt vinegar. Chippy teas every week.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

I think Amber malt is your problem you should have used pale and added 5-10% Amber.

Yes, I use MO in my mild and don’t use amber at all. You may have a good point about the quantity of amber used in this recipe.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

My feeling is the mash was so lacking in enzymatic activity it was more of a steep, extracting a very dextinous wort.

This is a good point and probably the point @Cheshire Cat was making and I failed to pick up - sorry Chesh!

 

[An Ankoù]

I am brewing a mild for the first time as as sort of nostalgic brew. I used to enjoy a pint of mild on the rare occasion I could find find one when I was young and now as mild is as rare as hens teeth I thought I would have a go at making one for the benefit of the education of my grown up sons.

Following a recipe from the grainfather app I brewed a dark mild but was horrified to only get an OG of 1.026. Now a mild is mild and I was expecting to produce a low alcohol beer but this was lower than I hoped. But I pressed on and set it to ferment using Wyeast english ale yeast, 2 packets in a 23 litre fermenter.

Fermentation has now stopped only a few days after the brew and the gravity is now 1.020 giving a 0.8% beer. Not what I had in mind. 1.026 might have given me a 2.75% beer and I would have been happier with 3.25%

So what to do?

Add more yeast to restart fermentation?

Add some brewing sugar and hope fermentation restarts? If so, how much?

Both of the above?

Something else?

Tast-wise the wort seems OK for what it is, and so the end product seems to be promising and worth saving if I can. Any advice would be welcome.

The fermentables aren't, really! Modern amber malt isn't diastatic and won't convert it's starches so your drop in SG is probably down to the fermentable sugars in the crystal malt fermenting. You need to start again, using some pale ale malt or even mild malt.
Another thing you could do is add some amyloglucosidase or a similar starch reducing enzyme to the beer and let it ferment out, but the beer quite be quite unusual with all that amber malt, I think I'd be inclined to start again.

I think you may have misread the recipe. A little research gives this:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/mild-mannered-ale-ag-e-uk-us.52776/

 

[Eskimo John]

The recipe above is a cut and past from the original so not misread I think. The grain was crushed but was quite heavy in the mash. I didn't get a stuck mash but I reckon it was a close run thing.

I don't want to chuck it away so will add sugar and try to restart the fermentation. If that doesn't work I will think again.

Thanks all.

 

[MrRook]

87% amber malt? That's your problem.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

The fermentables aren't, really! Modern amber malt isn't diastatic and won't convert it's starches so your drop in SG is probably down to the fermentable sugars in the crystal malt fermenting. You need to start again, using some pale ale malt or even mild malt.
Another thing you could do is add some amyloglucosidase or a similar starch reducing enzyme to the beer and let it ferment out, but the beer quite be quite unusual with all that amber malt, I think I'd be inclined to start again.

I think you may have misread the recipe. A little research gives this:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/mild-mannered-ale-ag-e-uk-us.52776/

That looks more like it. I did think the colour looked wrong, I’d be happier with the stated SRM in this recipe.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

The recipe above is a cut and past from the original so not misread I think. The grain was crushed but was quite heavy in the mash. I didn't get a stuck mash but I reckon it was a close run thing.

I don't want to chuck it away so will add sugar and try to restart the fermentation. If that doesn't work I will think again.

Thanks all.

Yeast will ferment sugar so that should be okay. When/if you do make this mild again use Maris Otter instead of the Amber malt and I’m sure you’ll do fine.

 

[AJA]

The recipe above is a cut and past from the original so not misread I think. The grain was crushed but was quite heavy in the mash. I didn't get a stuck mash but I reckon it was a close run thing.

I don't want to chuck it away so will add sugar and try to restart the fermentation. If that doesn't work I will think again.

Thanks all.

The sugar will ferment but you'll still be left with a high FG beer. Milds come in sweet and dry variants so it could be tasty.

 

[An Ankoù]

The recipe above is a cut and past from the original so not misread I think. The grain was crushed but was quite heavy in the mash. I didn't get a stuck mash but I reckon it was a close run thing.

I don't want to chuck it away so will add sugar and try to restart the fermentation. If that doesn't work I will think again.

Thanks all.

The problem isn't the crush or the sparge, EJ, it's the grain. Base malts like pale ale malt and vienna malt are dried at a relatively low temperature as part of the malting process. This not only keeps the grains pale, but it also keeps the enzymes "alive". Without these enzymes, you can mash the grain for as long as you like, but nothing will happen to covert the starches into sugars. Most beer yeasts won't ferment starches directly. Roasted malts like amber malt, brown malt and chocolate malt are roasted at such a high temperature that the enzymes are denatured. This means that in order to use them, you have to mix them with at least 50% of an enzyme-rich malt such as pale malt. (Maris Otter is just a variety of pale malt). Confusion can happen when using very old recipes where both amber malt and brown malt were made in such a way that they retained their enzymes and could be mashed and fermented. this is not the case with modern Amber and Brown, though.

 

[Cheshire Cat]

Crisp’s website says use Amber at 5%.

 

[Sadfield]

Most % recommendations are based on flavour, though. You could use amber at 65-70% if the remaining malt has enough DP.

 

[Eskimo John]

Interesting replies, I am learning a lot!
In future I won't use a recipe that hasent got a base of 50% pale malt or more!

 

[Cheshire Cat]

I would go for 80%+ base malts doesn’t have to be all pale.