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As the title suggests, I'm looking for options to dry out a beer (stout) that's already been force carbed in a keg. Can I simply bring it back up to temp in hopes that fermentation will restart? It's just too darn sweet to enjoy. Thanks in advance for your constructive suggestions!

The beer in question was made with typical stout recipe with the intent to produce a sweet, low abv beer. Used northwest ale #1332. OG was 1.059, FG 1.020, which would have been fine except then I added 3 lbs of cherry puree for 5 days. The cherry sugars never fermented out because I dropped the temp to 45 degrees in an attempt to keep it sweet and flavorful. Unfortunately, this brought the gravity back up to 1.028, much to sweet for my taste.

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    Can you post some more details about the beer, specifically starting and finishing gravities, length of fermentation, temperature, grains/extracts used, yeast strain, &c.? Unless you cooled your beer down before fermentation had finished, though, it's doubtful simply bringing it back up to temperature will help.
    – Franklin P Combs
    Commented Sep 21, 2015 at 15:07
  • Typical stout recipe with the intent to produce a sweet, low abv beer. Used northwest ale #1332. OG was 1.059, FG 1.020, which would have been fine except then I added 3 lbs of cherry puree for 5 days. The cherry sugars never fermented out because I dropped the temp to 45 degrees in an attempt to keep it sweet and flavorful. Unfortunately, this brought the gravity back up to 1.028, much to sweet for my taste.
    – Greg
    Commented Sep 21, 2015 at 15:27
  • As per Franklin more details are needed. If you mashed at a high temp it could just be that you've lots of unfermentables in which case trying to ferment further won't do anything unless you use bacteria or brett
    – John
    Commented Sep 21, 2015 at 18:19

1 Answer 1

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It shouldn't be a problem. Just release pressure and raise temperature. Consider moving your beer back to fermentation tank, if you are afraid that there is not enough space for foam or that yeast will clog pipes. If that's not a problem, leave it there.

If fermentation will not start after about 3 days, you might need to add a fresh yeast slurry. Best would be from the foam of primary on a similar brew.

Carbonation is not good for yeast, but shouldn't kill them, either. It's a gamble if yours are alive and good enough. On the other hand, carbonation does not cause any permanent changes in beer, so once you get rid of it, fresh slurry will be able to finish the job.

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    I would suggest leaving it in the keg (unless there's virtually no head-space). Returning to a fermenter means racking back to a keg as well, two more chances for oxygen pickup, and probably more hassle than it's worth. Otherwise, good advice.
    – Franklin P Combs
    Commented Sep 21, 2015 at 15:56
  • @FranklinPCombs i meant "consider" as in "think if you need", not "just do it". Is it better now?
    – Mołot
    Commented Sep 21, 2015 at 17:23
  • Quick update on how things turned out with this: I pulled the keg out of the fridge, released all CO2 and added a blow-off tube to the "in" connection. I then let it sit at room temp (~72 degrees) for 7 days. No bubbles come out of the blow-off tube, but gravity tests revealed fermentation did indeed restart at some point. I was able to bring the gravity from 1.028 to 1.022 during that 7-day period. Tasting the beer also confirmed the reduction in sugars, as the flavor was much less sweet than before. Overall, a successful experiment. Thanks to all who contributed to this post. CHEERS!!!
    – Greg
    Commented Sep 28, 2015 at 19:51
  • @Greg don't know "in" tube's diameter, but if there were a foam, it might have not been enough. That's why I didn't put it in my answer. For airlock when you are reasonably sure foam will not reach it, it seems good. Of course, you probably have safety valve, but testing it with foam gluing it is something I would rather avoid, too. Well, glad this wasn't an issue :)
    – Mołot
    Commented Sep 28, 2015 at 20:51

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