Rescue an under-carbonated Perry

[Schikitar]

Hi guys,

I made my first Perry a few months ago (using my own pears I minced and pressed about 19l). I used carbonation drops during bottling and I was actually paranoid of bottle bombs so I split the 750ml PET bottles by putting only 1 drop in half of the bottles and two drops in the other half.

Fast forward to now and the two-drop bottles are only slightly carbonated - sort of at the point where it seems like it should be fizzy but it's just not. The one-drop bottles just don't have anything going on. Flavour wise it came out pretty good but the mouthfeel is a little 'thick' and it seems like it needs the carbonation to lift it.

So, can I do anything to fix this OR should I just chalk it up to experience and try to get it right next year when I harvest my pear tree again?

Cheers!

 

[Airgead]

Usual suspects - too cool for secondary fermantation (keep a bottle or so somewhere nicer and warm for a week and see how that goes) or too much alcohol stopping the yeast from doing the secondary (how strong is it, as what yeast did you use?)

Cheers
dave

 

[Grott]

I don't think opening and adding extra sugar drops will help.
You state " the mouthfeel is a little thick.." I'd then fill a glass say 3/4 and add a bought pear cider to give a boost?

 

[Schikitar]

The secondary fermentation in the bottles at the time were probably at around 20 degrees, but it's much colder now, probably 10-12 degrees.

The OG was 1.066 (I had added a kilo of sugar as per the recipe I was using) and I dry-pitched one packet of Mangrove Jacks Cider Yeast. After three days there was a bit of fizzing but not much activity so I added another packet of yeast. Almost within an hour it took off and had a very active airlock. Three days later and most activity had stopped. In total I left it for 14 days in the fermenter, the last three days it held 1.012 consistently. I then took this to two secondaries (I dry-hopped one and left the other), after another 4 days I bottled.

So, that's pretty much that. I did try sprucing it with soda water but that watered it down too much and didn't really lift the carbonation, perhaps pimping it with a commercial cider is something I could try. I have considered the soda stream but fear the potential outcome! I also wondered what would happen if I added a little more sugar and some fresh yeast to the bottles, or even dumping everything back into a priming bucket, reintroduce some sugar and yeast and re-bottle, is that even a thing?! Sorry, I'm only new to brewing so I'm not sure...

 

[manticle]

Get a few, upend gently to get yeast back in suspension and let warm to 20 deg for a week or two. Test again.

Did you measure gravity before bottling?

To answer your question - you can reprime but avoid pouring out and rebottling and wait till you've tried the above before trying.

 

[Schikitar]

Cool, thanks, I'll give this a try and see how it goes...