Baseline Berliner Weiss

[Kealia]

Done wrong enterobacter will produce a vomit smell/taste.

Would that be better or worse than this?

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[mashani]

The exposure to oxygen might promote the growth of enterobacter bacteria before the lacto does its souring. So keeping oxygen to a minimum either by purging the kettle with CO2 and covering the wort with Saran Wrap or a little head space as possible is critical during the souring phase. Done right the lacto will produce a clean sour taste. Done wrong enterobacter will produce a vomit smell/taste.

Ok, that makes since I guess, but it's only a problem because of this particular process and/or if sanitation isn't good.

In a true mixed culture (yeast + lacto) IE a Berliner blend fermentation this simply won't happen, as the yeast fermentation changes the alcohol/ph and reduces the oxygen levels quick enough to demolish those bugs before they can do any damage.

Pedio could still make baby puke later, but hopefully you don't have any in there, or you would have consumed it long before the pedio really got into it. (pedio is slow, but it is what makes mixed culture bug farm sours only good to drink when somewhat fresh or old, but not so much in between). The baby puke and diacetyl it makes eventually goes away if you ignore it long enough.

So then my question is how do actual kettle souring people avoid the same potential problem? (oh, I think you answered this, purge kettle with CO2?). I haz no CO2, so I could not do this.

kitty.jpg

You know I've made cat but ale before right?

[Kealia]

Haha, yes - I remember that!

Out of curiosity, how long does it take to sour a BW using the mixed pitch? I know this would somewhat require dedicated equipment on the cold side due to exposure to the Lacto, but I'm curious. I could see dedicating my 3G fermentor to sours at some point. Same thing with a bottling wand as I would bottle those for my wife and not expose my kegs and taps to it.

[Inkleg]

So then my question is how do actual kettle souring people avoid the same potential problem? (oh, I think you answered this, purge kettle with CO2?). I haz no CO2, so I could not do this.

If you don't have CO2, laying Saran Wrap directly on top of the wort works too. The goal is to limit O2 as much as possible.

Would that be better or worse than this?

kitty.jpg

Depends on what style your aiming for.

[mashani]

Haha, yes - I remember that!

Out of curiosity, how long does it take to sour a BW using the mixed pitch? I know this would somewhat require dedicated equipment on the cold side due to exposure to the Lacto, but I'm curious. I could see dedicating my 3G fermentor to sours at some point. Same thing with a bottling wand as I would bottle those for my wife and not expose my kegs and taps to it.

Assuming you make a proper (highly fermentable) wort, so that the complex sugars don't remain and make it harder for the sour to come through, and you keep your hops to a minimum (no more then 5-7 AAUs, err on the low side if you are going to err, because more will make the lacto sad):

Then, The White Labs Berliner blend can turn around beer in 2 months if you keep it above 70 degrees and pitch enough of it.

The Wyeast one, about 3 months if you keep it above 66 degrees and pitch enough of it.

The Wyeast one has some Brett in it, the White Labs one does not. The Brett adds complexity and likely old world authenticity, however some people think it makes worse beer because they don't like bretty funk. If you don't like brett beers, stick with the White labs one. I like the Wyeast one, but I'm used to Brett. The White labs yeast will give you a "cleaner" beer, which is just as good or maybe better, depending on what you want. Sometime simple is better.

The longer you let it sit the more sour and more bretty (if using Wyeast) it will get, even in bottles, up to a point. You don't have to tie up a fermenter to let it age and sour, it will do it in the bottles. So if it's not sour enough in those timeframes just leave it sit more in the bottles. Just remember it will carb a bit more as it ages, especially if it's got the Brett, so if you are planning on aging in bottles, be cautious with priming sugar. I guess this wouldn't be an issue at all in kegs, as long as you don't mind having a "sour keg" and "sour lines" and "sour tap". I don't know how you'd do that, I don't keg.

You can mix a Kolsch or German Ale strain and a pack of Lacto and do similar things yourself. You do want to pitch less of the Ale strain then you normally would to let the lacto get more into the mix up front. The balance of the two will determine how sour it gets how fast. The blends above are already balanced as to turn around beer about as quick as is possible.

If your temperatures are lower, or your wort is more "sweet" then times will probably increase.

[mashani]

BTW when I made those and bottled them, what I did is like what I do now with my Brett C beers. I just tried one up front, and if it wasn't where I wanted it, then every few weeks or a month or so if it seems to be progressing slowly to see how it is. If I really like how it is, then I throw them all in the fridge. If I think it needs more, then I let them sit.

Also BTW, those temps I threw out are also conditioning temps. IE if I get a Brett beer when my basement temps are low here, it won't do much of anything for a long time, and then when my basement gets up more towards 66-68 degrees in the summerish months it wakes up my beer is carbonated properly in no time, and/or if I over shot the priming sugar they go into the fridge soon afterword's. It is rare that I actually get a Brett beer until my temps warm up, but once in a while it happens. Luckily I usually know it's a brett beer before I bottle it regardless because my fermenters are semi-open so at about day 14 or so (or a week or so after my fermentation settles down) enough oxygen gets in that it makes a pellicle. The brett that lives here makes pellicles quite readily when exposed to oxygen. This is one of the reasons I've stuck with free venting fermenters instead of airlocked ones. With airlocked fermenters I'd still have the brett, but might not know it and prime my beers fully and then... boom.

Just like my Brett beers, I didn't wait for 2 months or 3 months to bottle the Berliners. I bottled them as soon as the sacc chewed through stuff and the gravity "seemed" stable for a few days, and then just used less priming sugar and let the rest happen in the bottle and threw them in the fridge when I liked them. You don't need to tie up a fermenter or a secondary fermenter for that long to do this, as long as you are careful about priming initially lightly and willing to be patient for it to carb up the rest of the way (IE ignore them until 2 or 3 months).

I think I'm going to make one in my M&B sometime when my ambient temps are appropriate. I think I'll just let it ferment right in the M&B, I have the lid/stopper and airlock for it. I can just bottle directly from it, and then boil some water to murder the bugs without contaminating any equipment. I've been avoiding live bug beers (besides my brett) with the plastic fermenters, except for little 1 gallon cider jug batches here and there. I could do a 5 gallon Berliner or Goze in the M&B. Maybe even a 6 gallon one. That would make it worth tying up the thing for a bit longer then I'd like, and less hassle then racking into a bunch of 1 gallon cider jugs.

[Kealia]

Good stuff.

Today I took a second ph reading and it looks to be just under 3.6. I say just under because I'm using ph strips that I bought years ago to check my StarSan and they only increment in 0.4 colors/measurements. When I checked Saturday it looked pretty solid at 3.6 and today it looks a bit lighter so there it is. I know these strips aren't very accurate but at least it verified for me that the ph did drop from the initial measurement of the wort, so that's a positive.

I dumped from the carboy into the kettle (not worrying about oxygen at this point) and brought it to a boil. I just went into auto-pilot instead of stopping to hold it @ 180, but no harm no foul. I let it sit for 10 minutes at that temperature just to be sure and ran off a little through the spigot to pasteurize whatever was in there, too.

Chilled to 70, racked to SS BrewBucket Mini (3.5G), pitched the Notty and set the temp control at 70. I've actually never used Notty before so hopefully it doesn't need too much headspace as I've got just over 3G in the 3.5G fermentor. I don't think I can rig a blowoff to this setup but I can go try if I need to.

Overall, the process was super easy, if not a bit uncertain at times - but it's like that with any new process, really. I'm not concerned about not hitting 3.2 - 3.4 ph because it was an arbitrary number I picked as a target anyway. What I have now is a baseline (thus, the thread name) to determine future brews. If it's not sour/tart enough, then next time I can wait longer and see if it drops more. And now that I have a dropper I can actually measure and use the lactic acid to drop the wort to 4.5 like I intended, too.

One thing I've been reading, is that some people run their starters up to 110, which is well over the Omega yeasts STATED recommended temps. Anybody have experience with it at that temp?

[mashani]

Not used the Omega stuff, but I don't know of any lacto that will die at 110, and lacto isn't like yeast where too warm temps will lead to off flavors or the like. Its more a matter of did you kill it or not.

Doing that would be "bad" with a mixed yeast/lacto blended live strain, but probably not with the Omega pure lacto stuff.

EDIT: Oh and Notty doesn't make a big krausen and it flocs out hard. For whatever it's worth K-97 would probably give you a more authentic result, but it makes ginormous krausen.

[Kealia]

Oh and Notty doesn't make a big krausen and it flocs out hard.

I ended up rigging up a blow-off tube pretty easily after posting last night since I had the ability to. Better safe than sorry.

[Kealia]

First - I'm glad I hooked up a blowoff....it was blowing hard for the first few days.

Second - given the vigorous activity and the fact that this was a log gravity beer I checked the gravity yesterday and it's only down to 1.016.

I really expected it to be done by now. I'll check again on Wednesday and if it isn't lower I'm going to pitch another pack of Notty in a small active starter tonseemkf I can get it going.

I know the yeast struggles a bit with the lower pH but I would have thought a full packet in a 3g batch would do the trick. Then again, this is my first time using this yeast - maybe it needs more than a week, but it started at 1.030 so I wouldn't think so.

A few more days will tell.

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[mashani]

I'm usually using Notty in the winter in the low 60s or even upper 50s, and although I am throwing a full pack into a 3 gallon batch, I just assume it's going to be slow at low temps, and I just tend to ignore it for 3 weeks and then bottle it. I think it's actually done most of the time in about 10-14 days at those temps though. In the upper 60s, it should finish in 5-7 days I'd think normally. So I dunno.

[Inkleg]

Throwing my Lacto hat into this ring. I have a 1 liter starter of Omega 605 that I started yesterday and a quite full kettle of 1.030 wort cooling down to 90º. My plan is to pitch the lacto and cover the surface with saran wrap. I'll keep it at 90º in my fermentation fridge till Wednesday then bring to 180º for a half hour, chill and pitch 05.

[Kealia]

I'm usually using Notty in the winter in the low 60s or even upper 50s, and although I am throwing a full pack into a 3 gallon batch, I just assume it's going to be slow at low temps, and I just tend to ignore it for 3 weeks and then bottle it. I think it's actually done most of the time in about 10-14 days at those temps though. In the upper 60s, it should finish in 5-7 days I'd think normally. So I dunno.

Maybe 7 days (6 really) is just too quick to expect it to be done. I'm just used to stuff being done that quickly, I suppose.


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[Kealia]

Throwing my Lacto hat into this ring. I have a 1 liter starter of Omega 605 that I started yesterday and a quite full kettle of 1.030 wort cooling down to 90º. My plan is to pitch the lacto and cover the surface with saran wrap. I'll keep it at 90º in my fermentation fridge till Wednesday then bring to 180º for a half hour, chill and pitch 05.

Whatcha brewin' ?

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[bpgreen]

I usually let Nottingham ferment for a few weeks in the low to mid 50s, but Danstar says it can finish in 9 days at 50, so I'm just being overly cautious.

They say it can finish in 4 days in the mid 60s.

They don't give an attenuation percentage, but just say "high." From my notes, I get high 70s to mid 80s.

I'd think it would be finished by now, but I'd expect the fg to get down to about 1.006 with an og ood 1.030.