Bsquared

Recipes 

I took a sample off the Barrel last week, I'm still waiting for the pellical (sp) to fall. I have had the barrel at a constant 68ºF so I guess that is slowing things down a bit. good for me because I've been in a holding pattern for brewing the last couple months.

Flavor wise, I'm happy to say there is little to no acidic acid, but sadly also there is little to no lactic acid coming through. The funk though is right there but not over powering,and balancing for how dry the beer is for being around 9%ABV. I think blending this beer with a little bit of newer beer and sour cherry will brighten it up a bit and bring it a little closer to the Cuvee.

The brandy from the barrel did not come through, as was mentioned earlier in the thread. This barrel was more of a neutral barrel, but the oak and tannins are coming through, but don't over power the beer.

Over all I'd say its an interesting beer right now, but needs some more time. I will have a keg or two of it at NHC, so you guys can try it then and tell me what you think. And for those who make it up to camp Everest (my house) we can pop a bottle of the real deal and do a little side by side comparison.

saq

Recipes 

A few things.

1: Brett on its own produces very little acids that will contribute towards a beer tasting sour. I have produced MANY beers that were fermented with 100% Brett or Brett in secondary and they are not sour. Some funky pineapple fruit aromas that might give a hint of tartness but we are talking apple level tart versus lemon level sour.
An example of this is Orval, which has a sacc primary ferment and then brett B secondary ferment. It is funky with no hint of sourness. Another delicious example of a quad with brett B in the secondary is Odell Saboteur (which uses Orval brett) which has some nice funk but again no sourness.
One thing to note on this is that White Labs Brett C culture has very low amounts of lactobacillus and pychia bacteria in it which will produce some very slight sourness but it quits pretty early. Perfect for making an Oud Bruin though.

2: The CdT dregs are crucial because it has some pretty unique lactic/acetic acid producing bacteria species that can survive in high alcohol environments and continue to produce lactic and acid where almost all species crap out and die. Brett will still survive and produce more alcohol but again we aren't talking more sourness, just more alcohol.
Some of the previous bugs I've worked with would have crapped out at 8-9% but these guys kept going at 12%+.
I haven't used any commercially available souring bugs that can kick ass and take names like my CdT culture can and I've used WLP655, wyeast lambic and roeselare.

Read Wild Brews where Jeff Sparrow talks about the alcohol tolerance of brett, lactobacillus, pediococous, acetobacter, etc. This is why almost all the sours from Belgium are less than 8% ABV.

I racked a 100% Brett B Brown (which wasnt sour at all) into my barrel after finishing off the CdT batch 2 and its about 4 months old now and amazingly intensely sour. Its a little acetic heavy and I'm going to try and figure out how to adjust the lactic sourness up a little bit more.

snowveil

Recipes 

I just made a Brett B beer and it added TONS of barnyard and funk. Are you sure it was Brett B and not another strain of Brett that you used?

weirdboy

Recipes 

Hey my homebrew club is making the "wild brews" version and then we are racking it to a chardonnay barrel. I believe the bulk of it is going to be brewed up this weekend, although we may end up splitting the batch between a couple of brew sessions just due to the volume and availability of systems. I'd sure love to sample yours if you're going to be around at NHC. I am planning on attending but still haven't made arrangements yet...

Bsquared

Recipes 

Sure thing Weirdboy, I'm hoping to have a couple kegs ready for NHC club night. If you can't make it for the whole conference, you should at least try and hit up pro-brewer night and or club night, they are both a lot of fun and you can but tickets for just those events, I think last year they where $40 a piece.

are you guys planing on doing the primary fermentation in the barrel, or will it be for the secondary only?

Also, I agree with saq about the dregs of the Cdt having some supper bug in it that can handle the high % of EtOH. I was using WL sour blend, but it did not sour this beer.I talked to Tomme at lost abbey before I started and he was trying to steer me to using the dregs from a bottle, but I was more familliar with the WL blend so I stuck with it.

I'm not too sure about adding the dregs now, and I really want to avoid having this beer turn more to the acidic acid side. So I might pull some out after I make a batch to re-fill the barrel and play with that, by adding some dregs.

weirdboy

Recipes 

We are doing primary fermentation in regular fermenters, then adding them to the barrel for secondary.

jessup

Recipes 

"You're very well read
It's well known.

But something is happening here
And you don't know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones ?"

i guess the wildcard is the barrel. that and the dregs from other beers, my own and others i threw in there. i've flipped through wild brews a few hundred times but i still recognize experience > reading material. these silly sours are so unpredictable...just because brett B was the only bug pitched doesn't mean there were others introduced due to dedicated sour hoses w/ mixd BS or the 100,000 other variables. it was barrel aged for 5 weeks and is just now reaching the 9month period where it will probably really step up it's complexity in the champagne bottles. today i'm going to do my first barrel primary with a WY blend which should be interesting. we read about one isolated laboratory incident and consider it gospel but the only thing to expect is the unexpected. consistent results in sour brewing are a longshot! brew on

SAQ: on page 164 (sparrow 2005): usually after 3-4 months lactic acid fermentation occurs. Pediococcus perform this phase of fermentation. The lambic tastes very sour during this phase, which lasts as little as 3-4 and usually no more than 6-7 months.

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Primary: vienna IPA, smoked porter, scottish 100/-, caramel cream ale, vanilla & cinnamon metheglin
set I: Pale (3) -> Mild (4-5) -> amber / Victory (20-25) -> special roast (40-50) -> brown (70)
set II: pilsner (2) -> Vienna (3-4) -> Munich (8-10) -> dark Munich (20) -> aromatic / melanoiden (25-30)