mattyp1214

Recipes 

Brewed a la folie clone recipe 6 months ago. Forgot about it until last night I opened a russian river supplication and decided to try it out. It tastes amazing! Drinkable without carbonation! It is a little lighter in color maybe because of partial mash.
It never really formed a pellicle. It seemed to for about a week then I woke up one day and it was gone. It has a great sour to it but not over powering. Very balanced with a touch of brett in the back. Used WLP655, 1056, and WLP brett.

Anyway my question is should I bottle it now that it is sour enough? Ive never bottled a sour before.
And when bottling sours do I use the same amount of corn sugar as normal?
Should I buy some wood chunks and add them in for a few weeks then bottle?

Any advice appreciated!

Oldsock

Recipes 

Have you taken a gravity reading recently? 6 months is still pretty young for a Flanders Red (the bulk of La Folie is aged for 2 years before blending and bottling). There is likely still some fermentation going on that could lead to over carbonation.

You can add some oak for awhile before bottling, less for longer gets better results in my experience. I'd add an ounce of oak cubes (medium toast French preferred) and let it sit for another 6 months before bottling.

When you do bottle it you should bottle it just like any other beer, although you might want to add a bit of fresh yeast to ensure rapid carbonation.

__________________
Check out The Mad Fermentationist for my adventures in fermentation (cheese, bread, ginger beer plant, and of course plenty of funky beer).

mattyp1214

Recipes 

Took the OG at 1.06 now its at 1.010. The target final gravity was 1.015 so its pretty low! I will get some oak and let it go for a bit longer and see if the gravity changes.

Should I boil off the oak and/or soak them in pinot noir or folie or something?

And as far as adding fresh yeast to bottle should I add 1056 or some brett or does it even matter?

Thanks!

BTW had a half glass this stuff is gunna be great!!

Oldsock

Recipes 

1.010 isn't that low for a sour beer, most of mine end up between 1.002 and 1.008, it certainly could drop another few points.

I usually boil the oak for a few minutes, just to remove some of the harsh/fresh oak notes. Sometimes I soak the cubes, but unless you are going to do it for a few weeks you might as well just add the wine/spirit to the beer directly.

I tend to use wine yeast since they are more alcohol/acid tolerant than ale yeast, but 1056 or Brett would do fine as well.

__________________
Check out The Mad Fermentationist for my adventures in fermentation (cheese, bread, ginger beer plant, and of course plenty of funky beer).

Potter1

Recipes 

I bet it will drop a few more points. Brett is slow, but strong
And a pellicle is formed when there is some interaction between the bugs and oxygen, so if there isn't any O2, no Pellicle,,,,,,,
or at least that's my understanding of it

__________________
Primary 1 Traditional Porter
Primary 2 Kentucky Common
Primary 3 air
Primary 4 Air

Secondary 1 air
2 air
3 air
4 air
Kegged
Fall Amber, Sparkling Cider, Cream Soda, Gum Bleeder II, Dunkel
Damn big drinkin' weekend

mattyp1214

Recipes 

Yeah some people reported no pellicle at all. And mine definitely has a brett funk so there probably just wasn't enough O2 to form it, which is fine with me as long as it does its job.

jessup

Recipes 

you def have to wait to bottle. since you've already waited this long, just put in the extra few months to make that baby really good. and the pellicle is def weird, my theory is it takes some extraneous factor. i've read on here and correlate the addition of oak cubes/chips many times to giving the extra nutrients or O2 for the pellicle to show up. i have a few sours under my belt and the only one to get the pellicle was when i reracked onto cherries. i bet you add the oak, it forms a pellicle and goes on to drop at least 2 more gravity points.

avidhomebrewer

Recipes 

I would let that beer sit another year or so and it will be that much better. All my lambics have sat at least 2 years (in the bottle, 1 in the carboy) before sampling and they are great.

yellowthere

Recipes 

Will you post the recipe? thanks man.

mattyp1214

Recipes 

La Folie clone
(New Belgium Brewing Company)
(5 gallons/19 L, all-grain)
OG = 1.062 FG = 1.015 (or lower)
IBU = 20 SRM = 17 ABV = 6.0%
“Never turn your back on (the barrels). They like to change on you and right when you think you know what one will do, it does the exact opposite.”
—Lauren Salazar

Ingredients

9.75 lbs. (4.4 kg) 2-row pale malt
1 lb. 5 oz. (0.60 kg) Munich malt
1 lb. 5 oz. (0.60 kg) crystal malt (60 °L)
10 oz. (0.28 kg) unmalted wheat
5.7 AAU Cantillion Iris hops (60 mins) (or any neutral hop)
(1.9 oz./54 g at 3% alpha acids)
Wyeast 1056 (American Ale), White Labs WLP001 (California Ale),
Fermentis Safale US-05 or Danstar Nottingham yeast
Wyeast 3278 (Lambic blend) or
White Labs WLP655 (Belgian Sour Mix 1) blend
1 cup corn sugar (for priming)

Step by Step

Mash at 154 °F (68 °C). Boil for 60 minutes. Ferment with neutral ale yeast at 75 °F (24 °C), then rack to barrel and add sour blend. Aging time is totally up to the barrel. This is where years of tasting and blending come in handy. If you want to blend, try ~ 20% of a sweeter (younger) barrel, ~30% of a nice mild sour barrel and ~50% of a well established “tour gripper” with nice oak notes (cherries, horse blanket, etc). (Young usually means ~ 1 year, mid range ~2 years and grippers are 3+ years.) But there are no rules here. Do whatever works for you.

Extract Option

Omit 2-row pale malt. Add 1 lb. 14 oz. (0.85 kg) dried malt extract and 4 lb. 10 oz. liquid malt extract. Steep in 4.8 qts. (4.6 L) of water at 154 °F (68 °C) for 45 minutes. Rinse with 2.4 qts. (2.3 L) of water at 170 °F (77 °C). Add water to make 3 gallons (11 L), add dried malt extract and bring to a boil. Boil for 60 minutes, stirring in LME at end of boil.