Barnyard flavors with Brett-B

Calder · 12-26-2010, 05:43 PM

I bought a bottle of Ommegang Biere De mars (2008). Drank it, loved it, tasted fruity, with no unpleasant flavors. I cultivated the dregs of the bottle.

I tasted some of the starter wort yesterday. It smelled strongly of a 'Barnyard', and tasted the same. I have heard that some Brett can give you this. I was not expecting this since the original beer did not have anything like it. The yeast had taken down the starter from 1.036 to 1.004.

I also have a starter of WLP650 (Brett-B) going. I've added some to a sour beer along with other 'bugs', I've added some to a secondary of a Belgian Blonde, and am getting ready to do an all-brett later this week. I had heard WLP was harsher than Wyeast (though I've not tried Wyeast). I tasted some of this starter and expected barnyard, leather, funky taste, but was nicely surprised with a fruity taste, not unlike the flavor in the Biere De Mars bottle. The yeast had taken down the starter from 1.036 to 1.008.

Anyone know what is going on. Why the two are vastly different (obviously different strains); I'd expected them to be similar.

Should I use the yeast cultivated from the BDM bottle? I'm planning on doing side-by-side gallon batches of a simple brown ale, as the primary strain, to see what happens. Same wort, and split after brewing.

I'm still trying to understand the world of Brett beers and the differences in the yeasts.

**dwarven_stout** · 12-26-2010, 06:43 PM

There are all sorts of things that could be factors here, but I would bet the primary (heh) factor is simply age.

First off, as you mentioned, they are different strains and *should* behave differently.

Secondly, brett as a primary fermenter (e.g. a starter) tastes very different than brett as a secondary. Tropical fruit can be a "primary" flavor for Brett C (Mike T might disagree here.. I know he's not gotten the pineapple, but I've gotten huge pineapple and mango). The Drie Fonteinen Brett B strain can also give you fruit (this is the strain sold as Brett L. by Wyeast/White Labs).

Third, brett can and often does mutate, giving different flavors at different times. Avery 15 is a great example of this.

Fourth, the flavors you get from brett will depend in part on what flavor compounds already exist and in what conditions you use it. For example, brett changes lactic acid into ethyl lactate, tends to metabolize "clove" phenols, and so on. You should expect starter worts to taste quite different than a mature beer with a brett secondary.

Edit: Fixed a couple things.