Brett Question

I have a saison that is about done with fermentation and a had a question about adding brett. I would like to rack off 1 gallon of this saison into a 1 gallon glass fermenter. My only sources of brett that would go into this 1 gallon would be from dreggs of beer I drink, Crooked Stave, Allagash, funkwerks, etc. Would this be alright to try, or would mixing this many different brett strains/beers be a bad idea? I have never had any experience with making bretts or sours but love the taste and thought this might be an "easy" way to venture into them. I really dont have a clue what to expect here, so any and all advice is more then helpful. Cheers!

Your 1 gallon with dregs idea is a fantastic one, alot of people get started that way. Rack into your 1 gallon fermenter and pitch dregs from a beer or so and let it dry out, and then bottle. You'll end up with great results that way, good luck!

So just a few bottles worth of dreggs is enough for 1 gallon? If I understand correctly, doesnt brett take awhile to create the wanted taste? Thanks for the info!

I usually build the brett up from dregs in a few starters. I start small with ~100ml of 1.020 wort then 250ml of 1.040 wort and may go higher from there or just pitch that as a ballpark guess on pitch rate. Or, you can just toss the dregs in the 1 gallon but it may take longer to get going and finish.

Yea, you will need to let age either in the fermenter or in bottles for 2-3 months (or shorter, or longer it varies) for the Brett create your desired flavors. You can package whenever the gravity is dry and stable, if its a Saison and it is already bone dry then you can probably bottle sooner. Brett does some awesome things under pressure in the bottle.

Play with it, build a pipeline and try different methods and see what works for you. Many ways for this cat to be skinned.

Thanks for all this information! The saison im going to use was brewed last sunday(2/16) and is at 1.006, which it will probably stay at. For now, I will just pitch dreggs straight from the bottle and see how that works. Im prepared to wait months to bottle and then months in the bottle, so thats not an issue for me. I should be getting a bunch of Crooked Stave on wednesday and will just use dreggs from them to keep as few variables as possible. Cant wait to try this, thanks again

Awesome! Let us know how it goes.

Will do. Looks like I already need more carboys after looking through the pellicle thread :cross:

I've had wonderful success so far pitching the dregs from 1 bottle of Orval (Brett Brux) into 5 gallons of Old Ale. I tried a sample at 4 months after sitting a bit cool (low- to mid-60s) for the duration and it was spectacular (granted, I added some toasted oak chips and a small amount of bourbon at the same time). It's taking an overly-sweet, kinda borking, so-so old ale into something I swear I've sampled at Russian River (vintage leather and old barrel with some pleasant earthy, hay-like, old farmhouse aromas and flavors - not sour, not tangy, definite "barnyard" characteristics but in a good way). It has actually done significantly more than I ever expected. It's doing the work inside a keg under mild pressure since it's my understanding that you can get more from brett when it's a bit stressed. It's only dropped the gravity by 2 points so far and I'm hoping for about 2-4 more by mid-summer. That's my only hands-on experience with brett so far and I'm super pleased.

finsfan said:

So just a few bottles worth of dreggs is enough for 1 gallon? If I understand correctly, doesnt brett take awhile to create the wanted taste? Thanks for the info!

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Different Brett strains create different flavors at different times. Some great, some less great. Personally, I think having a diverse microflora of brett helps even out the less desirable flavors and keep the beer well rounded as it ages.

Brewbien said:

Different Brett strains create different flavors at different times. Some great, some less great. Personally, I think having a diverse microflora of brett helps even out the less desirable flavors and keep the beer well rounded as it ages.

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So would adding a few different crooked stave dreggs be beneficial, or should I even add some from other breweries as well?

finsfan said:

So would adding a few different crooked stave dreggs be beneficial, or should I even add some from other breweries as well?

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Completely up to you, I would say if you like the beer, go ahead and add it. Crooked Stave adds several strains to most of their beers and they have a little more research about which strains produce which flavors at which times with their given malt bill. I say have fun with it, be adventurous and take good notes

Brewbien said:

Completely up to you, I would say if you like the beer, go ahead and add it. Crooked Stave adds several strains to most of their beers and they have a little more research about which strains produce which flavors at which times with their given malt bill. I say have fun with it, be adventurous and take good notes

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Awesome, thanks! Im pretty excited for this

finsfan said:

My only sources of brett that would go into this 1 gallon would be from dreggs of beer I drink, Crooked Stave, Allagash, funkwerks, etc. Would this be alright to try, or would mixing this many different brett strains/beers be a bad idea?

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nothing wrong with mixing different strains of brett. you'll likely end up with something complex (and awesome).

only negative that i can think of is that you won't know which yeast contributed what flavor. personally i'm quite fine with this. i'm not looking to reproduce my dregs-driven batches, each is unique.

sweetcell said:

nothing wrong with mixing different strains of brett. you'll likely end up with something complex (and awesome).

only negative that i can think of is that you won't know which yeast contributed what flavor. personally i'm quite fine with this. i'm not looking to reproduce my dregs-driven batches, each is unique.

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I did decide last night that I plan to use dreggs from Crooked Staves batch 60 which is 100% brett. I emailed them as well to ask which brett strains were in the beers that I plan to use, just so I have as much information on the process as possible. I also just found more 1 gallon jugs on craigslist so im going to do 2 separate gallon batches of this. One with only Crooked Stave dreggs and one with Russian River/Allagash dreggs. I know RR uses more then brett, but it should be a great side by side, plus a start to making a brett/sour pipeline (as small as it may be). :rockin:

I have another question that this group might be able to help me with. I was thinking about all the different bottle dreggs that I could use, and had a thought. Is it a good idea to save all the bottle dreggs that have brett/lacto/pedio in them (instead of throwing them out) and mix them together for a future use? Would I need to make a starter with the first bottle or two of dreggs, and then just continue to add dreggs to this in a mason jar? Or would I need to make a small starter with all of this every time I add more dreggs? Is it possible to have too many bugs mixed together and turn out with something terrible? Should I even consider doing something like this, or will it not save until I have something to use it on? I really dont have any clue as to what to expect if I tried something like this. Sorry for the barrage of questions, any advice is welcome!

You can certainly do that. I have done this a few times when getting ready for a sour beer, I usually make a small starter in a 250ml flask or a mason jar and add the dregs to the jar after I drank them. You don't have to make a small starter each time you add dregs but it would help to get them going, you can always decant your mason jar periodically and add fresh wort to keep everyone alive and viable.

I am a big proponent of biodiversity in my mixed fermentations, so imo no having too many bugs in a beer is not bad thing Ive gotten some great flavors that way.

Thank you very much for the feedback. I was looking at the cellar last night for dreggs I could use on this experiment and realized how many I had that could be used. I would like to make a 5 gallon sour batch in the future but also didnt want to waste any bugs if I had drank those beers before being ready to do the sour. This really helps!

finsfan said:

Is it a good idea to save all the bottle dreggs that have brett/lacto/pedio in them (instead of throwing them out) and mix them together for a future use? Would I need to make a starter with the first bottle or two of dreggs, and then just continue to add dreggs to this in a mason jar?

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my method for collecting bugs: make enough ~1.030 wort to fill a small sanitized Mason jar half way. i use a little oats, malto-d, or some other form of long-chain sugar for the bugs to eat. optional: add the tiniest amount of sacch to start fermentation & protect the starter (drop the pH, create alcohol), can skip this step if adding a lot of dregs immediately. throw in dregs as they become available. do not use a stir-plate.

i try not to go too long with this method, i wouldn't keep this kind of a starter going for more than a month or so. i would be nervous about aceto and other undesirable bugs.

finsfan said:

Is it possible to have too many bugs mixed together and turn out with something terrible?

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mo' bugs = mo' happiness. i don't know of any combination of bugs that are good by themselves that all of a sudden are terrible when mixed.

I have a gallon jug with an airlock into which I pitch dregs/new cultures/etc. I occasionally feed it with fresh wort, and when I'm making a sour beer I will take some liquid from the middle and pour it into the new wort/green beer. Obviously I'm pitching very low quantities of whatever is in there (50-100 mls of liquid, not dregs, in 3 gallons), and I have no idea what has survived/what is dominant. Sometimes these are the only bugs I pitch, when I just want a light funk in the final beer; sometimes I do it along with a blend like Roeselare or some of the yeast cake from a finished sour that turned out well, when I'm looking for something more assertively sour but with the added diversity this brings.

It's worked well so far. I taste it occasionally to make sure I'm not pitching vinegar. But there's always a risk that I won't catch any unpleasant changes in the character it brings to a beer until several months (and several more potentially ruined beers) later.

i've had great results going the "bug jar" route. as many have said, more bugs, more complexity. personally, my favorite type of beer to make is a sour/funky saison. what i do is save the dregs of any funky/sour beers i drink in a quart jar. when it's full, i pitch a pkg of saison sacc yeast along with the bug jar and presto! after 4-6 months, i've got a great, complex saison to show for it. sometimes i'll make a larger batch (10 gal) of the wort and pitch the dregs in 5 gal and keep the other 5 gal clean. provides a nice control to see what those bugs get up to.

also, i find saving dregs really helps me justify the cost of expensive wild/sour beers

Started it tonight. Crooked stave in #1, RR consecration in #2.

Fins. all CS stuff has lacto in it these days, as you will probably here back from Chad.

TNGabe said:

Fins. all CS stuff has lacto in it these days, as you will probably here back from Chad.

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Even better if thats the case. I used batch 60 dregs, are you sure that has lacto? The bottle says 100% brett. I wouldnt be surprised if it did though, it tasted sour.

Do you think #1 is filled too much? Does it matter at all?

finsfan said:

Even better if thats the case. I used batch 60 dregs, are you sure that has lacto? The bottle says 100% brett. I wouldnt be surprised if it did though, it tasted sour.

Do you think #1 is filled too much? Does it matter at all?

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The '100% brett' on the bottle is misleading. It should say 'sacchromyces' free. A friend emailed about what strains were in St Bretta, he got a reply saying the foudres all have lacto in them now as well. I wouldn't be surprised if it's pedio or a wild lacto strain because of the diacetyl issues they've had lately.

#1 looks, fine. If it blows off, it blows off, but fuller is better. I wouldn't use those plastic screw on lids long term, I'd prefer a stopper for less 02 transfer.

TNGabe said:

The '100% brett' on the bottle is misleading. It should say 'sacchromyces' free. A friend emailed about what strains were in St Bretta, he got a reply saying the foudres all have lacto in them now as well. I wouldn't be surprised if it's pedio or a wild lacto strain because of the diacetyl issues they've had lately.

#1 looks, fine. If it blows off, it blows off, but fuller is better. I wouldn't use those plastic screw on lids long term, I'd prefer a stopper for less 02 transfer.

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I plan to get some stoppers soon, thanks for the heads up. I did look at the bottle and since its a wild ale, I figured it had more then brett. Either way im alright with it

TNGabe said:

The '100% brett' on the bottle is misleading. It should say 'sacchromyces' free. A friend emailed about what strains were in St Bretta, he got a reply saying the foudres all have lacto in them now as well. I wouldn't be surprised if it's pedio or a wild lacto strain because of the diacetyl issues they've had lately.

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Good info, I wasn't aware of that.

#1 is not too full. the beer in there is a fully fermented saison, right? there isn't enough sugar left in there to cause too much damage. if this was fresh wort then you would need to worry.

sweetcell said:

#1 is not too full. the beer in there is a fully fermented saison, right? there isn't enough sugar left in there to cause too much damage. if this was fresh wort then you would need to worry.

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you are correct. It was 1.006, 8.25% saison when I put it in there last night.