Two brews and a bug question

tugbucket · 01-20-2012, 06:21 PM

I'm going to be brewing up a Russian River Temptation clone. Reading the recipe, it suggests pitching half pack of both Pedio and Lacto. That leaves me with Half of each obviously.

My second brew is going to be a black sour. Pretty much Jamil's Flanders but darker malt. in this I am going to pitch Roeselare. If I were to also dump the left over bugs from the Temptation, what would be the risk. Would it just end up being over soured? My plan is to dump in cherries come Summer and let it stew.

I really enjoyed last years La Folie and the super tart was more than fine by me. Seeing as just the Roeselare would lend it to be closer to Rodenbach, i'm fine with having it be higher in the tart levels.

For the record I have a Flanders sitting now. So when all is done I'll basically have Temptation, Rodenbach and this black bastard. If each one was more intense I'm okay with that.

Homebrewtastic · 01-20-2012, 08:22 PM

Why not just keep the other two? Put each in their own growler and make starters. They require little maintenance from what I've read. This year my goal is a bunch of sours so I plan on doing just that, keeping starters of different bugs.

tugbucket · 01-23-2012, 09:37 PM

Thanks for the reply. Still wondering if having higher levels of Lacto and Pedio in the mix would elevate the the sour higher or if just adding more sugars (fruit) would so the same thing over time.

Making starters sounds fine as I have some jugs I can use. I haven't locked down a set of 'instructions' for doing so yet. Have a link to some of your reading? Is it more just pitching the rest into some wort and letting it sit? If so, what would be the harm of dumping both bugs into the same gallon jug for the wait?

I don't honestly see me doing another full sour this year as I will have all my carboys full hopefully in the next couple weeks (damn you glorious college bball season for interrupting my brewing

).

Edit: http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2011/03/maintaining-brett-and-lacto-cultures.html

Homebrewtastic · 01-24-2012, 11:52 PM

I was actually going to point you to that link. I'm starting the lacto starter tomorrow with apple juice.

I think that the advantage of making separate starters is that you'll have pure cultures of each to tinker around with later.

As far as what to pitch and in what quantity I'm honestly not too sure as my sour beer experience is only a few batches. Everything I've read says that pedio makes more lactic acid than lacto does. My thought though is that because the sacc ferments so much faster than your bugs that whether or not you pitch a large quantity of bugs won't make a noticeable difference at the end. But I could be wrong.