Recent content by Agate

I'd head to the grocery store and check out the yoghurt section for anything with live cultures. Or look for probiotics with some lacto plantarum. Probiotics are a great source for lacto cultures, although it might take some trial and error to find the best choice. As for your question above...

If you have a way to measure pH, I'd try a starter. Lacto doesn't have a great visual indicator that it's working, but it does get hazy. Do you trust tasting your starter, or go by visual haziness? Otherwise, pH drop will tell you it's ok.

Agreed, it's hard to say from the description, but that doesn't sound terribly much like chokecherries. Chokecherries turn almost black when they're really ripe. Could you have cranberry viburnum? They also make a great wine. Was there one large pit on the inside, or several smaller seeds?

The couple times I've used DD, I haven't been terribly impressed. They came out pretty clean, even after 18 months or so.

Go to the s-type airlocks, as they take much longer to dry out than the three piece airlocks. And it only takes a small amount of liquid to keep them sealed, whereas the three piece takes a good amount. Or just go to a silicon waterless airlock and call it good.

Last time I used fw2, I didn't have krausen until day 5. Very slight pellicle after 36 hours. Brett tests your patience...

Definitely the funk weapon #2. Anomala really shines in secondary, but funk weapon 2 is insane fruity/juicy. Mash high and you should end up with some residual sugars... the last one I did was mashed at 158°F and it ended up at 1.008. Fantastic with galaxy.

Esters tend to dominate the flavor profile in a young brett beer. They break down over time, though, leading to the phenolic flavors taking over in the long run.

Absolutely - at 6 months, there is plenty of active yeast in a brett beer to bottle condition. I recently bottled one that was in secondary for 18 months, and although it has gone slowly, I have some nice carbonation after about 4 weeks. At 6 months, there should still be some viable sacch to...

The microbes will be more active at room temperature or slightly warmer, which is kind of what you want. I usually keep them off in a corner until it looks like they're doing something, and then keep it at cellar temperatures (i.e., banished to basement) when I'm tired of walking around them...

I really like to keep my bottle dregs in a 5-gallon carboy full of 1.050 wort, preferably fermented out with some phenolic yeast. But seriously, if you're storing bottle dregs long term, you don't want to expose them to oxygen and give other microbes and mold the opportunity to get in there...

What specifically concerns you with oxygen exposure? Oxygen doesn't actually cause problems with off flavors with lactobacillus. And brettanomyces scavenges oxygen during its growth phase, so acetic acid is not a concern. Oxygen can cause a problem with spoilage bacteria, but if you're using a...

I'm assuming you're asking me? It's a little tough to say, I'm about 2 years in to what is probably a 4 year process. I have a local yeast that throws a lot of blueberry and peach esters, and that seems to be pretty regular. I don't taste them anymore for the first year, as they just taste...

I don't use any hops in my quick sour beers. All they do is inhibit the lacto, which is kind of counter-productive in this kind of beer. Give it a good boil to kill everything, pitch your lacto, and then your yeast once it sours. Shouldn't take more than a day or two. But there really isn't much...

I do a couple of spontaneous inoculations per year. One in the early spring and one in the late fall. It's definitely do-able, and you can expect to see the start of fermentation after 4-7 days or so. Very roughly speaking. I don't think a bucket is the ideal way to do this, and you're likely...