Scottish 60 Shilling using JP La Roja Dregs

Last night I made the following recipe:

5lbs 8oz Light/Pale Malt Extract Syrup
8oz American Two-row Pale
8oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine
2oz Roasted Barley
2oz Peated Malt

I've made this Scottish 60-/ before, but I didn't like it much. My friend, however, enjoyed it a lot. Well, after drinking a bottle of La Roja (and becoming pretty tipsy on other homebrew) I decided I wanted to pour the dregs into the fermenter with the Scottish ale yeast. I've had a LOT of sour beers, but never formulated a recipe for one, and never decided randomly to try and sour one. Thoughts on how this will come out? (I'm going to wait it out anyway, but I just wanted to see if anyone had an idea of how it'd work). Also, I've got access to O'Dell's Friek and Sabetour, so would it be worth it to go drink a bottle of that and pour the dregs in?

kinkothecarp said:

Well, after drinking a bottle of La Roja (and becoming pretty tipsy on other homebrew) I decided I wanted to pour the dregs into the fermenter with the Scottish ale yeast.

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Admit it, 'pretty tipsy' really doesn't do it justice, you were bombed!

Might just be the best thing you ever did for your homebrew. I hope you can wait it out for the 6 months (probably more like a year) that it will take for the bugs to really have an effect. You only pitched the dregs from 1 beer, it will take a while for them to multiply to get a decent hold on the beer.

I think you will be very pleased with the results.

Brett added after primary fermentation won't give you a ton of character unless you feed it something else, or pitch in some Pedio. Find out of JP dregs are just Brett, and if so, add something else to kick it up.

ghpeel said:

Brett added after primary fermentation won't give you a ton of character unless you feed it something else, or pitch in some Pedio. Find out of JP dregs are just Brett, and if so, add something else to kick it up.

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The JP was quite sour, so I assume that means there was more than just brett (I actually dislike the taste of brett). But this was dumped right into the primary.

JP beers (well, definitely La Roja) has Brett, Pedio and Lacto. I just did two five gallon batches of Berliner Weisse and ended up dumping dregs from La Roja and Oro de Calabaza in one of the batches. I was going to wait until after primary but I just said screw it! No activity after 24 hours then, boom, going like a champ after about 36.

ghpeel said:

Brett added after primary fermentation won't give you a ton of character.

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Orval might disagree with you.

Calder said:

Orval might disagree with you.

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+1, its where the brett character most are used to comes from.

After sputtering and stammering for a few minutes, I realize you gentleman are correct. What got mixed up in my head was an opinion from The Mad Fermentationist (oldsock here) that adding just Brett in the secondary will not add a ton of ACIDITY to the beer. Flavor & character, yes. Mouth-puckering acidity, no.

I also was under the impression that Orval had Pedio AND Brett in the bottle, but some googling now seems to indicate that they just use Brett. Which makes sense when you taste Orval, which has lots of character, but not a huge ton of sourness compared to something beastly like a La Folie.

Brett will never add much acidity unless it is aerated, and then only acetic acid. I do have trouble getting acidity in general from pitching bacteria into secondary, but those Jolly Pumpkin dregs will do it if anything can. You can always add some fresh wort, or fruit if the bugs need a boost in a couple months.

Oldsock said:

but those Jolly Pumpkin dregs will do it if anything can.

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Having just discovered that Jolly Pumpkin can be found in my area, I am super excited to get a WeizenBam clone (funky wheat) going in the next couple weeks. That beer is delicious :cross:

I added dregs from Odell's Friek, Petrus Oud Bruin, Monk's Cafe Sour Red, Goose Island Juliet and Goose Island something else. YAY for Dregs! (I know some of these are pasteurized, but some a few aren't right?)

kinkothecarp said:

I added dregs from Odell's Friek, Petrus Oud Bruin, Monk's Cafe Sour Red, Goose Island Juliet and Goose Island something else. YAY for Dregs! (I know some of these are pasteurized, but some a few aren't right?)

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I actually think all of those are fine. I've had my doubts about Petrus and Cafe, but I have had several people post about their success using them on my Bottle Dreg Post.

Oldsock said:

I've had my doubts about Petrus and Cafe, but I have had several people post about their success using them on my Bottle Dreg Post[/URL].

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I can vouch that Monk's Cafe has viable bugs.

My first sour was using Monk's Cafe dregs. I first made a starter, and that tasted sour. I made a Flanders with it (+ some brett, WLP650) and after a few months, I was disappointed as there was little sourness in it. I had read your post which questioned the viability of Monk's Cafe, and wondered if I had just set up a year ferment for a regular beer.

Well, I let it go, and to my surprise, it started to sour. I bottled 2 of the 7 gallons at about 11 months, and they are really tasty ..... My first try and I made a excellent Flanders. I've since bottled a couple of gallons that sat on fruit for 6 months and they are nice; very refreshing and sour. I still have a couple of gallons which will be bottled next month, and hopefully be kept until summer before drinking.

ghpeel said:

I am super excited to get a WeizenBam clone (funky wheat) going in the next couple weeks. That beer is delicious :cross:

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Recipe? I'm looking for something different. I have 2 Flanders, and 1 pLambic in the pipeline, and will be trying an imitation of Dark Dawn next. Looking for some more variety since these beers take such a long time to brew.

So I tasted it today (it's only been five days). I pitched some even more dregs. It's got a deep and wonderful sourness. It's not complex, but it's certainly sour and tangy. The JP dregs really seem to have been doing some work. I don't know, however, if that's a result of many of the portions of the sour beers I've been mixing and not actually the bugs doing any work yet.

At 5 days all you are tasting is the dregs of the beers you tossed in there. It takes a few months for the souring organisms to get going.

Okay, so this is what happened -

I kegged the beer after four weeks of sitting in the fermented. I purged, disconnected the gas, and let it be. But there was a small leak, so my keg ended up sitting a few days without CO2 blanketing the beer.

I tasted it and it seems fine.

Will this affect the souring process?

I tasted this beer yesterday (I know).

I just drew a bit from my keg. It's amazing. I don't think I want it to get much more sour. It's really complex. Tastes a lot like Monk's Cafe

Calder said:

At 5 days all you are tasting is the dregs of the beers you tossed in there. It takes a few months for the souring organisms to get going.

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I know I'm responding to a 2 month old post, but this chart is for a 'spontaneous lambic fermentation'. If you are pitching a bunch of commercial bugs into primary at the same time as the sach yeast, you'll be adding a healthy population of lacto/pedio that will have equal access to the wort sugars as the sach yeast, and you'll have a fairly sour beer pretty quickly.
I pitched Roselare, JP and RR dregs directly into a Flanders red in primary and after 2 months I have a beer that is as sour as a Rodenbach GC. Big difference between spontaneous (coolship) fermentations and pitching established colonies of commercial bugs into primary fermentation.