Berliner Weisse

A couple of buddies and I are going to be brewing some Berliner Weisse up real soon. I have beer reading up on the style and I am still deciding on a recipe. The one thing I keep hearing some folks saying is that I should use the Wyeast Berliner Weisse blend. The problem is that I am wanting to brew this up in the next 3 weeks and the BW blend won't be available again until July. If somebody has a proven recipe and some yeast suggestions then by all means post them up. :rockin:

I didn't know wyeast had a berliner weisse blend. White labs does and it's currently available from Brewmaster's Warehouse. However, I wouldn't use it for aberlinerwiesse because it contains a traditional german weizen yeast which wouldn't be appropriate for a real berliner wiesse. You want something clean and neutral like a kolsch or alt yeast or maybe even 1056 for the base yeast, then also some lacto in there.
If you have the march/april copy of zymergy there is a good recipe for berliner weisse on page 36 that uses a quick method for making good sour beers.

I actually just bottled up a BW with the wyeast blend last week. I believe the biggest difference between the white labs and wyeast blends is that the wyeast has a touch of brett in it. As I understand the blend, the proportions of microbes leans towards lacto in order to give it a head start, then sacch, then brett. You could pretty easily do this by pitching a lacto culture followed by a nuetral ale strain, then brett in secondary. Or use the white labs blend and pitch brett in secondary.

I really liked the sample I took at bottling, and think the brett adds a nice profile to the beer. I did pitch 2 packs of 8 month old blends, so my the bug balance may have been a little off, but after 2 months it was tart, clean, and just a little bretty.

Just did a search for the wyeast blend and it definitely sounds more appropriate than the whitelabs blend (german ale vs weizen yeast) that I've seen. If you don't want to wait for the extended aging required, the quick sour mash method in the issue of zymergy I mentioned does sound intriguing. You wouldn't get any brett character, though. But the guy who wrote the article claims that his method produces a fairly complex sourness (more so than just pitching a single lacto strain).

I don't have the magazine, I have a new subscription. I am thinking that I will use the BYO recipe for now, unless someone convinces me otherwise. I am thinking that maybe I need to pitch the lacto first and then maybe 2 days later pitch the 1007. What do you guys think of that plan? I will have to do starters for both since it will be either a 10-15 gallon batch and split 2-3 ways.

http://***********/stories/recipein...r-ale/209-berliner-weisse-napoleons-champagne

That recipe sounds good (grain bills for these are pretty simple and straight forward).
The quick souring method in the article that I mentioned basically consists of making a 1 pint starter for 5 gal of 1.030 sugar solution (you can use wort but the author says he just uses honey for his starters). You then pitch a few tablespoons of malt into the starter, loosely cover and keep it at a relatively warm temp (100 F is ideal but not necessary) for three days. The PH drop in the starter kills off nasty bacteria and leaves behind tasty lacto and pedio. You'll know you did it right if it smells pleasant, tart, kinda like green apples.

On brew day, after you mash, bring your wort up to a boil to kill off nasties, let it cool to around 100 F and drain it into a sanitized cooler and pitch your starter. Let it sour for about 18 hrs then return to bk and proceed as normal.

A little more work up front but it could save you a few months of aging.

If you have a few weeks, I would also whip up a batch of lacto cultured from grains. You could whip up two or three different batches and choose the one that smells best.

You can just experiment with it and see if you like the taste of it and if it doesn't work for your tastes, no big loss.

Just pitch 1 cup of milled grain with 1 cup of hot tap water in a food-grade container, cover the surface with foil, and put a lid on it. I use leftover buckets from bulk LME. You might have to vent gases once a day, you can put it on a heating pad to keep it warm. It seems like keeping it warm is key to getting a culture to develop quickly. Since the grain investment is so low and there's no boiling or extra steps, once you have all of the pieces of the puzzle in order, it takes about 1 minute of labor and 1-2 days of waiting and you've got nice lacto.

I just kegged a Berliner that I pitched the lacto first then waited 2-3 days for the 1056 and it is the best one that I've done. That's the way I would go.

Don't let the mash get above 168, mash hop, and don't boil. Let this spontaneously ferment for 3 days then pitch your yeast of choice. It's hos BW was made for a few centuries and mine came out awesome done this way. If you have lactobacillus on your grain, why waste money on a blend that gets sketchy reviews anyway?

El_Exorcisto said:

Don't let the mash get above 168, mash hop, and don't boil. Let this spontaneously ferment for 3 days then pitch your yeast of choice. It's hos BW was made for a few centuries and mine came out awesome done this way. If you have lactobacillus on your grain, why waste money on a blend that gets sketchy reviews anyway?

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+1

Traditional and delicious.

I already had the Lactobacillus on hand, but am I hearing right that you guys think we should just do a standard mash but add the hops to the mash. Let it cool and then send it to the fermenter and wait for 2-3 days and then pitch a nice clean ale yeast. Would you do that over doing the no boil but pitching the lacto right away and then pitch like 1007 3 days later?

If I were you I'd use the lacto that you already have, just cause you were already planning to and you have it and it can only help. I would do the no boil thing cause it's the traditional thing. I've done two batches, one with the no boil method and one boiled. The 2nd batch is still aging but the taste seems very similar to the first at this stage. With the no boil method I got a much lighter color, almost creepy ghostly pale, which is cool looking. I also got a pellicle with the no boil, but no pellicle on the boiled one - even though it is souring just fine and tastes much like the first.

Long story short, I think both ways work, just have fun

just did two berliners and while they're not in bottles, i would do them both differently... i like ex's idea personally (next time make that same post two months ago, mmmkay? lol)...

the first one got whitelab's BW blend and again, not in bottles, but not a fan so far - the other got a lacto culture pitched at 110 and was let to ride for 24 hours then i added sacc. the first has some lactic, the second is boooooooring (now). we'll see...

jtakacs, I did... hehehe

Sour your whole mash for 24 hours!

BenjaminBier said:

If you have a few weeks, I would also whip up a batch of lacto cultured from grains. You could whip up two or three different batches and choose the one that smells best.

You can just experiment with it and see if you like the taste of it and if it doesn't work for your tastes, no big loss.

Just pitch 1 cup of milled grain with 1 cup of hot tap water in a food-grade container, cover the surface with foil, and put a lid on it. I use leftover buckets from bulk LME. You might have to vent gases once a day, you can put it on a heating pad to keep it warm. It seems like keeping it warm is key to getting a culture to develop quickly. Since the grain investment is so low and there's no boiling or extra steps, once you have all of the pieces of the puzzle in order, it takes about 1 minute of labor and 1-2 days of waiting and you've got nice lacto.

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I want to try this. How am I sure that I've gathered Lacto and not some other bug? And since the lacto is on the outside of the grain, why do you need to crush it?

so it has something to eat. and you'll know by smell if it's lacto...

jtakacs said:

so it has something to eat. and you'll know by smell if it's lacto...

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So a 1cup to 1cup water ratio is sufficient for 5 gallons? And lacto smells sour, correct? Also, how long does this usually take?

it depends on how much sour you want... i've soured about 10-20% of my grist using a thinner mash (it gets pretty thick so about 1.5-2.0 quarters per 1.0 lbs of grain)... lacto will smell very sour (and clean if that makes sense) and you can expect it to start to sour after 24 hours for sure... i've never gone beyond 72 hours however...

The 1 cup of grain to 1 cup of water is just a starter culture of lacto, enough to get a sense of the smell and taste of your eventual lacto character. You can use this culture to pitch into your sour mash as described by Jtakacs or to pitch into your 100F wort after brewing.

For my experiment, I split the liquid from my 1C Grain / 1C Water starter pitching half into a full sour mash and half into a standard half-gallon 1.040 DME starter. I used the sourmash right away and made a no-boil Berliner. The DME starter formed a little pellicle and chugged away and fermented out completely. I just left this finished starter in the brew closet for 5 months. I made a 2nd Berliner and boiled it, let it cool to 100F, then just pitched the entire DME starter into it, let it go for 72 hours, then pitched US-05. I bottled this 2nd brew last weekend and it is very very close to the first, only slightly less sour and more malty. I would do either way again and be happy!

jtakacs said:

it depends on how much sour you want... i've soured about 10-20% of my grist using a thinner mash (it gets pretty thick so about 1.5-2.0 quarters per 1.0 lbs of grain)... lacto will smell very sour (and clean if that makes sense) and you can expect it to start to sour after 24 hours for sure... i've never gone beyond 72 hours however...

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+1!

I soured 100% of the mash for 48 hours and it will just about rip off your face it is so sour. Blended with a little syrup it's just right

It seemed to me like the sour mash goes through a brief "barnyard smell" phase between the 12-24 hour period and then starts cranking on the bright lemony sour. Did yours go through phases like that?

OK. I made a couple of lacto starters with a 1 cup to 1 cup ratio. It's sour. Doesn't really smell barnyardy or like a diaper, so thats a good thing. But it doesn't smell tart either. But whatever.

My question is, do I pour just the liquid of the starter into my fermenter, or all the grains too?

Going to brew this in about 3 hours, so any help would be appreciated!

a few things you could do at this point;

1) strain the starters, sparge them and toss the liquid into the last few minutes of a boil to end lactic production (limited sour, depending on how big your starters were).

2) strain (no sparge) and innoculate your pre-boil wort at 120 degrees and hold it between 90-110 as long as possible (12-24 hours) to let it grow.

3) strain (no sparge) and innoculate your post boil wort at the same temperatures. i'm doing this for my flanders, but it adds an unsanitary element to your beer.

i'd be inclined to do #3, but i don't mind the risk of infection on certain beers... however, i'd probably likely do #2 so i could control it.

I would also do #2, but i'm a little late XD How'd it go?

Kind of off topic, but for those of you pitching your lacto before your sacc, how long are you leaving the beer on the entire yeast cake before racking it off?

beesy said:

Kind of off topic, but for those of you pitching your lacto before your sacc, how long are you leaving the beer on the entire yeast cake before racking it off?

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I'm no expert on this, but have been researching this myself. I brewed mine about a month and a half ago. Pitched the lacto first at around 100F then after 48 hours pitched the European Ale yeast. From what I have read, when it is done fermenting it can be bottled and will sour faster in the bottle, then if left in the primary fermenter. I'm going to bottle mine this week and let it sit in a hot room for another 2-3 months before trying one.

boralyl said:

I'm no expert on this, but have been researching this myself. I brewed mine about a month and a half ago. Pitched the lacto first at around 100F then after 48 hours pitched the European Ale yeast. From what I have read, when it is done fermenting it can be bottled and will sour faster in the bottle, then if left in the primary fermenter. I'm going to bottle mine this week and let it sit in a hot room for another 2-3 months before trying one.

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I wouldn't do this! The Lacto can keep eating long after the yeast is done. If you do this too soon, it will create bottle bombs! If you do this, I you do bottle, I recommend Belgian Bottles.

What I recently did for my BW is make a lacto starter about a week in advance with some grain. I did a no boil mash, drained into my kettle and cooled to about 100 degrees. I then added my lacto and let it sit in the fermenter.

After about 12 hours, I had a nice krausen line of Lacto. Airlock was bubbling away rappidly. After 48 hours, I added some US-05 Dry yeast. The Lacto had eaten about 65% of the sugar at that point I believe.

I tasted this morning, It's sour, but not too much to be off the style. Since mine was an Imperial BW (around 1.050, I found this to be nice). You could go 72 hours or longer depending on how sour you want it.

Anyways, just a thought.

Morkin said:

I wouldn't do this! The Lacto can keep eating long after the yeast is done. If you do this too soon, it will create bottle bombs! If you do this, I you do bottle, I recommend Belgian Bottles.

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I'm a little confused on this topic. I thought I read some where that lacto will not cause bottle bombs, while brett could if it is not finished. My original intention was to let it sit for 3-4 months, but I swore I read last week it can be bottled after primary fermentation is done. Although, now I conveniently can't locate that information. The gravity is at 1.003 and hasn't changed for over a month. I only used White Labs Lactobacillus Delbrueckii Bacteria WLP677 and White Labs European Ale WLP011.

If I find any of this information again I'll edit this post. Can anyone shed any light on this subject?

EDIT: I was reading this thread https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f127/berliner-weisse-235718/ The bottle type isn't mentioned, I assumed normal long necks.

just to top the thread, i bottled BW1 because it was done (lacto post boil, 48 hours, then US-05) and i'm probably gonna try it tonight even tho it'll be undercarbed.. the WL berliner blend however i racked off the yeast cake (under a significant krausen) and was going to bottle it immediately but couldn't - been sitting for a week and it has formed a lacto pellicle which i'm not too pleased about but am happy to wait i guess (the beer tells you when it's done)... i'll wait until it's stopped forming or it's dropped.

to answer your question boralyl, lacto can create over-carb because it does eat sugar and make CO2 but only (imo) if it's added post boil as its intended. there's a huge difference between lacto-d and lactic acid. we're shooting for lactic acid, in order to create bottle bombs you'd need to pitch lacto-d and bottle it prematurely. the reason people pitch lacto first is to make sure it creates lactic acid and THEN ferment out (to create alcohol)

frankly i'm done with this method, for "quick sours" i'm convinced sour mash is the way to go... theoretically you could sour mash and bottle a sour in a few weeks. there's no lacto-d to keep eating post-boil.

brewing an oud bruin tonight and doing exactly that, sour mashed 15% of the grist for 96 hours (too long, 72 max imo) and will add it to the boil late and let it roll for 5 minutes only... of course i'm pitching pedio/lacto/brett-b,c/sacc so it'll sitt for 8 months+ likely...

although i'm considering letting the lacto part of the mash boil off and then add it at flame out... what could go wrong? lol...

The notion of lacto causing bottle bombs seems to come up pretty often. From my experience, lacto hasn't produced gas during sour mashing, but I did some quick research to find out more. Based on the information from this paper from Cornell's dept of food science, using lacto d. does not produce co2. Lacto d is a homofermentative bacteria that has a primary byproduct of lactic acid. Other lactic bacteria are heterofermentative and will also produce alcohol and co2. If a pure culture is produced then co2 should be avoided. Perhaps if grain is used to inoculate the wort then results could be different.

Basically, if pitching a lacto culture from wl or wy then bottle bombs should not be a problem as long as the sacch is finished.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...ujJVVaxbV4n2WKAeQ&sig2=i1mo5XQBNyXtyoC65IgVlQ

pohldogg said:

The notion of lacto causing bottle bombs seems to come up pretty often. From my experience, lacto hasn't produced gas during sour mashing, but I did some quick research to find out more. Based on the information from this paper from Cornell's dept of food science, using lacto d. does not produce co2. Lacto d is a homofermentative bacteria that has a primary byproduct of lactic acid. Other lactic bacteria are heterofermentative and will also produce alcohol and co2. If a pure culture is produced then co2 should be avoided. Perhaps if grain is used to inoculate the wort then results could be different.

Basically, if pitching a lacto culture from wl or wy then bottle bombs should not be a problem as long as the sacch is finished.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...ujJVVaxbV4n2WKAeQ&sig2=i1mo5XQBNyXtyoC65IgVlQ

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Thanks for posting the article and your summary. I ended up bottling my month old batch last week, so we'll see how it turns out.

i've come to the conclusion (after a run) that a berliner is the most refreshing beer on the planet... crystal clear, lactic tang, gobs of flavor and light.

jtakacs said:

i've come to the conclusion (after a run) that a berliner is the most refreshing beer on the planet... crystal clear, lactic tang, gobs of flavor and light.

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Yeah, dude! This is one of the best beers for all the right reasons you say.

One thing that drinkers forget to do is mix this with woodruff or raspberry syrups - it's part of the drink! It's a little "anti-craft" to mix syrup into your beer, but with BW it's part of the tradition.

Nothing better than the 1st half of a 22ozer pure, 2nd half mixed with a bit of woodruff.

BenjaminBier said:

Yeah, dude! This is one of the best beers for all the right reasons you say.

One thing that drinkers forget to do is mix this with woodruff or raspberry syrups - it's part of the drink! It's a little "anti-craft" to mix syrup into your beer, but with BW it's part of the tradition.

Nothing better than the 1st half of a 22ozer pure, 2nd half mixed with a bit of woodruff.

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Where did you find woodruff? I can find raspberry easy enough but woodruff has been tough for me to find.

AlphaWolf-Brewery said:

Where did you find woodruff? I can find raspberry easy enough but woodruff has been tough for me to find.

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See this link for making your own syrups out of the raw ingredients - though it still might be tough finding the Woodruff. I guess the all natural hippie co-op is your best bet?

http://www.cocktailsoftheworld.com/all-about-syrups.html

I'm using this stuff that I brought back from Germany for about $3 per bottle... useful if you make the trip: