First Berliner Weisse Attempt - Pictures

I just brewed my first Berliner Weisse on Saturday. I am following the method used by Morkin for Alferman Imperial Berliner Weisse except that I am extract. I am at the same OG (1054).

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f72/alferman-imperial-berliner-weisse-255777/

Mainly I am hoping people can look at my pictures and say "yea that looks normal" or "that looks horribly wrong, dump it before it grows legs".

My starter was 1/2c crush grain and 2c of ~120 F water. I let it sit covered with foil for about three days. I have a picture of the starter.

I "mash hopped" with my steeping grains. Added extract and raised temp just to a boil before cooling. I added the starter at a temp of ~120 F.

Everything then went into a heated water bath and has been at 85 F since.

I will taste it tonight to see if it is sour. If so then I'm planning to cool to ~75 F and add rehydrated T-58.

Here is a link to the pictures.
http://s586.photobucket.com/user/leniotr/library/Berliner%20Weisse?page=1

I indicated elapsed time in the title of each picture. At 33 hours this morning things actually looked more like krausen to me. Its a little hard to tell with the condensation.

Thanks in advance for the help.

I tasted last night. Not really sour. The smell from the airlock and beer is "yeasty" smell. Is this normal for Lactic?

The SG was down around 1020 (OG 1054) but still not much sour. I wonder if I didn't pick up some yeast from somewhere. Maybe contamination from last batch (3711) that I had in that carboy.

I'm confused. The starter was crushed grains and water? Where is the sugar for the lactobacillus to work on? I guess it could work on the starch, but simple sugars are easier for it to breakdown. Should have used some sugar water.

You certainly seem to have gotten something working in there. Without any sugars, I suspect it wasn't lactobacillus in the starter.

Lacto doesn't like hops much. I usually don't use any.

1.054 to 1.020. Something is working in there. If it isn't sour, it's not Lacto.

You've got something, but it isn't a Berliner Weisse.

The starter method came from the thread I linked to above. A lot of people have used it and it seems to work for them. I guess I could try some sugar next time. You can see the picture of the starter it took three days but it did develop something on the surface. It smelled like lactic, sour, yogurt, sourdough.

Maybe the hops killed it. I used a half ounce for 2.5 gal.

I wondering if the yeast could be contamination from my last batch. I had WY3711 in there. It does taste/smell similar.

By the way, still no sour. The "krausen" has pretty much fallen but I see some stuff that looks like a pellicle. I think I'll let it keep going.

Alcohol will also slow down lacto, so it it is still in there and working, it is going to take a long time to decently sour (months, lots of months).

If it tastes good, just go with it as is.

Had an idea....

I could make up another gallon of wort (wheat DME/water). Throw some crushed grain in and let that work for a while. Then mix it in with this batch