Wyeast 9097 - Old Ale Blend (w/ Brettanomyces)

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Amity

Amity

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I've brewed an Old Ale with 9097, which is a blend of an attenuative strain and a Brett strain. The OG was 1.060.

How long will it take the Brett to do its work? This brew was for a competition that will be judged on May 29. Will the beer be ready by then? Would it be better to bulk age it in carboys or bottles? Was hoping to bottle after about 3 weeks (yes, will check gravity) and then give it 6 weeks in bottle.

Any advice?
Thanks!

Mike
 
I brewed an old ale with that strain about 3 weeks ago and there is no Brett character yet. You could enter it but I wouldn't expect it to have much from the Brett or to be similar to what it will be a year from now. Mine was a 1.080 OG and right now if I were entering it I would put it as a barleywine. This strain and the Old Ale style are both meant to really shine many months down the road.
 
That's what I figured. It's okay because the competition will be judged by non-brewing people, so the Brett character can stay hidden for now. I'll wait a while longer before really diving into it myself.
 
One idea would be to just bottle the amount you need to compete with and keep the rest bulk aging. I always keep some muntons carb tabs around for that reason.
 
Tonedef131 said:
One idea would be to just bottle the amount you need to compete with and keep the rest bulk aging. I always keep some muntons carb tabs around for that reason.
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I would just bottle it when it is ready. Bulk aging isn't going to help the brett in this beer take off. A year on a shelf in a bottle will do much better.
 
carnevoodoo said:
I would just bottle it when it is ready. Bulk aging isn't going to help the brett in this beer take off. A year on a shelf in a bottle will do much better.
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It could also make some nice bottle bombs with brett.

Something that will help out brett a lot is if you can give it some oxygen. Put an oak dowel down through your stopper in place of the airlock. In a week or so, you should have a nice pellicle (assuming the primary fermentation is over). The brett flavor will take a very long time to show up. It's very slow working.

I know you're not brewing for real beer judges, but when brewing for a competition, always go big because the ******* in front of you did and now the judges can't taste your beer. A 1.060 old ale would go unnoticed.
 
z987k said:
It could also make some nice bottle bombs with brett.

Something that will help out brett a lot is if you can give it some oxygen. Put an oak dowel down through your stopper in place of the airlock. In a week or so, you should have a nice pellicle (assuming the primary fermentation is over). The brett flavor will take a very long time to show up. It's very slow working.

QUOTE]

Could someone expand on this. I just made a 1.070 Old ale with this yeast and I'm not sure if I should age it in the carboy or bottles. Should it be racked off of the yeast cake after the 1st week and then aged in the carboy?
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I dont think brett needs oxygen. It's in the same family as Saccromyces, so I think it only needs oxygen when reproducing....and needs to be in an anaerobic environment for fermentation. Lactobacillus is also anaerobic. The only bug that needs oxygen is acetobacter, and you dont want too much of that one. It's what turns alcohol into vinegar.

edit: to answer the above question, age it in the carboy. Unless you're confident it wont ferment much more in the bottles (creating bottle bombs).
 
I dont think brett needs oxygen.
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Brettanomyces needs oxygen to develop the classic flavors associated with this genus of yeast, but it's low-level oxygen. The pellicle regulates the amount of oxygen reaching the working cells.
 
Resurrection! Will the oak dowel impart oak flavors as well as provide oxygen? The reason I ask is because I've got my old ale on oak cubes right now. There is no pellical yet and I didn't expect much of a pellicle yet (and I don't want one as long as the cubes are in there!) and I don't want a ton of oak flavor. Should I remove the cubes, add the dowel, and let the dowel do the rest of the oaring to allow a pellicle to form?
 
Over the course of 20+ brett/sour brews, I've found that I generally prefer the flavor of brett developing in the bottle over giving it 6-12 months in the carboy. (This can depend somewhat on the beer, of course. Lambics, etc get a long carboy aging time.) Look at something like Orval. They use their brett strain as a bottling yeast and it works great!
 
I am about to switch my old ale over to secondary, and was looking into putting something on the 9097 yeast cake. Maybe a black IPA? I need a beer for a special event in the nearish future, so I don't think the Brett in the yeast will make any noticiable appearance. With silimilar-ish specs to an American Ale (1056), does this make any sense?
 
petercarrjones said:
I am about to switch my old ale over to secondary, and was looking into putting something on the 9097 yeast cake. Maybe a black IPA? I need a beer for a special event in the nearish future, so I don't think the Brett in the yeast will make any noticiable appearance. With silimilar-ish specs to an American Ale (1056), does this make any sense?
Click to expand...

hmmm, Black IPA and brett don't seem to mix IMO. I've never tried it but there are no commercial examples of something like that, that I know of. I would think that brett and the hop aroma would clash. Maybe not though; Orval is dry hopped (but not citrusy). Beyond that, brett dries out beer so much that the IBU level of an IPA would seem harsh at that low of a FG.
 
jmo88 said:
hmmm, Black IPA and brett don't seem to mix IMO. I've never tried it but there are no commercial examples of something like that, that I know of. I would think that brett and the hop aroma would clash. Maybe not though; Orval is dry hopped (but not citrusy). Beyond that, brett dries out beer so much that the IBU level of an IPA would seem harsh at that low of a FG.
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Agreed, plus you have a time disparity. IPAs should be fresh, brett needs a long time to work. I also think you would get some other flavor carryovers from the old ale that aren't complementary to an IPA.
 
I agree that brett plus IPA is not quite so desirable, but I don't think the beer will last that long. I'm definitely planning on fermenting/drinking it within 6-8 weeks (for a bowling party, of sorts). What sort of flavor carryovers will I get from the old ale? Will the fruity esters be too raw coming off the primary without the initial secondary?
 
petercarrjones said:
I agree that brett plus IPA is not quite so desirable, but I don't think the beer will last that long.
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I dont enjoy highly bitter beers an brett, but thats mostly because I like the brett esters/phenols to shine, there are commercial examples of brett ipa's that are well thought of, Avery's Brett Ipa is one off the top of my head

http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/avery-brett-ipa/94252/

You could try this, but I would have another beer ready, in my experiences with Brett, the higher the OG the more phenolic the beer is early on and it takes some time aging for things to meld together
 

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