Could use a little help.

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johnnytaco

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So, my friend is getting married over Labor day weekend this year. We made a strawberry Kolsch style beer, from LME and natural strawberry flavor(no fruit), for valentines day. He loved it and wants us to make more for the wedding. We've since switched to all-grain brewing. I prefer hoppier beers, so in our test batches, the one I brewed was more like a blonde ale with a Kolsch yeast. His test batch was very plain and more traditional, same yeast. After ten days in the primary, I racked his beer into a carboy and put it in my basement to clear at 52 degrees, since we don't have a filter. It failed to clear up in three weeks, and when I went to check on it yesterday, I noticed it has a layer of white film on the top. From what I know, that's a brett strain that tainted my beer, right? It's obviously wild, since I've never brewed with brett before. I was going to pitch it, but I tried it first. It was sour, but not bad. Being low hopped, it seems to me like it could fit into the lambic style. My real question is, if I wanted to make a rhubarb lambic out of it, how long should I let it develop the brett flavor before I put it on the fruit? I don't want it to taste like horse nuts, but appreciate the barnyard flavor. Thanks for any help, yall.
 
Give it a year to fully develop, if you are sure it is Brett. Three weeks is pretty fast development for a wild Brett, accidentally introduced. An increase in acidity may be mistaken as sourness. You could have Acetobaker and not Brett.
 
So, my friend is getting married over Labor day weekend this year. We made a strawberry Kolsch style beer, from LME and natural strawberry flavor(no fruit), for valentines day. He loved it and wants us to make more for the wedding. We've since switched to all-grain brewing. I prefer hoppier beers, so in our test batches, the one I brewed was more like a blonde ale with a Kolsch yeast. His test batch was very plain and more traditional, same yeast. After ten days in the primary, I racked his beer into a carboy and put it in my basement to clear at 52 degrees, since we don't have a filter. It failed to clear up in three weeks, and when I went to check on it yesterday, I noticed it has a layer of white film on the top. From what I know, that's a brett strain that tainted my beer, right? It's obviously wild, since I've never brewed with brett before. I was going to pitch it, but I tried it first. It was sour, but not bad. Being low hopped, it seems to me like it could fit into the lambic style. My real question is, if I wanted to make a rhubarb lambic out of it, how long should I let it develop the brett flavor before I put it on the fruit? I don't want it to taste like horse nuts, but appreciate the barnyard flavor. Thanks for any help, yall.

if you bottle you need to wait, kegging is a different story. Either way though its possible to knock out bacteria with campden/fining/cold crashing. It also seems to work well with brett (WY/WL/ECY strains)

Rhubarb isnt the best choice of fruit if you want any flavor, Ive used it in a b weiss, and it added next to no flavor, just quite a bit of acidity. Which if the beer is already quite sour can easily make it too acidic, on the other hand if its lacking acid character it can really help

Back to your strawberry beer for the wedding. You might think about trying to use german ale yeast or a english strain fermented cold in the future. The kolsch yeast is nice, but it really takes some time to taste right. The german ale is a close approximation and is ready to drink much more quickly
 
Are you sure you have a wild yeast, and have not made some vinegar. Brett generally doesn't sour.
 
sounds like it might be lacto to me. i would check the FG and bottle as-is instead of embarking on a time-intensive experiment based on a contaminated batch, but if you really want to do it I would recommend pitching some brett and pedio or at least some bottle dregs from a beer you know has brett and pedio. after six months I would try it and if it is worth it at that point i would rack it onto fruit fro another six months.
 
Just looked at my records. The beer was checked on pretty regularly for six weeks before whatever is in there showed up. It does not taste like vinegar. I know it's early for a Brett, and cool, but from what I've read, lacto strains are alcohol sensitive and after all that time in the primary plus the time in the secondary, wouldn't the alcohol be there? Also, I've read that lacto strains don't usually make a white film. I'll post a pic later to show you what it looks like. The yeast is the WLP 029 German Ale/Kolsch yeast, but harvested and reused on both batches of kolsch, from different jars.
 
Ok. I just tasted it again. I hadn't noticed the "sourness" when I tasted it the other day. I tasted the sourness when I racked it over into the secondary. With a clean palate, I just tasted it again and there really isn't an off flavor to it. A bit of something, not off per say, but it just seems different than any other kolsch I've ever had. Most of the sourness is gone. I talked to my LHBS owner and he said that the yeast now setteling out wasn't a bad thing, because the yeast cells will soak up any diacetyl produced by the longer fermentation at 68 degrees. There's still only an inch or so of clear beer in the carboy and no new film on it since I moved it to see what that white junk was, but still has white floaties on top. I think I'm giong to throw the whole carboy into cold storage for a week and see if it clears up. If not, I'm going to try throwing the rhubarb into it with some strawberries anyway and see what happens. I know it should start to ferment if I do this. Do you reccommend that I try to keep the beer cool to ferment the extra sugar from the fruits, or bring it back up to 68? The taste was much smoother than I expected today, and for that and all your comments, I am grateful.
 
That would be sweet. I actually had that thought and is actually the reason that I started the thread. Thanks for your input.
 
I think I figured out the timeline of my infection. It showed up the first time in a Guinness clone I did at my LHBS. I had made ten gal. but it only showed up in one. My friend had racked a kriek over onto the fruit earlier that day. He used wlp's American farmhouse blend. I had cleaned and sanitized the auto siphon, but obviously not well enough and it's been chilling out in my fermentor since then. I am going to soak the carboy in iodine solution when this gets bottled. Thanks again for your help.
 
Well, I was wrong about my infection being gone. I have used PBW, then Idophor and finally StarSan to try and knock this out, to no avail. The problem as I've seen it is this. It doesn't seem to show up until after primary fermentation is completed. It seems to thrive in highly hopped beers and ones with rather high alcohol content, as well. They almost all turn hazy after fermentation has occured for at least two weeks and the taste is disgusting, almost a rotting turnip smell. Now that I have tasted this in quite a few different beers and at different stages of infection, I have tracked it back to a batch of IPA we made in January.(At least the first time I tasted it) There is a rotting fruit/vegetable taste in all of them, but using Citra hops makes it taste like decaying fruit and Cascade makes it taste more like vegetables. It thrives in alcohol, almost not showing up until it is there, and must be in a fermentor, because we have split batches and only one gets funky. What is making me crazy is that it looks different in different beers, and the fact that no mattere how much I clean, it keeps showing up. All beers have been made from CO, foothills of Denver, well water. I have thrown away 50 gal of beer in the last few weeks. Please help!
 
PS. Whatever it is gives you the runs when drank and didn't show up in an arrogant bastard clone that was in the same fermentor. I'm confused.
 
Are you just soaking in a sanitizer or are you actually cleaning first? Brett and some bacteria can form biofilms (pellicles) that will act as a barrier between it and the sanitizer so it won't go away. You need to get in your equipment and clean by contact with pbw then sanitize.

Are you using washed yeast? It's probably the source of repeat infections.

If not, give your equipment a solid (but careful) scrub and sanitation. Consider boiling your carboys and treating any soft plastic in water over 165F for a few minutes (does not have to be boiling, 170F is ok). Small components definitely need the most attention because they are the hardest to clean and the easiest place for unwanted guests to reside.
 
The easiest solution to eliminate the fermenter and plastics is to get new replacements. If that's too much, you can try cleaning with bleach.

Clean fermenter, and soak fill with mild bleach solution (about a tablespoon per gallon of water) for a week or more. Maybe double the amount since you are believe you have a real problem, just remember, too strong a bleach solution will not work as well as a weak one. Fill tubing with same solution, and leave in fermenter. Any other plastic, soak in fermenter. Metal doesn't do well in bleach.

When emptying the fermenter, siphon the bleach solution out with the tubing, to ensure you get to everything.

After the bleach solution, everything needs to be rinsed with very hot water to get rid of the chlorine. Bleach will leave a film, and you need to get it off. You don't need to fill with hot water, just rinse a couple of times with a small quantity of hot water.

If you want to use temperature, pasteurizing occurs with 10 seconds exposure to 160 F water, or 20 minutes at 145 F temperature. Boil a kettle and pour the hot water over all the surfaces. It gets difficult to run the water thru the inside of tubing though.

Good luck.
 
Are you just soaking in a sanitizer or are you actually cleaning first? Brett and some bacteria can form biofilms (pellicles) that will act as a barrier between it and the sanitizer so it won't go away. You need to get in your equipment and clean by contact with pbw then sanitize.

Are you using washed yeast? It's probably the source of repeat infections.

If not, give your equipment a solid (but careful) scrub and sanitation. Consider boiling your carboys and treating any soft plastic in water over 165F for a few minutes (does not have to be boiling, 170F is ok). Small components definitely need the most attention because they are the hardest to clean and the easiest place for unwanted guests to reside.

No, I'm not just soaking in sanitizer. I pbw for 24 hrs before using any fermentor. I thought that it may be because of the washed yeast, but then it happened with yeasts directly from White labs. I did get a carboy scrubber and replaced all smalls to avoid cross contamination. The infection seems to have been more prevalent at my LHBS, where I do brewing demos on Saturdays. The one fermentor that had it @ my house has had three brews in it, without any bad results.(fingers crossed) After throwing away 55 gal, I think our cleaning and sanitation has worked. No signs in the last three to four weeks. Sucks pitching that much brew, but definately a learning experience. I have a microbiology professor at Metro State in Denver checking out four obviously tainted beers and should have results in the next few weeks. Will keep you posted.
JT
 
I recently learned that PBW works kind of like Oxy Clean, in that it continues to produce bubbles until it has totally finished working. I started soaking my fermentors 24+ hours before use, sometimes a week+ so they're never just sitting empty, then a good rinse and 4+ hours with fresh Star-San every time I brew. A little more expensive, but cheaper than throwing away 50 gal again! Seems to be working. I appreciate all your help. -JT
 
If anybody cares, I recently had a couple beers tested by a microbiologist professor here in Denver and she confirmed my worries. It was the exact same mix of brett and saccromyces that was in the White labs American Farmhouse blend, mixed in with the yeast that I pitched. I had my suspicions, but after it showed its ugly head again, two weeks after my (former) boss made a sour saison, I knew I was correct. That was a lot of work to have the contaminants re-introduced back into the environment. I have learned how to control it, but am finished wasting my time and energy at his store. He blamed me and my "poor personal hygiene" on all this. I guess brett doesn't live in my hair. Whew! I just wish I hadn't thrown away all the beer, because I tried one the other day and the nasty funk flavor has faded substantially and is turning into a nice cidery/leathery funk, as well as having a pellicle ring in each bottle. I like it! If I was patient, I'd be set for the next few years with sour beers. Live and learn.
 
I was employed there, part-time all summer and since last December, I have been doing an all-grain demonstration for newbies on Saturdays, even though I am one as well. So yes I was at my LHBS, and the owner was there and just as clueless as I was as to what was going on. The off flavor showed up in a lot of different batches, so I started to teach myself about where they come from and how to avoid them. The problem was that none of the off flavors I researched were exactly like what was in my beers. The mircobiologist I spoke with said that off-flavors can be created by two competing saccromyces strains in the same beer, as well as by the Brett we saw. Sometimes, multiple strains of yeast make sweet music when mixed in the right proportions, but not what I had going on. It was with multiple diferent kinds of yeast, too. Not a problem that I ever want to see again. I'm afraid to buy a brett beer unless I can drink it outside.
 
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