When to bottle a funky saison?

I feel like brewing a funky saison--with dregs (jolly pumpkin?), revived in a small starter and pitched alongside wyeast 3711 or a blend of Belgian and French saison.

I'm wondering... since there won't be much sugar left for the wild bugs to chew on, could I possibly bottle at 2 volumes (assuming saccromyces will do most of the sugar chewing) when I reach final gravity (usually 1.006)? Or should I bottle with more sugar? Or less? Or wait for months before bottling like other sour beers?

I currently have a saison OG of 1.060 (blend of both the Belgian and French strains) that is four months old. I dosed it with Brett. L when the gravity was at 1.020 (cellared at that point at 60F) and Jolly Pumpkin dregs (at high krausen) when the gravity reached 1.010. It has had a pelicule since the Brett. L was in the carboy for two months. I plan on kegging at the beginning of June for an end of school party (no more books, no more student's dirty looks).

As far as bottling, I would think that you should let it reach terminal gravity (at least four months). The added benefit is that it will develop more Jolly Pumpkin funk the longer you let the wild bugs work.

Bottling really depends on how much carbonation you want and what your bottling capability is at the time.

When you bottle you would add the normal amount of sugar since the Sacch will provide most of the carbonation. Why are you bottling at only 2 volumes though with the saison, I bottled my most recent batch at 3.5 in common Belgian long necks. Then in the corked bottles I added some dextrin, and priming sugar then dosed with JP microbes. I'm hoping the corked bottles get between 3.5 and 4.

Last time I used 3711 (well it was the first time), it took a 1.059 down to 1.002. I have my second going with the same yeast, and it's down from 1.060 to 1.007 in 3 days and still going strong.

3 volumes is about .003 in gravity. If you bottle with JP dregs, I think you can expect it to give you 2 volumes, but it will take a long time. Figure what you want to do from there. Standard bottles risk exploding at 6 (maybe less).

If you use a different yeast from 3711, you are going to leave more for the dregs to work on.

Be careful!

Actually 1 point of gravity gives you approximately .5 volumes of CO2. I keep hearing that brett gives .5 to .75 vol CO2 compared to Sacch. So at 1.003 he could expect 1.5 volumes with sacch only and possibly only .75 to ~1.125 volumes with the Brett taking it all the way down to 1.000. I just wish I had a cheap way to measure the dissolved CO2 in my bottles when I pop them.

smokinghole said:

Actually 1 point of gravity gives you approximately .5 volumes of CO2. I keep hearing that brett gives .5 to .75 vol CO2 compared to Sacch. So at 1.003 he could expect 1.5 volumes with sacch only and possibly only .75 to ~1.125 volumes with the Brett taking it all the way down to 1.000. I just wish I had a cheap way to measure the dissolved CO2 in my bottles when I pop them.

Click to expand...

Just checked Palmer's Nomograph to see who is correct. It seems it is somewhere in between.

From the Nomograph. At 65 F:
1.5 volumes = 1.4 ozs table sugar
3 volumes = 4.8 ozs tble sugar

Using the difference of the two, 3.4 ozs table sugar = 1.5 volumes in 5 gallons. I'm using the difference to eliminate the effects of entrained CO2 in the wort. It will also eliminate any temperature effects.

1 lbs sugar = 46 gravity points. Therefore 3.4 ozs = 9.775 gravity points. In 5 gallons, 1.5 volumes of CO2 = .001955, or .002 gravity change.

Based on this. .003 gravity change will = 2.25 volumes of CO2.

I don't think there is any difference between Sacc and Brett in generating CO2 for a given gravity change. Only problem is; the Brett will keep on fermenting some of the sugars Sacc will not, so he will end up with a higher CO2 content for the same sugar addition.

weird - i could have sworn i read brett produces less CO2.. damn, time to research.

Is the OP bottling at 2vol in hopes of the Brett bringing the CO2 up further through fermentation in the bottle?

If that's his plan I think he'll be fine bottling around 1.006 as long as he uses strong enough bottles.

The sad thing as I bounce around looking up CO2 production in relation to sugar in Sacch. I find different numbers everywhere. None of them seem to come from highly reliable sources either so I don't know what to use really. I was basing my calculations off some numbers from braukaiser concerning carbonation beer with krausen.

On one of the sessions, Chris White mentioned that they were possibly seeing some evidence that brett produced around half the CO2 of sacch. When I was preparing a brew that used brett b as the primary strain I email White Labs this question, and the reply was that brett and sacch would produce similar carbonation. This reply was received in March of this year and the session was several years old so I'm leaning towards the newest info as being the best. I haven't bottled the batch yet so I can't give any results, just the info.

I'm no chemist, and I'm not going to look it up, but I think the conversion of a set amount of sugar to alcohol will produce a fixed amount of CO2 as a by-product. Where else does the Carbon and Oxygen go. Seems reasonable to me that they would produce the same CO2 for the same amount of sugar used.

I don't claim to know, but it seems reasonable to me.

The question I have for the yeast scientists is whether the acetic acid production by Brett is a potential source of decreased alcohol and CO2 production. If the yeast is producing acetic acid it releases the acid and water instead of alcohol and CO2. I don't think they produce it at the same time but the acid production is a result of a stressed metabolic pathway. If the yeast are metabolically stressed then it might push them towards acid production and as a result less CO2 is produced. That is assuming that brett produce the acetic acid and water like acetobacter do. For all I know brett produces acetic acid and CO2. I will be doing more research on the subject because this talk of decreased CO2 has me intrigued.